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MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE. 


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TREATISE 


ON 


Dn a ee 


MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE 


BY 


FRANCIS “WHARTON, 


Caahisisetivion 
AUTHOR OF ‘'A TREATISE ON AMERICAN CRIMINAL LAW,”’ ‘‘ PRECEDENTS OF INDICTMENTS,” 
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AND 


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THE MEDICAL PART REVISED AND CORRECTED, 
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ie a ta 
ae ed 

o WH3X ee 

1960 


PREFACE 10 THE SECOND EDITION. 


CA In the present edition nearly three hundred pages have been added 

to the legal and psychological department. The chapters on Insanity 
| have been rearranged, expanded, and in some material points corrected, 
so as to bring them in harmony with the current decisions of the 
English and American courts. Several distinct topics have been in- 
troduced and examined at length; among which may be mentioned 
Survivorship; Medical Malpractice; the Legal Relations of Identity ; 
the presumptions to be drawn from wounds and the Instrument of 
Death, and the Psychical Indications of Guilt. On the other hand, 
the chapters on circumstantial evidence have been condensed by 
abridging cases which in the first edition were new to the professional 
eye, but which have since become generally accessible. 

Without making any alteration in the general arrangement of the 
medical portion of the work, the editor has added to it about eighty 
pages of new matter, consisting of a chapter on the Signs of Death, 
besides many illustrative cases, and recent methods of investigation. 

Very little space has been devoted to the discussion of general 
principles, for in criminal legal proceedings particular persons and 


56 © 


+ acts are concerned, whose reciprocal relations constitute the sole sub- 
2 ject of inquiry. All rules, therefore, which are liable to frequent ex- 
_'\sceptions, should be very cautiously admitted as tests in practice, when 
“S their weight may incline the scales of justice, and affect the life, 
’ liberty, or character of the accused. 
WY The original text has been carefully revised, and pains everywhere 


taken to render the language clear, and the statements accurate; in a 
< w ord, to make this portion of the work, as nearly as possible, wee its 

Perera author would have done, had he survived to perform a 
Naa duty. 


% F. W. 
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| AO estsiaott ae 16 2ognq eff at Hols tore quootth “aul jartt otew o1sdaredls 
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*: @dy ai dedi fot ebw gi] gapqittos oxike aid ‘atthiw bas entit oothen | 
hed thob-Jasiy 8 waw otod? nolieoqz9 “feuol-ogthant lo ‘oemet tah 
Ti as Bilt of yaeegoosinath ek tart fsorbomt ‘oil of ‘ybitestotal Agee 
teal anole yap pe et: 4 bird be ody ao .bar oni MOR 

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hy ‘otisnt toadue eit Io adiatvib s rel qu bawoltet aoaasrabiaes saw emt 
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PREFACE. : 


THE two points which were mainly before the authors of the follow- 
ing treatise when they entered upon its preparation, and the hope of 
reaching which formed their chief inducement in approaching a topic 
which has already been in other respects so ably and fully discussed 
elsewhere, were, first, the incorporation in its pages of the results of 
late continental, and particularly French and German, research; and 
secondly, the bringing together stereoscopically—if the metaphor can 
be permitted—of the Legal and Medical points of vision, so that the 
information required by each profession might be collected and viewed 
at the same time and within the same compass. It was felt that in the 
usual range of medico-legal exposition there was a great deal that, 
though interesting to the medical man, is unnecessary to the legal 
practitioner; and, on the other hand, it is equally clear that there 
are many points upon which the latter needs information, which the 
former, either from inadvertence or from what would be to him their 
extreme simplicity, may forbear to touch. The converse also is true, 
viz., that the legal writer who undertakes such a work, except in 
subordination to medical advice, may exhibit very satisfactorily the 
necessities of legal practice, but will fail to supply the information by 
which these necessities can be met. 

These two points, viz. the absorption of recent medico-legal re- 
search in France and Germany, and the union of the medical and legal 
stand-points, it was here hoped to reach, not so much by a concurrent 
authorship of each page, as by a general preliminary comparison of 
views and adjustment of material by the two writers by whom the 
task was undertaken, followed up by a division of the subject matter 
between them in subordination to the plan previously agreed upon. 
In pursuance of this scheme, the second, third, fourth, and fifth books 
—viz., those on the Foetus and New-born Child, on Sexual Relations, 
on Identity, and on the Causes of Death—were assigned to Dr. Stillé, 
with the exception of those sections in the two former which concern 
the legal relations of gestation, abortion, and rape; while to the pre- 
sent writer fell the preparation of the first and sixth books, embracing 
Mental Unsoundness and the Legal Relations of Homicide, together 

vii 


PREFACE. 


with the general disquisition on Indicatory Evidence Agere which the 
latter book concludes.. 

Of the manner in which was performed at least a portion of the task 
whose history is now given, it may not be unsuitable for the writer 
_who now survives to speak. It was to the preparation of’ this portion 
that the last year of Dr. Stillé’s short but distinguished professional 
career was given. It was a year of patient and severe research, marked, 
to an extent of which the annals of science afford few parallels, by the 
most self-denying industry, as well as by a rigorous and almost fasti- 
dious conscientiousness in the pursuit, not only of truth, but of the 
most appropriate terms by which that truth could be expressed. And 
the labor was not one which derived any portion of its severity from 
the want of prior preparation. Dr. Stillé had not only enjoyed great 
opportunities for literary and professional culture, but, what is rarer, 
these opportunities were faithfully improved. The liberalizing influ- 
ences of European culture, as well as the simpler discipline of home 
instruction, passed not over him in vain. The schools of Hurope 
received from him in the prime of his early manhood the same single 
and conscientious attention as the schools of Philadelphia in his youth. 
He found the pleasures of travel and the desultory influences of foreign 
habits of no more avail in drawing him from a laborious personal 
attendance on the hospitals—those great repositories of disease which, 
in the development of God’s wonderful providence, are made the arse- 
nals which supply the weapons by which the maladies that necessitate 
them are to be combated—than he found the more primitive habits 
and more limited associations of his native city. The great continental 
tongues, in their scientific as well as their popular relations, were mas- 
tered by him to a completeness of which, among persons of his age, we 
have rare examples. Few men, even among the most mature, have 
gone to the grave so richly fraught with the literature of a profession, 
which to him was a philosophy as well as an art. And few, at so 
early an age, have gone to the grave with faculties under more complete 
moral discipline. To one of his most remarkable qualities—that deli- 
cate and yet modest firmness of perception which, unwarped on the 
one side by pride in his own opinion, or on the other by undue defer- 
ence to that of others, enabled him, after the most difficult and subtile 
research, not only to reach but to express the truth—no one has had 
better cause to testify than the present writer. The work which these 
lines now close was one which brought both of those who engaged 
in it into the most intimate and affectionate personal intercourse for 
many months; and the one who survives can now scarcely look back 
upon the APG pHtAtOR of a single page without having additional cause 
to remember and record those high mental qualities and culture, 


whose value in the present case was only increased by the gentleness, 
Vili 


pee, 7% 
2’ 4 
is _ PREFACE. 


the refinement, and the fine sense of personal honor with which they 
were associated. 

Dr. Moreton Stillé was born in Philadelphia, on October 27 th, 1822, 
and, after having gone through a preliminary course at the Edgehill 
Sehsnanh at Princeton, entered the Department of Arts of the Uni- 
versity of Pennsylvania in 1838, and graduated on July 15th, 1841. 
He immediately began his professional studies in the oflice of his bro- 
ther, Dr. Alfred Stillé, to whose training and instruction he became so 
greatly indebted; and in the spring of 1844 he received from the 
Medical School of the same University the degree of Doctor of Medi- 
cine, his thesis, on “Cyanosis,” having obtained the rare compliment 
of having been called for by the Faculty for publication. In October, 
1844, he embarked: for Liverpool; from November, 1844, to March, 
1845, was engaged in attendance upon the hospitals and schools in 
Dublin; and was employed in the same duties from March, 1845, to 
September, in London, and from September, 1845, to March, 1846, in 
Paris. After travelling for some time, he visited Vienna, where he 
was occupied in study from October, 1846, to April, 1847; and finally 
returned to Philadelphia in the fall of 1847, when he entered at once 
into practice. In the summer of 1848 he became a candidate for and 
was elected to the post of Resident Physician at the Pennsylvania 
Hospital, where he continued until April, 1849; and it is no slight 
evidence of the zeal with which he pursued his profession, and the 
' generous and self-denying spirit by which he was actuated, that in the 
succeeding summer, upon the appearance of the cholera in a malignant 
type at the Blockley Hospital, he volunteered to attend at that institu- 
tion, and remained there until he was himself attacked and prostrated 
by the epidemic. Perhaps, indeed, even in a profession whose history 
has been so marked by acts of zeal and of disinterestedness, when we 
take into consideration the fact that Dr. Stillé was impelled by no 
other motive than that of professional love and enterprise in the 
severe course of study and self-sacrifice in which he was engaged, 
there will be found few cases where these qualities have been so emi- 
nently exhibited as the present. Possessed of an ample fortune, he 
was one of those uncommon instances in which the most arduous and 
protracted courses of preliminary trial are gone through with under 
the calm and equal effect of a will which is impelled neither by neces- 
sity nor the desire of present applause, but by the faith in a distant 
future, in which the result will be none the less precious because it is 
the longer delayed. 

But this future was one which to Dr. Stillé—and to the great loss 
of popular as well as of medical science—was only in part to arrive. 
Early in 1855 he received the appointment of Lecturer on the Practice 
of Medicine in the Philadelphia Association for Medical Instruction, 

, ix 


PREFACE. 


and at the end of June closed the first portion of a course of lectures 
of which it is not too much to say that they were received with un- 
mixed satisfaction by the class to whom they were addressed, and the 
colleagues with whom he was associated. In the first week of July 
he sent from his office the last of the manuscript of that portion of the 
following pages which fell under his charge, and almost immediately 
afterwards was stricken down by a disease which found him with 
strength impaired by the exhausting studies of the preceding winter. 
On August 20, 1855, he died, at Saratoga, almost at the moment when 
the press was issuing the last sheets of a work which contains so much 
worthy of being erected as a monument in which his professional 
brethren will recognize the impress of his high intellectual gifts and 
culture. And now, when on this the final inscription is being recorded, 
it will not be considered out of place to add to it a single tribute to 
those eminent domestic virtues, which it is here hardly possible justly 
and at the same time delicately to express, and yet which gave to 
MORETON STILLE when living, and now places on his monument when 
dead, a character which is the highest that human standards can afford, 
that of a husband, son, and father, always true, tender, and just. 


F. W. 
PHILADELPHIA, October 1st, 1855. 


x 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


BOOK I. 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS. 


CHAPTER I. 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IN ITS LEGAL RELATIONS. 


I. WHAT DEGREE OF UNSOUNDNESS INVALIDATES A CONTRACT OR WILL, @ 2. 
As to Lunatics or Idiots, 2 2. 
General legal principle is, that contracts or wills of idiots or lunatics will 
not be enforced, 
Cases where there is a sufficient degree of sanity to create responsibility for 
crime, and yet when a contract or will will be avoided, 
Ist. Imbecility generally, and herein of fraud and compulsion, 

Fraud itself vitiates a contract, and in this the contracting party’s intel- 
lect becomes an essential item for consideration, 2 3. 

Lord Portsmouth’s case, 2 3. 

Acts and contracts of persons of weak understanding will be held void 
when such persons have been imposed upon by cunning or undue 

. influence, ¢ 4. 

In cases of wills this is peculiarly the case, 2 5. 

The testator must have had a desposeng memory, 2 5. 

Over-importunity of controlling friends may destroy capacity, 2 5. 

The question in reference to contracts and wills does not depend upon 
mere subjective capacity, and hence no positive definition can be 
given, @ 6. 

Idiocy, to make it a positive incapacity, must be shown to have been 
accompanied with business disability, 2 7. 

The question of capacity will be greatly affected by the reasonableness 
or unreasonableness of the act attempted to be set aside, @ 8. 

The inquiry in many cases is, whether the testator or grantor had capa- 
city or information enough to comprehend and disregard any 
attempt at fraud or coercion, 2 9. 

Difficulties in such cases from conflict of medical opinion, 2 9. 

A distinction is taken between the cases where the court is asked to 
annul an executed contract, and where it is asked to execute an 
unexecuted one, 2 11. 

Weakness of intellect, from extreme old age, works a disability, 2 12. 

But great caution should be exercised in this respect, the object being 
to protect old age, not to render it still more defenceless, @ 12. 

How far the deaf and dumb are thereby incompetent, 2 13. 

2d. Partial insanity, @ 14. 

Rule in this country is, that unless the contested act is the product of 
an insane delusion, it is not vitiated by it, 2 14. 

The present English rule, however, seems to be that the existence of 
an insane delusion destroys testamentary capacity altogether, 
¢@ 15. 

xi 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


Qpinion of Lord Brougham on this point, 2 17. 
' Objections to this view, 2 18. 
Compatibility of hallucinations with sound disposing memory, 2 19. 
Instances of existence of hallucinations in persons otherwise sane, @ 21. 
3d. Lucid intervals. 
When habitual insanity is shown, the presumption is, that the act was 
committed in an insane period, % 33. 
The character of the act goes a great way in determining whether it 
was committed in a lucid interval, 2 35. 
Ath. Intoxication. 
When actually existing renders a party civilly incompetent. 
A party, however, cannot use his drunkenness as a means of imposi- 
tion, 2 36. 
Difference in this respect between executed and unexecuted contracts, 
@ 37. 
In actions for torts, drunkenness is no defence on the merits. 
Drunkenness avoids a will when acted on by fraud or imposition, 2 38. 


Ii. Wuat IS NECESSARY TO BE PROVED, IN ORDER TO DEPRIVE A PARTY OF THE MAN- 

AGEMENT OF HIS ESTATE, @ 40. 

When a party is incapable, the practice is to appoint a committee, who take 
the alleged lunatic’s place, @ 41. 

In what way the question of lunacy, under such circumstances, is tried, ¢ 42. 

General and not partval incompetency must be shown, ¢ 42. 

The test is, is the respondent capable of managing his own estate? 3 42. 

What in such cases is required of medical witnesses, @ 43. 

The same process lies in cases of habitual drunkenness, 2 44. 

The test here is, is there a fixed habit of drunkenness? 2 44. 


III. Wuat DEGREE OF UNSOUNDNESS AVOIDS RESPONSIBILITY FOR ORIME, @ 45. 
The difficulties in this respect have arisen from mistaken dzcta, given in par- 
ticular cases, for general and absolute rules. 
Til consequences arising from looseness of citation, ¢ 45, 7. 
The true doctrine is, that medical science is a part of the common law of the 
land, and is to be treated as such, 2 45, n. 
Ist. Cases where the defendant is incapable of distinguishing right from 
wrong in reference to the particular act, 2 46. 
Under this head fall cases of idiocy and amentia, 2 46. 
2d. Cases where the defendant is acting under an insane delusion as to cir- 
cumstances, which, if true, would relieve the act from responsi- 
bility, or where his reasoning powers are so depraved as to make 
the commission of the particular act the natural consequence of 
the delusion. 
An act committed under a bona fide belief of its necessity in self-de- 
fence, will be regarded as if there really was such necessity, @ 47. 
And the gauge here is the defendant’s capacity, 3 47. 
An honest insane delusion is to be viewed in the same light, 2 48. 
But the delusion must have been the cause of the crime in order to 
excuse it, and not collateral, 3 52. 
3d. Cases where the defendant is impelled by a morbid and uncontrollable 
impulse to commit the particular act, 2 53. 
Moral insanity as viewed by the courts of this country, ? 53. 
Opinions of the courts, 22 53-57. 
The right and wrong test is impracticable as an absolute rule, 22 60, 61. 


IV. How Far INTOXICATION AFFECTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME, 3 62. 
1st. Insanity produced by delirium tremens affects responsibility in the same 
way as insanity produced by any other cause, 2 62. 
2d. Insanity immediately produced by intoxication, does not destroy respon- 
sibility where the patient, when sane and responsible, made himselr 
voluntarily intoxicated, 2 66. 
3d. While intoxication is, per se, no defence to the fact of guilt, yet when 
_ the question of intent or premeditation is concerned, it may be 
proved for the purpose of determining the precise degree, ¢ 70. 
4th. Burden of proof in insanity, @ 73. 


X11 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


Cee Aye Fen bd, 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED PSYCHOLOGICALLY. 


Classification of Dr. Ray, @ 74. 
rh Flemming, ¢ 1D, 
ss “ Ellinger, 2 76. 
2 “ Present Treatise, 2 77. 


I. GENERAL THEORIES OF MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, ? 78. 
Ist. Psychological theory, 2 79. 
2d. Somatic theory, 2 80. 
3d. Intermediate theory, @ 81. 


IJ. How MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IS TO BE DETECTED, 2 86. 
Ist. By whom, 2 86. 
Medical expert necessary for this purpose, @ 86. 
Responsibility in law of medical examiner, @ 87. 
Importance of examiner adopting his manner to patient’s condition, 
@ 90. 
Important that legal and medical officers should, in such cases, act in 
concert, 2 90. 
Law as to the manner in which medical witness is to be examined on 
trial, 2 92. 
Experts may be asked as to patient’s insanity, 2 93. 
And this on an assumed state of facts, 2 94. 
Law as to witnesses not experts, 2 94. 
Books on insanity not generally admissible, ¢ 94. 
2d. At what time, 2 95. 
(1.) Time of act, 2 95. 
(2.) At trial, 2 97. 
(3.) At and after sentence, 2 98. 
3d. By what tests, 2 100. 
(1.) Physiognomy, 2 100. 
Relations of the different features, ? 101. 
(2.) Bodily health and temperament, 2 102. 
State of bowels, 2 102. 
Physical disorganization, 2 103. 
Insensibility to pain and cold, 2 104. 
Irregularities in action of senses, 2 105. 
Change in disposition, 2 106. 
(3.) Hereditary tendency, 2 107. 
Importance of this test, 2 108. 
Admissible in point of law, 2 108. 
Opinion of Gibson, C. J., 2 108. 
(4.) Conversation and deportment, 2 110. 
Necessity of great circumspection in this respect, 2 110. 
Cases illustrating this, @ 111. 
(5.) Nature of act, 2 112. 
(a) Insensibility, @ 112. 
b) Its incongruity with antecedents, 2 113. 
6 Its motivelessness, 2 114. 
(d) Its inconsequentiality, 3115. 


II. From WHAT MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED, 
Ist. Emotions, ? 116. 
(1.) Remorse, 2 116. 
ts Anger, @ 118. 
tz Shame, @ 122. 
4.) Grief, 2 124. 
(5.) Homesickness Nowalge) @ 125. 
2d. Simulated insanity, 2 127. 
Necessity for close examination, 2 127. 
Tests to be applied, 2 128. 


xil 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


Delirium most usually counterfeited, but the most difficult, 3 129. 

Physiognomy and health to be examined, 2 130. 

Case to be compared with other recorded cases, 2 131. 

Simulation not to be inferred from absence of a trace of insanity at 
the examination, ? 132. 

Causes why such signs may be suppressed, ? 132. 

Pretended insanity frequently turns into real, 2 133. 

How examination is to be conducted, ¢ 134. 

Patient to be brought into a succession of relations, ¢3 135-8. 

To be furnished with pen, ink, and paper, and other methods of ex- 
amination, 22 135-8. 

Insanwa Occulta, features of, 2 139. 

Necessity of guarding against, 2 139. 


TV. Menta UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH DERANGEMENT OF THE SENSES AND 
DISEASE, % 140. 

Ist. Deaf and Dumb, 2 140. 

2d. Blind, 2 141. 

3d. Epileptics, 2 142. 
Peculiar tendency of epilepsy to insanity, 2 142. 
Nature of epilepsy, 2 143. 
Distinction between the several classes, ? 144. 
Different stages of the disease, 3 145. 
Actions committed during attack, not valid, 2 146. 
Rule as to intermediate stages, @ 147. 
Tests laid down by Clarus, ¢ 148. 


V. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP, ? 149. 
General effect of sleep on the senses, 149. 
Ist. Somnolentia or sleep-drunkenness, 2 151. 
2d. Somnambulism, ¢ 159. 


VI. MzenraL UNSOUNDNESS, AS AFFECTING THE TEMPERAMENT, 2 163. 
1st. Depression, 2 163. 
2d. Hypochondria, 2 166. 
3d. Hysteria, 2 169. 
Ath. Melancholy, 2 170. 


VII. MenTaL UNSOUNDNESS, AS AFFECTING THE MORAL SysTEM, 3 174. 
Ist. General moral mania, 3 174. 
Effect of, 3 174. 
General symptoms, 3 175. 
Illustrations, 3 176. 
2d. Monomania, 3 177. 
Doctrine of Mania sine Delirio, 2 178. 
Difference of opinion as to its existence, 3 178. 
Authorities sustaining it, 2 179. 
Zs rejecting it, 2 183. 
Tests to be applied to it, 2 184 (3). 
Its legal relations, 3 184 (5). 
(1.) Homicidal mania, 2 186. 
Cases where Esquirol supposes it to exist, 2 186. 
Precautions necessary in its recognition, 3 190. 
Tests suggested by Dr. Ray. 2 190. 
‘ : Dr. Taylor, 2 190. 
Dr. Mayo’s objections to the entire theory, 2 191. 
a Kleptomania—(morbid propensity to steal), 2 192. 
(3.) Pyromania—(morbid incendiary propensity), 2 195. 
How far recognized in England, 2 197. 
Necessary tests, 2 198. 
(4.) Aidoiomania— (morbid sexual propensity), 2 199. 
(5.) Pseudonomania—(morbid lying propensity), 2 202. 
ie Oikeiomania—(morbid state of domestic affections), 2 204. 
(7.) Suicidal mania—(morbid propensity to self-destruction, 2 206. 
Tendency to this in cases of melancholy, &c., 3 207. 
Legal consequences in actions against life insurers, 2 208. 


X1V 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


(8.) Fanatico-mania, 2 209. 
(a) Supernatural or pseudo-natural demoniacal possession. 
a!. A prvorz improbability of such possession, 3 209. 
b'. Solubility of the instances of such possession by 
natural tests. 
a’. Disease, 3 210. 
b*. Morbid imitative sympathy, 2 211. 
c?, Legerdemain and fraud, 2 212. 
d?. Mistake of senses, ¢ 213. 
e?, Guess work, 2 214. 
i ie € hole phenomena at present inexplicable, 
215. 
c!. Historical evidence of such possession, 2 216. 
(b) Religious insanity. 
a'. Christianity, taken in its practical sense, has no 
tendency to produce insanity, 2 217. 
b'. What is called religious insanity is produced 
a*, By a departure from practical Christianity. 
a’. Reliance on frames and emotions, ¢ 218. 
63. Appeal to unscriptural supernatural- 
ism, @ 219. 
c3, Appeal to the selfish element, 2 219 (a). 
6%. By constitutional idiosyncrasies, 2 219 (0). 
(c) Fanatico-mania as a defence, 3 219 (c). 
(9) Politico-mania, @ 220. 
How far an epidemic, ? 221. 
Causes likely to generate it, 3 221. 


VIII. Mentau UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH PROSTRATION, ¢ 222. 
Ist. Idiocy, 3 222. 
Nature of, 2 222. 
Physical incidents of, 22 223-5-6. 
Cretinism, ? 228. 
2d. Imbecility, 3 229. 
With concomitant insanity, 2 230. 
| Original, 2 230. 
Supervening, 2 230. 
Specious, @ 230. 
Without confusion of mind, ? 230. 
Without insanity, 2 231. 
Distinction between innocent and malignant imbecility, 2 232. 
2d. Dementia, 2 234. 


IX. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS ACCOMPANIED WITH DELIRIUM, 3 235. 
Ist. General delirium, 2 235. 
(a) Depressed delirium, 3 236. 
(b) Maniacal delirium, ¢ 237. 
(c) Delirium tremens, 2 238. 
(d) Puerperal mania, 3 239. 
2d. Partial delirium, 2 240. 


X. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH DELUSIONS AND HALLUCINATIONS, 2 241. 
Ist. General, 2 241. 
Marked by general derangement of the perceptive faculties, ¢ 241. 
Various phases it assumes, @ 242. 
Tests of Ellinger, 2 243. 
Effect of general delusion, 3 244. 
2d. Partial, 2 245. 
Delusions and hallucinations, ¢ 245. 
When there is no other sign of mental unsoundness, 2 246. 
When mental unsoundness has made some progress, ¢ 247. 
In cases of drunkenness, &c., 2 248. 
In cases of developed insanity, 2 249. 
Causes of delusions, 3 250. 
Abercrombie’s classification, 2 252. 
Hallucination in regard to a change into, or a possession by, wild ani- 
mals, 3 253. 


XV 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


XI. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH LUCID INTERVALS, @ 254. 


XII. TREATMENT OF INSANE CRIMINALS, @ 259. nary 
Necessity of separate places of confinement in which insane criminals can be 


placed, @ 259. 


(1.) For retribution, 2 260. 


In most, if not all, cases of crime resulting from insane impulse, 
there is original responsibility, 2 260. 
Insanity, in most cases, the result of moral excess, 22 261-9. 
Qualified responsibility of lunatics, 22 261-9. 
(2.) For prevention, 2 270. 
Mischief to society if monomaniacs are suffered to go at large, 
@ 270. 
Necessity of restraint, 3 271. 
(3.) For example, 2 272. 
Contagiousness of unchecked crime, 2 272. 
(4.) For reform, 2 273. 
Impossibility of patient recovering when permitted to run at 
large, @ 273 
Injury to the community from the want of secondary punish- 
ments, the result being acquittals of dangerous parties, from 
unwillingness to see the severer penalties inflicted, 2 274. 
Ordinary penitentiaries inadequate, 2 275. 
And so of ordinary lunatic asylums, 3 276. 
(5.) Concluding remarks on the remodelling of our present system. 


‘BOLO eal 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO THE F@TUS AND NEW-BORN CHILD. 


CHAPTER I. 


SIGNS OF PREGNANCY. 
1st. Suppression of the menses, 2 278. 
2d. Enlargement of the abdomen, ¢ 279. - 
3d. Changes in the mouth and neck of the womb, 2 281. 
Ath. Quickening, 2 282. 
5th. Sympathetic phenomena, 2 284. 
6th. Pulsation of the foetal heart, 2 289. 
7th. Other sounds indicative of pregnancy, 2 290. 
8th. Kiestein in the urine, ? 291. 


DELIVERY. 


CHAPTER II. 


Ist. Signs of recent delivery, 2 292. 

2d. Signs of delivery in the dead, 3 296. 
3d. Corpus luteum, 2 297. 

Ath. Feigned delivery, 2 301. 


CHAPTER III. 


DURATION OF PREGNANCY. 
1st. Presumption that the child born in wedlock is legitimate, 7 302. 
2d. Protracted gestation, 2 303. 


1.) Usual duration of pregnancy, 2 373. 
2.) Mode of reckoning duration of pregnancy, 2 304. 
(a.) Cause of conception, 2 305. 
(0.) Cessation of the catamenia, 2 307. 
(c.) Arrest of monthly discharge, 2 308. 
(d.) Statistical results, ¢ 311. 


3d. Legal decisions, 2 322. 
4th. Early viability, 2 323. 


XV1 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER IV. 
SUPERF@TATION. 
1st. Twin pregnancies in which the children have had different fathers, 2 328. 
2d. Parturition of children at the same time, but of different degrees of de- 
velopment, 2 331. 
3d. Short intervals between births of equally mature children, ¢ 331. 


CHAPTER V. 


ABORTION AND F@TICIDE. 

Ist. Natural causes, 3 335. 

2d. Drugs as means of producing abortion, @ 336. 
(1.) Ergot, 2 336. 
(2.) Savin and oil of tansy, 2 337. 

3d. Venesection, 3 340. 

Ath. Mechanical means, 2 341. 
(1.) Legitimate medical practice as inducing premature labor, 2 344. 
(2.) Blows upon the abdomen, ¢ 345. 

5th. Signs of abortion, 3 346. 
(1.) From an examination of the body expelled, 2 346. 
5 From an examination of the female, ? 355. 


CHAPTER VI. 


INFANTICIDE. 
Ist. Characteristics of stillborn and living children, 2 357. 
2d. Tests of live birth, ? 369... 
(1.) Hydrostatic lung test, 2 370. 
(2.) Static tests, 2 376. 
3d. Causes of death in the new-born child, 2 379. 
(1.) Causes of death before or during birth, 2 380. 
(a.) Compression of, and by, the umbilical cord, 2 380. 
*} Protracted delivery, 3 384. 
+ Debility, 2 385. 
(d.) Hemorrhage from the umbilical cord, 3 386. 
(e.) Length of the umbilical cord, 2 388. 
( nH Fracture of the skull, 2 389. 
(2.) Causes of death after birth, 2 393. 
(a.) Exposure, 2 394. 
(b.) Suffocation, 2 396. 
c.) Strangling, 2 398. 
d.) Drowning, 2 399. 
e.) Wounds, 2 400. 
(f.) Dislocation of the neck, @ 401. 
g.) Unconscious delivery, 2 402. 
¥ i} Poisoning, 2 404. 
Ath. General considerations, 2? 405. 


BOOK Ill. 


QUESTIONS ARISING OUT OF THE DIFFERENCE OF SEX. 


CHAPTER I. 
DOUBTFUL SEX. 
1st. Male hermaphrodites, 2 408. 
2d. Female hermaphrodites, 2 409. | 
3d. Real hermaphrodites, 2 410. 
4th. Absence of sexual organs, 3 412. 


B XVI 


* TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER II. 


SEXUAL DISABILITY. 


RAPE. 


Ist. Sterility, @ 415. 

(1.) Removable causes of sterility, 3 415. 

(2.) Incurable causes of sterility, 3 416. 
2d. Impotence, 3 419. 

(1.) Congenital absence of the testes, ¢ 419. 
) Castration, @ 420. 

Diseases of the testes, ? 421. 

; Defect in size and malformation of the penis, % 422. 
) Obstruction from large hydroceles or herniz, % 423. 
Local relaxation, ? 423. 
} Causes of a psychical character, 2 424. 
) Want of age, 2 424. 


2. 
3. 
4. 
D. 
6. 
xf 


( 
( 
( 
( 
( 
( 
(8. 


CHAPTER III. 


1st. Rape upon children, 3 4277. 


- 2d. Rape upon adult females, 2 438. 


3d. Rape upon persons under the influence of ether or chloroform, 2 443. 
Ath. Physical evidence of. rape, 3 445. 
(1.) Condition of the hymen, ¢ 446. 
(a.) It is not always destroyed by the first connection, 2 447. 
(b.) It may be lost from other causes than coition, 2 448. 
(2.) Seminal stains, 2 450. 
a.) Microscopical examination of semen, ? 451. 
(b.) Chemical relations of semen, ? 453. 
jth. Feigned rape, @ 454. 
6th. Rape by females, ¢ 455. 
7th. Pederasty—Sodomy, 2 456. 
8th. Legal relations of rape, 3 457. 
(1.) Submission of prosecutrix, 3 457. 
(a.) From artificial stupefaction, 2 458. 
(6.) From ignorance of the nature of the act, 2 460. 
(c.) From mistake of person, 2 464. 
(d.) From fear, 2 465. 
(2.) Prior want of character of prosecutrix, 2 466. 
(3.) Subsequent suppression of fact by prosecutrix, 2 468. 
(4.) Extent to which coition was carried, 2 46% 
(5.) Want of age of defendant, @ 472. 
(6.) Want of sexual capacity of defendant, 3 472. 


BOOK IV. 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO IDENTITY. 


CHAPTER I. 


IDENTIFICATION OF THE LIVING OR DEAD. 


Xvill 


Ist. Cases of doubtful identity, 2 473. 
2d. Means of identification, 2 474. 
(i 3 Hstablishing age from the skeleton, 2 474-5. 
(2.) By means of the teeth, 2 477. 
(3.) Determination of sex from inspection of the skeleton, 3 478. 
(4.) Fractures, deformities, and peculiarities in the dead body, Z 479. 
(5. Cicatrices, @ 481. 
a Hair, ¢ 483. 
(7.) The length of time that has elapsed since death, 3 484. 
(a.) Heat as influencing decomposition, 2 485, 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


m4 Air as influencing decomposition, 2 487. 
c.) Water as influencing decomposition, 488. 
(d.) Dryness and moisture of the soil as influencing decompo- 
sition, 3 489. 
8.) Putrefaction in the foetus, 3 491. 
9.) Influence of lime on the putrefactive process, 2 492. 


( 
( 


B O.O; hi 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO THE CAUSE OF DEATH. 


PART I. 
POISONING. 


CHAPTER I. 


GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 


ist. Definition of poison, @ 493. 
2d. Mode of action of poisons, ? 494. 
(1.) Where a harmless substance is converted into a poison, ? 495. 
(2.) Influence of the habit of taking poison, 2 496. 
(3.) Influence of disease, ? 497. 
3d. Hvidence of poisoning, 2 498, 
(1.) The symptoms, 2 499. 
(a.) The mode of invasion of the symptoms, 2 499. 
(b.) The duration of the symptoms, @ 499. 
a Post-mortem appearances, 2 501. 
(3.) Chemical analysis, 2 503. 
(4.) Experiments upon animals, 2 504. 
4th. Differential diagnosis of poisoning, 2 505. 
(1.) Diseases most liable to be mistaken for poison, 2 506. 
(a.) Cholera, 2 506. 
(b.) Bilious cholera, 2 507. 
(c.) Perforation of the stomach, 2 508. 
(d.) Gastritis, gastro-enteritis, and peritonitis, 2 511. 
(e.) Strangulation of the intestines, 2 511. 
(2.) Sources of error arising from natural changes in the body after death, 
@ 514. 
5th. Classification of poisons, @ 518. 


CH AEE HE RET: 


IRRITANT POISONS—ACIDS. 


I. SutpuurRic acip (Oil of Vitriol), 2 519. 
Ist. Symptoms which follow the ingestion of the acid, 2 520. 
2d. Quantity taken, 3 521. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 522. 
Ath. Poisoning by ink, 2 525. 
5th. Chemical examination, 2 526. 
(1.) Stains on clothing, ¢ 528. 
6th. Aromatic sulphuric acid, 2 528. 
7th. Sulphate of indigo, ¢ 529. 


IJ. Nirric acrp (Aqua-fortis), 2 530. 
Ist. Symptoms, 2 531. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 532. 
3d. Chemical examination, ? 533. 
(1.) Diluted acid, 2 533. 
(2.) When the liquid contains organic matters, 2 534. 
(3.) Stains on cloth, 2 535. 
XIX 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


III. Hyprocunoric acip, mMuRtatic acrp (Spirit of Salt). 
1st. Symptoms, 2 536. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, 3 537. 
3d. Chemical examination, 2 538. 
IV. Oxautc acrp, ¢ 540. 
1st. Symptoms, ? 540. 
2d. Rapidity of its action, 2 542. 
3d. Quantity capable of destroying life, 2 543. 
4th. Post-mortem appearances, 2 544. 
5th. Chemical examination, @ 545. 


V. Tartaric acip, 2 548. 
VI. Acetic actp, 2 549. 


CHAPTER -[it. 
IRRITANT POISONS—ALKALINE. 


J. Porasu, sopa, &c., 2 550. 
II. Nirrate or potassa, ? 551. 
1st. Post-mortem appearances, % 552. 
2d. Chemical examination, @ 553. 
III. AMMONIA AND SESQUI-CARBONATE OF AMMONIA, @ 554. 
1st. Post-mortem appearances, ? 555. 
2d. Chemical examination, 2 556. 
TV. Baryta, ? 557. 
Ist. Chloride of barium, 2 557. 
2d. Carbonate of baryta, 2 558. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 559. 
Ath. Tests, 2 560. 


CHAPTER IV. 


IRRITANT POISONS—METALLOIDAL. 


I. Puosruorvs, 2? 561. 
Ist. Symptoms, @ 562. 
2d. Quantity required to destroy life, 3 562. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, ¢ 563. 
Ath. Chemical examination, ? 564. 

II. Bromine, 2 566. 

III. Ioprne, 2 567. 
Ist. Symptoms, 2 567. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, ¢ 568. 
3d. Chemical tests, 2 569. 
4th. lodide of potassium, 2 569. 

TV. Cuuorine, 2 570. 


CHAPTER VY. 


IRRITANT POISONS—METALLIC. 


I. Meraniic arsenic, 3 571. 


II, Arsenious acrp (White Arsenic), 3 572. 
Ist. Symptoms, 2 573. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, 3 582. 
3d. Quantity capable of destroying life, 2 585. 
4th. lts effects upon the putrefactive process, 2 587. 
5th. Arsenic found in the body, 2 590. 
6th. Chemical examination, ¢ 592. 
(1.) As a solid, 3 592. 
(2.) As a liquid, 2 596. 
(a.) Hydro-sulphuric acid, 3 597. 
te Ammonio-nitrate of silver, 3 598. 
(c.) Ammonio-sulphate of copper, 2 599. 


xX 


TABLE OF CONTENTS, 


(3.) Mixed with organic matter, 2 601. 
a.) Marsh’s process, 3 602. 
b. ) Fallacies to which Marsh’s process may give rise, 2 604. 
(c.) Reinsch’s process, ? 606. 
(4.) Arsenic in organic mixtures, 2 607. 
(5.) Arsenic nota natural constituent of the body, 2 610. 
III. SusoxipE oF arsentc (Fly Powder), 2 612. 
IV. ARSENIC act, 2 613. 
V. ARSENIATE OF POTASH, 2 613. 
VI. ARSENIATE OF sopA, @ 614. 
VII. SuLPHURETS OF ARSENIC, 2 615. 
VIII. ARsENIURETTED HYDROGEN, @ 616. 
IX. ARSENITE OF POTASH, 2 617. 
X. ARSENITE OF copPER (Scheele’s Green), 2 618. 
XI. Corrosive suBLIMATE (Bichloride of Mercury), @ 620. 
Ist. Symptoms, 2 621. 
2d. Smallest quantity capable of destroying life, 2 621. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 622. 
Ath. Tests, 2 624. 
(1 a Corrosive sublimate in the solid form, 2 624. 
(2.) Corrosive sublimate in solution in water, % 625. 
(a.) By sulphuretted hydrogen, @ 625. 
b.) By protochloride of tin, 2 625. 
c.) Metallic test, ¢ 625. 
(d.) Galvanic test, 2 625. 
(3.) Corrosive sublimate in organic liquids, 2 626. 
5th. Where corrosive sublimate has been the cause of death, it is not 
always found in the body of the deceased, 
6th. Length of time required for its disappearance from the system, 
2 629. 


XII. Nitrate or MERCURY, ? 630. 


XIII. DELETERIOUS EFFECTS OF MERCURIAL PREPARATIONS, ? 632. 
Ist. Cancrum oris, 2 633. 
2d. Gangraenopsis, @ 635. 
XIV. THE sAuts OF LEAD, ¢ 640. 
Ist. Form, 2 640. 
2d. Symptoms, 2? 641. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 646. 
Ath. Chemical examination, 2 647. 
XV. THE SALTS OF COPPER, % 648. 
Ist. Symptoms, 2 648. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 649. 
3d. Chemical examination, ? 652. 
XVI. Tarrrate OF ANTIMONY AND Potassa (Tartar Emetic), 2 653. 
Ist. Symptoms, ? 653. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 654. 
3d. Chemical examination, 2 655. 
Ath. Chloride of antimony, 2 658. 
XVII. Sauts oF zinc, 3 659. 
Ist. Oxide of zine, 3 659. 
2d. Sulphate of zinc, 2 660. 
3d. Chloride of zinc, 2 662. 
XVIII. Tin, 2 663. 
3 Ist. Chloride of tin, 2? 663. 
XIX. Sriver, 2 664. 
Ist. Nitrate of silver (lunar caustic), 2 664. 
XX. Iron, 2 665. 
1st. Sulphate of iron (copperas, green vitriol); 2 665. 
(L.) Symptoms, @ 665. 
is Chemical analysis, 2 665. 
Xxi 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


2d. Chloride (muriate) of iron, ¢ 666. 
3d. Subnitrate of bismuth, 2 667. 
Ath. Bichromate of potash, 2 668. 


: CHAPTER VI. 
IRRITANT POISONS—VEGETABLE. 


I. Coicuicum autumNALE (Colchicum, Meadow Saffron), 2 669. 

Ist. Symptoms, 2 669. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, ? 669. 
3d. Chemical examination, 2 670. 

II. Drastic purGaATIvEs, ? 671. 

III. Castor sEEDS OR BEANS, ? 672. 

ITV. Foner (Mushrooms), 3 673. 
Ist. Description of different kinds, 2 673. 
2d. How their poisonous qualities may be removed, 2 674. 
3d. Symptoms of poisoning by them, @ 675. 
Ath. Post-mortem appearances, @ 676. 


CHAPTER VII. 


IRRITANT POISONS—-ANIMAL. 


I. CantHaripes, @ 677. 
Ist. Properties, 2 677. 
2d. Symptoms, 2 678. 
3d. Quantity required to destroy life, 2 679. 
Ath. Post-mortem appearances, ? 680. 


II. Potsonovus sausaacss, ¢ 681. 
Ist. Nature of the poison, @ 681. 
2d. Symptoms, 2 682. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 684. 


III. Potsonous CHEESE, ¢ 686. 


IV. Potsonovs Fisu, 3 687. 
Ist. Oysters, 2 687. 
2d. Mussels, ? 688. 


V. Unsounp meat, 2 689. 


VI. Mecuanicat irritants, 2 690. 
Ist. Effects of pins and needles, 2 691. 


CHAPTER OV 1Ide 
NARCOTIC POISONS. 


I. Opium AND ITs PREPARATIONS, 2 692. 
Ist. Symptoms, ? 692. 
2d. Average duration of cases, 2 694. 
3d. Amount which will prove fatal, 2 695. 
4th. Influence of idiosyncrasy in modifying its effects, 2 696. 
5th. Post-mortem appearances, 2 698. 
6th. Poisoning by morphia, 2 699. 
7th. Chemical examination, 2 700. 
8th. Morphia, 3 702. 
9th. Detection in organic mixtures, 2 703. 


II. Hyprocyanic or prussic acrp, 2 705. 

Ist. Its qualities, 3 705. 

2d. Its symptoms, 2 706. 

3d. Period at which death takes place, 2 707. 

4th. Smallest quantity capable of destroying life, 3 709. 
5th. Instances of: recovery from very large doses, 2 710. 
_6th. Post-mortem appearances, 2 711. 

Xxil : 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


7th. Chemical tests, 2 716. 
(1.) The iron test, 2 717. 
(2.) The silver test, @ 718. 
(3.) The sulphur or Liebig’s test, 2 719. 
(4.) Detection after death, 2 720. 
8th. Essential oil of bitter almonds, 2? 721. 
(1.) Instances of its fatal effects, 2 722. 
(2.) Its strength, 2 723. 
9th. Apricot kernels, 3? 724. 
10th. Peach kernels, ? 725. 
11th. Cherry-laurel water, 2 726. 
12th. Cyanide of potassium, 2 727. 
III. CHLOROFORM AND ETHER, 2 728. 
Ist. When injurious, 2 728. 
2d. Symptoms, 2 729. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, ? 731. 


Ath. Whether they can be used for criminal purposes, % 733. 


IV. Atconon, ? 734. 
Ist. Fatal effects of large quantities, 2 734. 
2d. Symptoms, ¢ 736. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 737. 
V. Campnor, ? 738. 
Ist. Symptoms, 2 738. 
2d. Power, 2 739. 
VI. Hyoscyamus nicer (Henbane), 2 740. 
VII. Hascuisca, ¢ 742. 
VIII. Lactuca, 2 743. 
IX. Sonanum, 2 744. 


CHAPTER IX. 


NARCOTICO-ACRID POISONS. ; 


I. Datura stRAMONIUM, @ 745. 
Ist. Nature and effects, ? 745. — 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 746. 


‘II. Nicotrana tasBacum (Tobacco), @ 747. 
Ist. Symptoms, 2 747. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, ¢ 748. 
3d. Nicotina or nicotia, 2 749. 
III. Contum macutatum (Common or Spotted Hemlock), ¢@ 753. 
Ist. Its action upon the human system, 2? 753. 
2d. Symptoms, ? 754. 
3d. The hemlock water drop-wort, 3 754. 


Ath. Conicine or conia, 3 755. . 


IV. Nux vomica—sTRYCHNIA, @ 756. 
Ist. Qualities, 2 756. 
2d. Symptoms, @ 757. 
3d. Power,.@ 758. 
Ath. Post-mortem appearances, 2 759. 
5th. Usual tests for strychnia, 3 760. 


V. Aconrre (Monkshood, Wolfsbane), @ 761. 
Ist. Its effects upon the body, @ 761. 
2d. Symptoms, ¢ 762. 
3d. Post-mortem appearances, @ 763. 
Ath. Tests, 2 764. 

VI. Losetia inriata (Indian Tobacco), 3.765. 

VII. Cepar om, 2 766. 
VIII. Savin, 2 767. 

Ist. Post-mortem appearances, 2 768. 
2d. Detection, % 769. 

IX. Taxus Baccata (Yew), 2 770. 


SXiil 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


X. Om or ransy, ? 771. 
XI. Coccutus rpicus, ¢ 773. 
Ist. Symptoms, @ 773. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, @ 774. 
XII. Arropa BELLADONNA (Deadly Nightshade), 2 776. 


XIII. Dierraris purpurea (Foxglove), @ 778. 
1st. Symptoms, ¢ 778. 


XIV. Quinta, 2:780. 
XV. Dapune mezerevum, 2 781. 


CHAPTER X. 


POISONOUS GASES. 


I. CaRBONIC ACID GAS. 
Ist. Effects upon the human body, 2 782. 
2d. Its qualities, 2 786. 
3d. Lightning gas, 2 786. 


Il. SunpuHurETTeD HYDROGEN, 2 789. 
Ist. Symptoms, 2 789. 
2d. Post-mortem appearances, 2 790. 


IIT. ExHaLaTIONS FROM THE DEAD, 2 791. 


PART II. 
OTHER FORMS OF VIOLENT DEATH. 
CHAPTER I. 


WOUNDS. 


1. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS, @ 792. 
Ist. What a wound is, 2 792. 
2d. General definitions, 3 793. 
3d. How far dangerous, 2 794. 
Ath. Examination of the body, 2 796. 
5th. External phenomena, 3 797. 
6th. Internal phenomena, 2? 797. 
Tth. Wounds made before or after death, 2 798. 
8th. Ecchymoses from natural causes, ¢ 805. 


{I. CLASSIFICATION OF WoUNDS, @ 807. 
Ist. Incised and punctured wounds, 2 808. 
2d. Lacerated and contused wounds, ? 809. 
3d. Gunshot wounds, 2 811. 
Ath. Wounds from wadding and gunpowder, ? 815. 


{II. Homrcipan, suICIDAL, AND ACCIDENTAL wounps, 3 816. 
Ist. Situation of wounds, ? 816. 
2d. Direction, 2? 817. 
3d. Position of body and of weapon, @ 819. 


TV. Bioop-statrns. 
Ist. General appearance, 2 820. 
2d. Chemical examination, ? 821. 
3d. Microscopical evidence, 2 831. 


V. CAUSE OF DEATH IN WouNDSs, ? 833. 

ist. Hemorrhage, 2 834. 

2d. Shock, ¢ 835. 

3d. Mechanical injury, 2 836. 

Ath. Diseased condition of body, 2 837. 
(1.) Wounds inflicted on pregnant women, 2 838. 
(2.) Indirect complications, 3 839. 
(3.) Tetanus, 2 840. 

XXIV 


} 


7”, 


TABLE OF CONTENTS, 


(4.) Hrysipelas, 2 841. 
(5.) Hospital gangrene, 3 842. 
(6.) Nervous delirium, &c., 3 843. 


5th. Surgical operations, 2 844. 
VI. Wovunns OF VARIOUS PARTS OF THE BODY. 


Ist. 


2d. 
3d. 


Ath. 
5th. 
6th. 
7th. 


8th. 
9th. 


10th 
11th 


Injuries of the head, 2 846. 


(1.) Concussion of the brain, 2 847. 
(2.) Fractures of the skull, 3 848. 
(3.) Wounds of the substance of the brain, 2 849. 


(4.) Wounds of the face, @ 852. 
Wounds of the neck, @ 853. 
Wounds and injuries of the spine, 2 854. 
Wounds of the chest, 2 855. 
Wounds of the lungs, 2 856. 
Wounds of the heart, 2 857. 
Wounds of the abdomen, ? 860. 
(1.) Superficial wounds, ¢ 860. 
x Penetrating wounds, ? 861. 
ounds of the liver, 2 861. 
Wounds of the diaphram, 2 862. 
. Wounds and rupture of the bladder, 2 863. 
. Wounds of the genitals, 2 865. 


CHAPTER IL 


Burns AND SCALDS. 


l 
IT 


. How classified, 2 866. 
. Appearance of burns upon dead body, @ 867. 


III. Wounds upon the burned, 2 870. 
IV. Effects upon the system, ? 872. 


¥: 


Post-mortem appearances, @ 873. 


CHAPTER III. 


SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION. 


CHAPTERIV. 


HEAT AND SUNSTROKE. 


rE. 
II. 


Symptoms, ? 880. 
Post-mortem appearances, @ 882. 


CHAPTER V. 


LIGHTNING. 


Ay 
ie 


Coup. 
I. 
II. 


Symptoms, ¢ 883. 
Post-mortem appearances, @ 884. 


CHAPTER VI. 


Symptoms, ? 885. 
Post-mortem appearances, ? 886. 


CH A BATE Raa Val. 


STARVATION. 
I. Mode, 2 888. 
II. Period, 2 889. 
III. Symptoms, 2 890. 
IV. Post-mortem appearances, % 891. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


SUFFOCATION. 
I. Post-mortem appearances, ¢ 894. 
Il. Accidental, 2 895. 
III. Suicidal, 3 896. 
IV. Homicidal, 2 897. 


XXV 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


CHART HEUER 


STRANGULATION. 
I. Cause, 2 899. 
II. Marks, 2 900. 
III. Period, 2 901. 
IV. Accidental, suicidal, or homicidal. 


CHAPTER X. 


HANGING. 
I. General symptoms, 2 907. 
II. Marks of the cord, 2 910. 
III. Rupture of artery, 2 913. 
IV. Tumefaction of genital organs, @ 914. 
V. Suicidal or homicidal, 2 915. 
Ist. Position and condition of body, 2 916. 
2d. Marks of violence, 2 921. 


CHAPTER XI. 


DROWNING. 
I. How producing death, 2 927. 

II. Time when body will float, &., 2 929. 

III. Signs of death by drowning, 2 930. 
Ist. Paleness and coldness of skin, &., 2 931. 
2d. Abrasion of the hands, &c., 2 932. 
3d. Water and froth in the lungs, ¢ 933. 
4th. Water in the stomach, 2 935. 
5th. Signs of asphyxia, 2 937. 
6th. Marks of violence, 938. 
7th. Putrefaction, &c., 3 939. 

IV. Accidental or otherwise, 2 941. 


CHAPTER XII. 


SIGNS OF DEATH. 
I. Cessation of the respiration and circulation, 2 943. 
Il. Filmy aspect of the eyes, 2 944. 
III. Pallor of the body, 2 945. 
IV. Extinction of animal heat, 2 946. 
V. Relaxation of the muscles, ¢ 947. 
VI. Relaxation of the cornea, 3 948. 
VII. Flattening of the fleshy parts, 2 949. 
VIII. Suggillations, 2 950. 
' Ist. External, 3 951. 
2d. Internal, 3? 952. 
tS Lungs, 2 952. 
2.) Brain, 2 953. 
(3.) Kidneys and intestines, 3 954. 
(4.) Heart, 2 955. 
IX. Cadaveric rigidity, 2 956. 
X. Putrefaction, ¢ 957. 
Ist. Fat, &., 3 958. 
2d. Woman after childbirth, 2 959. 
3d. Newly-born infants, 2 960. 
Ath. Manner of death, 2 961. 
5th. Effect of external agents, 2 962. 
(1. Exposure in open air, 2 962. 
(2.) Moisture, 3 963. 
(3.) Heat, 2 964. 
6th. External signs, 2 965. 
XI. Saponification, 2 966. 
XII. Mummification, 2 967. 
XIII. Decomposition of internal organs, 2 968. 


XXVi1 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


1st. Windpipe, 2 969. 
2d. Brain of infants, 2 970. 
3d. Stomach, 2 971. 
Ath. Intestinal canal, 2 972. 
5th. Spleen, 2 973. 
6th. Omentum and mesentery, 2 974. 
7th. Liver, ? 275. 
8th. Brain of grown persons, ? 976. 
9th. Heart, 2 977. 
10th. Lungs, 2 978. 
11th. Kidneys, 2 979. 
12th. Urinary bladder, 2 980. 
13th. Gsophagus, 2 981. 
14th. Pancreas, 3? 982. 
15th. Diaphragm, 3 983. 
16th. Arteries, 2 984. 
Lith. Uterus, 2 985. 


LO 5 od ND 5 OO 


MEDICO-LEGAL EXAMINATIONS. 
IT. Locality, 3 987. 
II. Identity, 2 988. 
Itt. Indications of violence or unnatural death, 2 989. 
IV. Manner of conducting the autopsy, 2 990. 
V. Natural aspect of the organs at different ages, 2 992. 
VI. Mode of drawing up reports, 2 1002. 


BOO Ke. V..E. 


LEGAL RELATIONS OF HOMICIDEH, F@TICIDE, AND 
INFANTICIDE. 


A. ELEMENTARY DEFINITIONS, ? 1003. 
I. Murder, 2 1005. 
General definition of, 2 1005-7. 
Malice the essential ingredient, 2 1006. 
Malice either express or implied, 2 1006. 
When malice to be presumed, ¢ 1006. 
Ist. Murder from general malice, 2 1006. 
When homicide is committed from general malevolence it is 
murder, ¢ 1006. 
But when from wantonness, but manslaughter, 2 1006. 
2d. Murder from individual malice, 2 1007. 
(1.) In reference to the party killed, 3 1007. 
How such malice to be proved, 2 1007. 
_ In what it consists by the civil and common law, 2 1007. 
(a) Intent to kill, 2 1008. 
In this case the offence is always murder, 2 1008. 
How such intent may be proved, 2 1009. 
Declarations and acts of defendant admissible for 
this purpose, 22 1009, 1156, 1173. 
(6) Intent to do bodily harm, ¢ 1010. 
In this country such homicide generally is murder 
in the second degree, 2 1010. 
The grade therefore depends on the intent, 2 1010. 
(2.) In reference to the party killed, when the blow falls on the 
deceased by mistake, 2 1011. 
When in an attempt to produce abortion, the mother is 
unintentionally killed, @ 1011. 
3d. From collateral malice, 2? 1012. 
This includes those cases where the malice is directed to an 
object other than that of human life or limb, 2 1012. 


XXVii 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


II. Manslaughter, 2 1013. 


III. Excusable homicide, @ 1015. 


General definition of, 2 1013. 
Involuntary manslaughter, 2 1014.. 


1st. Where a man doing a lawful act, without any intention of hurt, by 
accident kills another, 2 1015. 
2d. Where a man kills another in self-defence, 2 1015. 
The distinction between excusable and justifiable homicide, is in 
this country merely theoretical, 2 1016. 


IV. Justifiable homicide, ¢ 1017. 


Ist. When committed by unavoidable necessity, 3 1017. 
2d. When committed in advancement of public justice, 2 1017. 


V. Murder in the second degree, 2 1018. 


. CorPus 


Object of distinction is the restriction of capital punishment to those 
cases only in which there is an intent to take life, 22 1018-19. 

The distinguishing feature between the two degrees is a specific intent 
to take life, 22 1018-19-20. 

Homicide by poisoning not necessarily murder in the first degree, @ 1023. 

Homicide collateral to rape, robbery, &c., is necessarily murder in the 
first degree, 2 1021. 

Homicide of A., when the intent was to kill B., is murder in the second 
degree, 2 1022. 

Specific intent to take life to be inferred from circumstantial evidence, 
and from declarations, &c., 2 1023. 


DELICTI. 


I. That a death took place, 2 1024. 


Universal rule of civil and common law, that the fact of death should 
be proved, @ 1024. 
Identification of dead body—see ante, ¢ 473, &c. 
Cases of conviction of innocent parties, from neglect of this precaution, 
2@ 1024-6. . 
Exceptions to the rule, 2 1027. 
Ist. Possession of body is unnecessary when decease is proved by 
eye-witnesses, 4 1027. 
2d. And so where it is proved that the body was destroyed by che- 
mical or mechanical agents, 2 1028. 
Webster’s case reported, 2 1029. 


II. That the death was from violence. 


XXVill 


It must appear that it was not natural, 22 833-846. 
How autopsy to be conducted, ante, 22 947-962, 2 1002, n. 
Ist. Poisoning. 
(a.) Measures to be taken by the prosecution when poisoning 
is suspected, 2 1084. 
(b.) Chemical proof of poison in stomach not essential, 2 1092. 

(See ante, 22 493-791.) 

Importance of chemical examination of stomach and its con- 
tents, 2 1093. (See ante, as to nature and character of 
post-mortem, 22 501-503, 514, 515, 516, 522, 532, 537, 544, 
563, 582, 622, 646, 649, 654, 669, 684, 700, 716, 731, 746, 
748, 768, 772, 3 1002, n.) : 

When, however, this is prevented by the accused, he cannot set 

up the want of it, 2 1093. 

On the other hand, neglect by the prosecution to procure it if 
in its power, is a powerful presumption in favor of the 
accused, 2 1093. 

(c.) po reported cases in the common law courts, 
Donellan’s case, 1781, 2 1093. 

Donnall’s case, 1817, 2 1097. 
Anonymous, 1835, 2 1098. 
Chapman’s case, 1831, 2 1100. 
Tawell’s case, 1825, 2 1102. 
Graham’s case, 1845, 2 1103. 
Hartung’s case, 1854, 3 1105. 
Palmer’s case, 2 1110. 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


(d.) Facts on which a verdict of guilty can be supported, 2 1120. 
(e.) Duties of counsel for prosecution and defence, 2? 1125. 
2d. Wounds and blows, 2 1127. 
a. Legal definition of wounds, 2 1127. 
b. isis what circumstances wounds imply criminal agency, 
1130. 
a', Character of the wounds themselves, 2 1130. 
a’. Adaptation to a particular instrument, 2 1130. 
b*. Shape and direction, ? 1132. 
c*. Particular class, 3 1133. 
a®, Gunshot, ¢ 1133. 
6’, Punctured, 2 1134. 
c3. Incised, ¢ 1135. 
d®, Contused, 2 1136. 
d?, Number, 2 1137. 
e*, Situation, 2 1138. 
b'. Expression of countenance, ? 1139. 
c'. Inferences from surrounding objects, 2 1140. 
a”, Clothing, 2 1140. 
b?, Agent commensurate to the effect, 2 1141. 
c?. Place where found, 2 1142. 
d*‘. Position and appearance of the body, 2 1151. 
a*, Attitude, 2 1151. 
b2, Marks of blood, 2 1151. 
c?. Bruises, ? 1153. 
el, Probability of infliction of injury before death, 2 1154. 
jf'. Connection of the wound with the death, 2 1155. 


C. INTENT AND DESIGN, FROM WHAT TO BE INFERRED, @ 1156. 


I. 


it: 


IIT. 


IV. 


Vir. 


Prior attempts, preparations and threats, ¢ 1156. 
Evidence of such always admissible, 24 1156-7. 
And so as to obtaining instruments of mischief, and possession of them, 
q List: 
Cases illustrative of this, 22 1158-9. 
Threats to be received for the same purpose, ¢ 1158. 
Cases illustrative of this, 2 1160. 
Marks of violence, 2 1161. 
Presumptions to be drawn from such, 2 1162. 
Presumptions to be drawn from nature of gunshot wounds, 2 811. 
It must appear that the alleged violence was the cause of death, either i 
part or in whole, 2 1163. 
Distinction between wounds made before and after death, 22 798, 804. 
Blood-stains, 24 820-831. 
Suicidal or homicidal, 22 810, 816. 
Instrument of death, ¢ 1164. 
The use of a lethal instrument leads to the eet Re that death was 
intended, 3 1164. 
Suicide may ‘be inferred from the position of the weapon, 1165. 
Other presumptions to be drawn from instrument of death, 22 819, 1166-7 
Liability of deceased to attack, 22 1166-7. 
1st. Possession of money, 2 1170. 
Avarice and ambition, 2 1170. 
2d. Old grudge, 22 972, 1133, 1173. 
3d. Jealousy, 2 1174. 


. Position of deceased, 22 946, 1152. 


Presumption to be drawn from this as to suicide, 22 819, 1152. 
In cases of hanging, 2% 907, 926. 

In cases of drowning, 2 938. 

In cases of poisoning, ¢ 1175. 


. Materials appr opriate to be converted into instruments of crime, 2 1177 


Importance of indicatory evidence in this respect, 2 1177. 
Purchase of poison and powder; preparation of other materials, @ 1177. 
Detached circumjacent bodies, 2 1178. 
Dress of deceased. Footprints. Presumptions to be drawn from the 
latter, 22 1180-1-2. 
Detached articles of clothing, 3 1181. 
XX1X 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


Wadding of gun, &c., 2 1179. f 
Cases illustrative of the importance of this species of evidence, 2 1185, &c. 
VIII. Possession of fruits of offence, ? 1193. 
Illustration of the general value of indicatory evidence, 2 1194, &c. 


D. INFANTICIDE AND FeTicrDE, 31195. (See for the Medical view of this subject, 
ante, 2% 335, 355.) 
I. How far feeticide is affected by the degree to which gestation has pro- 
ceeded, @ 1195. 
At common law destruction of an unborn infant is a misdemeanor. Late 
differences of opinion as to whether there must be a quickening. 
Better opinion is, that all attempts of this character are misdemean- 
ors, no matter what be the stage of gestation, 22 1195-97. 
II. How far the offence is affected by the fact of birth, 2 1202. 
When a child dies after birth, from a wound inflicted before, the offence 
is murder; when the death takes place before birth, it is at common 
law but a misdemeanor, @? 1203-4. 
III. Tests of viability recognized by the courts, 2 1204. 
Viability medically considered, 2@ 356, 378. 
Time of gestation—see ante, 33 310, 327. 
Difference of opinion as to actual degree of birth which is requisite to 
constitute the legal offence, 2 1205. 
General propositions of law bearing on this topic :— 

(1.) Where there is a malicious wound inflicted on an infant, with intent 
to produce death, and death ensues after berth, the offence is 
murder, 2 1205. 

(2.) Where there is a malicious exposure of an infant, with intent to 
produce death, and death ensues after birth, it is murder, ? 1205. 

(3.) Where there is a wanton exposure of an infant, without the intent 
to procure death, but with the expectation of shifting the support 
of the infant upon some third person, and death ensues after 
birth, it is manslaughter, 2 1205. 

(4.) Where there is an exposure resulting from necessity, ignorance, or 
insanity, and death ensues after birth, the offence is excusable 
homicide, in which, in accordance with American practice, the 
defendant is entitled to an acquittal, 2 1205-8. 

IV. Corpus delicti in infanticide, ¢ 1208. 
Difficulties arising in this respect from 

(1.) The uncertainty of the fact of pregnancy, 21208. See ante, 22 310, 
329. 

(2.) The uncertainty of the time of death, 2 1208. 

(3.) Uncertainty of presumptions, 3 1208. 

(4.) Casualties of gestation and delivery, 21208. See this subject medi- 
cally considered, ante, 23 379, 398. 


BiQsOrKi wats 


LEGAL RELATIONS OF IDENTITY. 


A. OF PERSONS LIVING, 2 1213. 
Ist. By direct evidence, ? 1213. 
a. Appearance, 2 1213. 
b. Voice, 2 1219. 
c. Marks, 2 1220. 
d. Daguerreotypes and portraits, 2 1221. 
2d. By inferential evidence, 1222. 
a. Presence in the neighborhood, 2 1222. 
b. Suspicious circumstances, 2 1223. 
B. Or PERSONS DEAD, 2 1223. 
Ist. Age, 2 1223. 
2d. Teeth, 2 1223. 
3d. Sex, 2 1223. 
Ath. Skeleton, 2? 1224. 
5th. Clothing, 2 1225. 
XXX 


TABLE OF CONTENTS. 


BO Qiks Nok, bobs 


SURVIVORSHIP. 


I. As TO THE PARTIES, 2 1225. 

Ist. Sex, ¢ 1225. 
2d. Age, 2.1227. 
3d. Size and temperament, ¢ 1228. 
Ath. Health, 2 1229. 

II. As To MODE OF DEATH, ? 1230. 
Ist. Drowning, 3 1230. 
2d. Asphyxia, % 1237. 
3d. Heat, ¢@ 1238. 
Ath. Cold, 2 1239. 
5th. Starving, ¢ 1240. 
6th. Poison, ? 1243. 
7th. Crushing or burying alive, 2 1244. 
Sth. Childbirth, ? 1245. 
9th. Wounds, 2 1246. 


Ill. Tests WHERE BODIES ARE FOUND DEAD, ? 1247. 


” 


BOOK (Ee XN 


MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. 


CHAPTER I. 


CIVIL LAW PRACTICE, @ 1248. 


CHAPTER II. 


ComMMON LAW PRACTIOR. 


I. In criminal prosecutions, 2? 1252. 
II. In actions for torts, 2 1273. 


Bieh On I VX 


PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. 


[. PrioR TO CRIME. 
1st. Preparations, 2 1276. 
2d. Intimations, ? 1278. 
3d. Overacting, 2 1284. 
II. AT CRIME. 
Ist. Incoherence, 2 1285. 
2d, Selfoverreaching, 2 1289. 
III. AFTER CRIME. 
Ist. Convulsive confession, ? 1291. 
2d. Nervous tremor, 2 1307. 
3d. Morbid propensity to recur to scene and topic of guilt, @ 1314. 
Ath. Permanent mental wretchedness, 2 1318. 
5th. Animosity between confederates, 2 1322. 


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TABLE OF CASES. 


SECTION, 


Abbey v. Lill (5 Bing. 299) 94 
Abner Baker’s case reviewed, 2 Am. 
Jour. of Insan. 26 187 


Andress v. Weller (2 Green, C. R. 604) 39 


Ayrey v. Hill (2 Adams, 206) 39 
Baker v. Lewis (4 Rawle, 356) 5 
Baldwin v. State (1 Missouri, 223) 94 
Bannatyne v. Bannatyne (15 Jur. 864; 

14 English R. 581) 2, 6, 8, 34 
Barry v. Butlin (1 Curtis, 637) 5 
Baxter v. Earl of Portsmouth (2 C. & 

P. 178) 140 
Beals v. Lee (10 Barr, 56) ait 
Beavan v. McDowell (24 Eng. R. 486) 11 
Beckworth v. Sydebotham (1 Camp. 

116) 94 
Bennett v. State (Mart. & Yerg. 133) 64 
Blackford v. Christian (1 Knapp’s Rep. 

73) 4 
Black v. Ellis (3 Hill, 8. C. 68) 39 
Blanchard v. Nestle (3 Denio, 37) 5 
Bocarmé’s case (MSS.) 1081 
Bonsall v. Chancellor (5 Wharton, R. 

37) a9: 
Boorn’s case (MSS.) 1026 


Borradale v. Hunter (5 Man. &Gr. 639) 208 
Bowler v. Bingham (2 Munf. 442) 302 
Bowler’s case (67 Hans. Par. Deb.480) 46 


Bowman v. Woods (1 Iowa, 441) 96 
Boyd v. Eby (8 W. 70) 14 
Breasted v. Farmers’ Loan Co. (3 Am. 
Law Reg. 358) 208 
Brown v. Mollison (3 Wh. 129) 5 
Brydges v. King (1 Hag. He. R. 256) 5 
Buckminster v. Perry (4 Mass. 593) 94 
Burrow’s case (1 Lewin, 238) 46, 68 
Campo v. State (3 Kelly, 417) 466 
Carter v. State (2 Carter, 617) 96 
Carawan’s case (Pamp. 1853) 1185 
Case of Mary Norket and others (14 
Ho. St. Tr. 1324) 1160 
Ceaver v. Phelps (11 Pick. 304) i 
Chase v. Lincoln (3 Mass. 27) 94 
Clarke v. Sawyer (3 Sanf. Ch. R. 351) = 5 
v. State (12 Ohio, 483) 93, 94, 95 
Clary v. Clary (2 Iredell, 78) 94 
Cleft v. Schwabt (3 Man. & Gr. 437) 208 
Cocks v. Purdy (2 C. & K. 270) 94 


SECTION, 


Collier v. Simpson (5 C. & P. 73) 94 
Colver v. Haslam (7 Barbour, 374) 94 
Com. v. Bangs (9 Mass. 387) 1190 
—— v. Beale, Phila., 1854. 471 
—— v. Bob (4 Dal. 125) 1013 
—— v. Carey (2 Peck, 47) 94 
—— v. Chapman (Pamp. 1831) 1100 
—— v. Chauncey (2 Ashmead, 227) 1017 
—— v. Clarey (2 Ired. 78) 94 
— v. Demain (6 P. L. J. 29) 1196 
—— v. Farkin (3 P. L. J. 482) 46 
—— v. Freeth (15 Am. Jour. of Ins. 
303) 55 
—— v. Fritz (8 P. L. J. 43) 305 
—— v. Furbush (9 Am. Jour. of Ins. 
151) 187 
—— v. Harman (4 Barr. 269) 207 
—— v. McCarty (4 P. L. J. 140) 305, 322 
—— v. McPike (3 Cush. 181) 1013 
—— v. Mitchell (1 Va. Cas. 716) 1013 
—— v. Mosler (4 Barr, 267) 46, 53, 54 
— v. , Mss., Phila., 1845 94. 
—— v. Parker (9 Metc. 263) 1196 
—— v. Rogers (7 Metc. 500) 46, 48, 93, 94 
—— v. Sheppard (6 Binn. 283) 302 
—— v. Stricker (1 Br. App. xlvii.) 302 
—— v. Thomas (1 Va. Cases, 307) 471 
—— v. Wentz (1 Art. 269) 302 
—— v. Wilson (1 Gray, 337) 96 
v. Wood, Mss. Phila., 1836 94 
Combe’s case (Moore, R. 759) 5 


Cornwall v. State (Mar. Yer. 142) 64, 69 


Cottril v. Mason (3 Fairf. 222) 45, 94 
Couch v. Couch (7 Alab. 519) 8 
Davis v. Mason (4 Peck, 156) 94 
Den v. Clark (1 Adams, 279) 15 


Denn v. Johnson (2 South, 454) 
Denton v. Franklin (9 B. Monr. 28) 


@ 


De Witt v. Barley (13 Barbour, 550) 94 
a (5 Selden (N. Y.), 
371) 96 


Dickinson v. Blisset (1 Dickens, 168), 140 
Dietrick v. Dietrick (58. C. R. 207) 5 
Dodge v. Meech (1 Hag. Ev. R. 620) 5 
Donellan’s case (MSS., 1817) 1095 
Dunick v. Beichenback (208.&R.84) 5 


Farrer v. State (2 Ohio, St. R. 54) 
Fenton v. Halloway (13 Stark. 126) 


XXXili 


al 


TABLE OF CASES. 


_ SECTION. 
Fenwick v. Bell (1 C. & K. 312) 94 
Fitzgerald v. Reed (9 Sm. & Mar.) meth 
Folkes v..Chadd (3 Dougl. 157) 94 
Ford v. Ford (7 Humph. 92) 5 
Freeman v. People (4 Denio, 10) 46, 55, 59 


Gardener v. Gardner (21 Wend. 526) 5,39 
33 


Gass v. Gass (3 Humph. 278) 

Gehrke v. State (13 Texas, 568) 96 

Gibson v. Gibson (9 Yerg. 829) 94 

Gibson’s case, Edinburgh, Dec. 1844 109 

Goble v. Grant (1 Green C. R. 629) 5,33 
5 


Grabel v. Barr (5 Barr, 441) 
Graham’s case (MSS., 1845) 1103 
Granger v. State (5 Yerger, 459) 48 


Grant v. Thompson (4 Conn. 203) 11, 94 


‘ Hacker v. Newborn (Style, 427) 5 
_ Hadfield’s case (67 Hans. Par. Deb. 

480) 46 

Hammond’s case (2 Greenl. 33) 94 


Hartung’s case, 1854 
Harrison v. Rowen (3 W. C. C. R. 580) 


5, 33, 34 
Hathorn v. King (8 Mass. 371) 5 
Hays v. People (1 Hill. 351) 462, 1195 
Henshell’s case (2 Lewin C. C.135) 1128 
Heath v. Com. (1 Robinson, 735) 1156 
Hinchman». Ritchie (Brightly R.) 143, 43 
Hix v. Whittemore (4 Metc. 545) 33 
Hoge v. Fisher (1 P. C. C. R. 1638) 33 
Horne v. Horne (9 Ired. 99) 5 
Howard v. Coke (7 B. Monr. 655) 5 


How’s case (MSS., 1824) 1192 
Hubley v. Vanhorne (78. & R. 185) 94 
Hulings v. Laird (9 Harris, 268) 4l 
Huntington’s case (Pamp.) 55 
Jackson v. Vandusen (5 Johns. 144) 33 
Johnson v. Moore (1 Litt. 371) 32 

v. State (17 Ala. 618) 1156 
Jumperts v. People (21 Ill. 373) 1176 


Kelly v. State (3 Smedes & Mar. 518) 69 


-—— v. Webster (8 Shep. 46) 33 
King v. Com. (2 Ma. Cas. 78) 1013 
Kinne v. Kinne (9 Conn. 102) 5, 94 
Lackey v. Lackey (2 B. Monr. 478) 42 
La Rue v. Gettyson (4 Barr. 375) 11 
Lee v. Lee (4 McCord, 183) 32 


Leech v. Leech (1 Pa. L. Jour. 179) 


* 122, 1, 43 
Lester v. Pittsford (7 Vt. 158) 94 
Level’s case (Cro. Car. 438) 152 


Lodge v. Phipher (11 8. & R. 333) 94 

Long v. Whidden (2 N. H. 435) 11 

Lord. Cornwallis’ case (Don. Proc. 
1678) 976 


Lowe v. Williamson (1 Green ch. 82) 5, 12 


Ludwick v. Com. (6 Harris, 173) 44 
Lyon v. Lyman (9 Conn. 55) 94 
Malton v. Nesbit (1 C. & P. 70) 94 


Marsh v. Tyrel (2 Hag. Ec. 84, 141) 5 
Marquis of Winchester’s case (6 Rep. 
24) 
McAllister v. State (17 Alab. 434) 93, 94 
XXXIV 


. 


SECTION. 
McCandless v» McWha (Am. Journ. 
Med. Sci., Jan. 1854, p. 273) 645 
Means v. Means (5 Strobh. 167) 8 
Mills v. Com. (1 Harris, 631) 1196 
Mitchell v. Kingman (5 Pick. 431) 11 
Molton v. Camroux (2 Exch. R. 487; 


4 Exch. R. 17) 11, 2 
Monroe v. State (5 Geo. 85) 48 
Moody v. Rowel (17 Pick. 490) 94 


Moriarty v. Brooks (6 C. & P. 684) 1127 
Morse v. Crawford (17 Vt. 499) 94 


Negro Jerry v. Townshend (9 Md. 145) 94 
Nichols v. State (8 Ohio 8. R.) 71 
Norris v. State (16 Alab. 776) 94 
Nottridge v. Ripley (Dundee, 1849) 43 
Nussear v. Arnold (138 S. & R. 323) 5 


Palmevr’s case (London Lancet, 1856) 1110 
Patterson v. Patterson (68. & R. 55) 5 
Penn v. Levin (Addison, 279) 1013 
v. Sullivan (Add. 143) 471 
Pell v. Ball (1 Cheves’ Chan. Cas.) 1232 
People v. Abbott (19 Wend. 192) 466 
v. Griffin (2 Am. Jour. of Ins. 


v. Metcalf (1 Wheel. C. C. 378) 464 


227) 187 
——v. Hammill (2 Parker, C. C. 
223) 70 
—— v. Kleim (2 Am. Jour. of Insan. 
245) 187 
——v. Lake (2 Kernan (N. Y.), 
358) 
——- v. McCann (5 Parker, C. R. (N. 
¥.); 242) 94 
—_ v. McLeod (1 Hill, 420) 48 


v. Pine (2 Barbour, 168) 48 
v. Robinson (2 Parker C. C. 
223) 70 
v. Sprague (6 Am. Jour. of In- 
san. 254) 187 
v. Thurston (2 Parker, C. R. 
49) 94 
Peterson’s case (MSS. 1852) 1143 
Pigman v. State (14 Ohio, 555) 71 
Poole v. Richardson (3 Mass. 330) 94 
Portsmouth v. Portsmouth (1 Hag. Ee. 

R. 355) 3 
Potts v. House (6 Georg. 324) 5, 94 
Pirtle v. State (9 Hamp. 663) 49, 93 
Queen v. Farmer (York Spring As- 

sizes, 1837) 114 
v. Milligan (Lincoln Aut. As- 
sizes, 1836) 157 
v. West (Carrington and Kir- 
wan’s Nisi Prius Rep., Vol. 
II. p. 714) 341 
R. v. Allen (9 C. & P. 31) 469 
— v. Angus (Burnett’s C. L. of Scot- 
land, 575) 1209 
— v. Barker (3 C. & P. 589) 466 
— v. Rarton (3 Cor. C. C. 275) 46 
— v. Beckett (1 M. & Rob. 526) 1127 
—v. Bird (2 Eng. R. 448) 1155 
—v. Brain (6 C. & P. 349) 1204 
—v. Briggs (M. C. C. 318) 1128 


R. v. 


— wv. 


cn 


—— De 


—v. 
» Wood (1R. & M.C.C.R. 381) 1128 


meal Pe 


. Higgins (Lond. Med. Gaz., 


) 
. Simpson (4C. & P. 407) 
- Smith (8 C. & P. 173) 


. Staunton (1 Car. & Kir. 415) 
. Stevens (R. & M. C.C. R. 409) 1128 


. West (2 Car. & Kir. 783) 
- White (Wilts Sum. Assizes, 


TABLE OF CASES. 


SECTION, 


Carroll (7 C. & P. 145) 71 
Case (1 Eng. R. 544) 461, 1195 


. Champlin (1 Car. & K. 746) 458 
. Conner (1C. & P. 438) 1017, 1163 
. Crompton (C. & M. 597) 1163 


. Cruse (8 C. & P. 541) 71 
. Davidson (1 Hume’s Com. 486) 1203 
. Donnall (MSS. 1817) 

. Enoch (5 C. & P. 539) 
. Frances (4 Cox C. C. 57) 94 
. Gammon (5 C. & P. 321) 
. Goode (7 Ad. D. L. 536) 
. Goule (Durham Summer Assizes, 


1097 
1204, 1217 


468, 469 
46 


1845) 114 
. Grindley (1 Rus. on Cr. 8, note 

n) 71 
. Grunnell (Wills on Circum. Ev. 

205) 1203 
. Harris (7 C. & P. 456) 1128 


ix. 


896) 1158 
. Higginson (1 C. & K. 129) 46 
. Hodgson (R. & R. 2) 464 
. Hughes (8 C. & P. 752) 470 
». Jackson (R. & R. 487) 464 
y. Jordan (9 C. & P. 118) 469 
. Layton (4 Cox. C. C. 149) 46 
. Lines (1 C. & K. 393) 470 
. Martin (6 C. & P. 562) 466 
. Mawgridge (Kel. 124) 1013 
. McLaughlin (8 C. & P. 635) 1127 
M’Rue (8C. & P. 641) 470 
. Meakin (7C. & P. 297) 64, 68, 71 
. Moore (reported 6 Law Rep., N. 
8. 581) 71 
. Murrow (R. & M. C. R. 456) 1128 
. Offord (5 C. & P. 168) 46, 93, 94 
», Oxford (9 C. & P. 533) 46 
Poulton (5 C. & P. 329) 1204 
. Reeves (9 C. & P. 25) 1204 
. Russen (1 East P. C. 438,439) 469 
. Saunders (3 C. & P. 265) 464 
. Searle (1 Mood & Rob. 75) 93, 94 


. Senior (1 Mood, C. C. 346) 1195, 1202 
. Sidwell (1 McNally’s Evid. 606) 469 
. Simplon (Cummin on Proof of 


1216 
1208, 1253 
1127 


Infanticide, p. 40 


South (Norf. Aut. Circ., 1834) 
461 


. Stocks (3 C. & K. 185) 46 
. Thomas (7 C. & P. 817) 64, 68, 71 
. Trilloe (1 Car. & Mars. 650) 120 

. Van Butchell (8C. & P. 629) 1254 
. Vaughan (1 Cox, C. C. 80) 46 
. Voke (R. & R. 531) 1156 
. Warman (2C. & R. 195) 1129 
». Walters (2 Car. & Marsh, 170) 1206 


1846) 197 
. Williams (3 C. & P. 286) 464 
Williamson (3 C. & P. 398) 1254 


Wright (9 C. & P. 754) 1204 


SECTION. 


R. v. Wright (R. & R. 451) 94 
Rambler v. Tyron (7 8. & R. 90) 94 
Rabello’s case (2 Am. Jour. of Insan. 

41) 187 
Rennie’s case (1 Lewin,C.C.76) 64, 68 


Revett v. Braham (4 T. R. 497) 94 
aes v. Reynolds (1 Spear, 756- 


) 13 

Rice v. Peet (13 Johns. 543) 6 
Roberts v. Slate (3 Georg. 310) 48 
v. Trawick (13 Alab. 68) 8 


Schaller v. State (14 Missouri, 502) 72 
Schwabt v. Clift (2 Car. & Kir. 134) 
Scribner v. Crane (2 Page, C. C. R. 
147) 5 
Scruby v. Fordham (1 Addams, 90) 8 
Selfridge’s Trial, 158 10 
Sentance v. Poole (3 C. & P. 1) 
Schaller v. State (14 Missouri, 502) 
Shaw v. Thackray (23 Eng. Reports, 
21) 37 


Sheafe v. Rowe (3 Lees R. 415) 94 
Shorter v. People (2 Comstock, 197- 
202) 48 
Shreve’s case (MSS. 1855) 1025 
Sickles’ case (Pamp.) 5D 
Sill v. McNight (7 W. & Ser. 245) 44 


Sloan v. Maxwell (2 Green, Ch. 563) 5 

Smith v. Kramer (1 Am. Law Reg. 
353) 

v. State (3 Reddig. 48) 


108 
1017 


v. Turner (1 Wright, 30) 69 


State v. Benton (2 Dev. & Bat. 196) 1017 
v. Bovard (30 Miss. 600) 52 
—— v. Clark (12 Ohio, 424) 55 
— v. Crow (10 West. L. J. 501) 464 
—— v. Cooper (1 Green, N. J. R.) 1011 
—- v. (2 Zab. 57) 1196 
—— v. Gardner (Wright’s Ohio R. 
392) 46° 
—— v. Harlowe, (2 Miss. 446) 70 
—— v. Hill (4 Dev. & Bat. 491) 1015 
— v. Hunting (21 Miss. 464) 52 
—— v. Leblanc (3 Brevard, 339) 471 
—— v. Lorkey (2 Kel. 8) 1013 
—— v. John (8 Ired. 330) 69 
—— v. McCann (13 Smedes & Mar- 
shall, 478) 1142 
v. Morea (2 Ala. 275) 1163 
v. Norris (1 Hay, 429) 1013 
—— v. Rash (12 Ired. 382) 1156 
—— v. Roane (2 Dev. 58) 1017 
—— v. Rutherford (1 Hawks, 457) 1017 
— v. Scott (4 Iredell, 409) 48 
—— v. Shepherd (7 Conn. 54) 464 
—— v. Spencer (1 Zabriskie, 196) 465-7 
—— v. Travers (2 Wheel. C. C. 506) 1013 
—— v. Watkins (12 Conn. 47) 1156 
Stegall v. Stegall (2 Brock, 256) 302 
Stevens v. Vancleve (4 W. C. C. R 
262) 5, 33 


Stewart v. Lispenard (26 Wend. 255) 8, 10 
Stroud v. Com. (11 §. & R.177) 471 


Taggart v. Thompson (2 Harris, 149) 6 
Tawell’s case (MSS. 1845) 1101 


XXXV 


TABLE OF CASES. 


SECTION, 

Taylor, ex parte (5 Carver, 51) 1013 
Thornton v. Royal (Exch. Co. Peak, 

25) 94 

Tulloch v. Allison (3 Hag. 527) 5 

- Tyner v. State (5 Humph. 383) 1024 


Underwood v. Wing (31 Eng. Law & 
Eq. 393) 
U.S. v. Clarke (1 Cranth, C. C. R. 
158) 65, 69 
—— v. Drew (5 Mason, U.S. Rep. 28) 64 
—— v. Harman (4 Barr, 269) 1220 
v. Hewson (7 Bost. Law Rep. 
361) 
v. McGlue (1 Curtis, C. C. R. 1) 
—— v. Wiltberger 
515) 


XXXvVl 


1235 


58 

94 

(3 Washburn, 
1017 


Si 


SECTION. 


Van Alst v. Hunter (5 Johns. Ch. 148) 12 


Vance v. Com. (2 Virg. C. 132) 46 
Waring v. Waring (6 Moore, P. C. 
Cases, 349) 17 


Webster’s case (Boston, 1850) 1029-1083 
Wheeler v. Alderson (3 Hagg. 602) 39 
v. Wheeler (3 Hagg. 574) 94 
Whitenack vw. Striker (1 Green, C. R. 

8) 2, 33 
William’s case (MSS.) 


272 
Windsor’s case (Brown’s Forum) 191 
Wogan v. Small (115. & R. 141) 94 


Woodbury v. Goodyear (7 Gray 
(Mass. ), 467) 

Woodward v. James (3 Strob. 552) 5 

Wynn »v. Allard (5 W. & S. 525) 38 


BOOK If. 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS. 


Bs a wk big Ad BAO 9d b eel evs alo Bh Bie aD 


CHAPTER I. 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNHSS IN ITS LEGAL RELATIONS. 


I. WHAT DEGREE OF UNSOUNDNESS INVALIDATES A CONTRACT OR WILL, § 2. 
As to Lunatics or Idiots, § 2. 
General legal principle’ is, that contracts or wills of idiots or lunatics will not 


be enforced, 


Cases where there is a sufficient degree of sanity to create responsibility for 


1st. 


2d. 


crime, and yet when a contract or will will be avoided, 

IMBECILITY GENERALLY, AND HEREIN OF FRAUD AND COMPULSION, 

Fraud itself vitiates.a contract, and in this the contracting party’s intellect 
becomes an essential item for consideration, § 3. 

Lord Portsmouth’s case, § 3. 

Acts and contracts of persons of weak understanding will be held void 
when such persons have been imposed upon by cunning or undue 
influence, § 4. 

In cases of wills this is peculiarly the case, § 5. 

The testator must have had a disposing memory, § 5. 

Over-importunity of controlling friends may destroy capacity, § 5. 

The question in reference to contracts and wills does not depend upon 
mere subjective capacity, and hence no positive definition can be 
given, § 6. 

Idiocy, to make it a positive incapacity, must be shown to have been ac- 
companied with business disability, § 7. 

The question of capacity will be greatly affected by the reasonableness or 
unreasonableness of the act attempted to be set aside, § 8. 

The inquiry in many cases is, whether the testator or grantor had capacity 
or information enough to comprehend and disregard any attempt at 
fraud or coercion, § 9. 

Difficulties in such cases from conflict of medical opinion, § 9. 

A distinction is taken between the cases where the court is asked to annul 
an executed contract, and where it is asked to execute an unexecuted 
one, § 11. 

Weakness of intellect, from extreme old age, works a disability, § 12. 

But great caution should be exercised in this respect, the object being to 
protect old age, not to render it still more defenceless, § 12. 

How far the deaf and dumb are thereby incompetent, § 13. 

PartIAL Insanity, § 14. 

Rule in this country is, that unless the contested act is the ace of an 
insane delusion, it is not vitiated by it, § 14. 

The present English rule, however, seems to be that the existence of an 
insane delusion destroys testamentary capacity altogether, § 15. 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS.—ANALYTICAL TABLE. [BOOK i. 


Opinion of Lord Brougham on this point, § 17. 
Objections to this view, § 18. 
Compatibility of hallucinations with sound disposing memory, § 19. 
Instances of existence of hallucinations in persons otherwise sane, § 21. 
3d. Lucip INTERVALS. 
When habitual insanity is shown, the presumption is, that the act was 
committed in an insane period, § 33. 
The character of the act goes a great way in determining whether’it was 
committed in a lucid interval, § 35. 
Ath. INTOXICATION. ; 
When actually existing renders a party civilly incompetent. 
A party, however, cannot use his drunkenness as a means of imposi- 
tion, § 36. 
Difference in this respect between executed and. unexecuted contracts, § 37. 
In actions for torts, drunkenness is no defence on the merits. 
Drunkenness avoids a will when acted on by fraud or imposition, § 38. 


- JI. WHAT IS NECESSARY TO BE PROVED, IN ORDER TO DEPRIVE A PARTY 


OF THE MANAGEMENT OF HIS ESTATE, § 40. 
When a party is incapable, the practice is to appoint a committee, who take 
the alleged lunatic’s place, § 41. 


In what way the question of lunacy, under such circumstances, is tried, § 42. 


General and not partial incompetency must be shown, § 42. 

The test is, is the respondent capable of managing his own estate? § 42. 
What in such cases is required of medical witnesses, § 43. 

The same process lies in cases of habitual drunkenness, § 44. 

The test here is, is there a fixed habit of drunkenness? § 44. 


Ill. WHAT DEGREE OF UNSOUNDNESS AVOIDS RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME, 


§ 45. 
The difficulties in this respect have arisen from mistaken dicta, given in par- 
ticular cases, for general and absolute rules. 
Ill consequences arising from looseness of citation, § 45, n. 
The true doctrine is, that medical science is a part of the common law of the © 
land, and is to be treated as such, § 45, n. 
Ist. CASES WHERE THE DEFENDANT IS INCAPABLE OF DISTINGUISHING RIGHT FROM 
WRONG IN REFERENCE TO THE PARTICULAR ACT, § 46. 
Under this head fall cases of idiocy and amentia, § 46. 
2d. CASES WHERE THE DEFENDANT IS ACTING UNDER AN INSANE DELUSION AS TO CIR- 
CUMSTANCES, WHICH, IF TRUE, WOULD RELIEVE THE ACT FROM RESPONSIBILITY, 
OR WHERE HIS REASONING POWERS ARE SO DEPRAVED AS TO MAKE THE 
COMMISSION OF THE PARTICULAR ACT THE NATURAL CONSEQUENCE OF THE 
DELUSION. 
An act committed under a bona fide belief of its necessity in self defence, 
will be regarded as if there really was such necessity, § 47. 
And the gauge here is the defendant’s capacity, § 47. 
An honest insane delusion is to be viewed in the same light, § 48. 
But the delusion must have been the cause of the crime in order to excuse 
it, and not collateral, § 52. 
3d. CASES WHERE THE DEFENDANT IS IMPELLED BY A MORBID AND UNCONTROLLABLE 
IMPULSE TO COMMIT THE PARTICULAR ACT, § 53. 
Moral insanity as viewed by the courts of this country, § 53. 
Opinions of the courts, §§ 53-57. 
The right and wrong test is impracticable as an absolute rule, §§ 60, 61. 


IV. HOW FAR INTOXICATION AFFECTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME, § 62. 


ko 


1st. INSANITY PRODUCED BY DELIRIUM TREMENS AFFECTS RESPONSIBILITY IN THE SAME 
WAY AS INSANITY PRODUCED BY ANY OTHER CAUSE, §§ 62. 

2d. INSANITY IMMEDIATELY PRODUCED BY INTOXICATION, DOES NOT DESTROY RESPONSI- 
BILITY WHERE THE PATIENT, WHEN SANE AND RESPONSIBLE, MADE HIMSELF VOL- 
UNTARILY INTOXICATED, § 66, 

3d. WHILE INTOXICATION IS, PER SE, NO DEFENCE TO THE FACT OF GUILT, YET WHEN 
THE QUESTION OF INTENT OR PREMEDITATION IS CONCERNED, IT MAY BE PROVED 
FOR THE PURPOSE OF DETERMINING THE PRECISE DEGREE, § 70, 

4th. BURDEN OF PROOF IN INSANITY, § 73. 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS.—ANALYTICAL TABLE, 


CHAPTER II. 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED PSYCHOLOGICALLY. 


Classification of Dr. Ray, § 74. 


6 ‘“* Flemming, § 75. 
& “ Ellinger, § 76. 
&“ “ Present Treatise, § 77. 


I. GENERAL THEORIES OF MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, § 78. 
1st. PsycHoLocicaL THEORY, § 79. 
2d. Somatic THEORY, § 80. 
3d. INTERMEDIATE THEORY, § 81. 


Il. HOW MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IS TO BE DETECTED, § 86. 
Ist. By wuom, § 86. 
Medical expert necessary for this purpose, § 86. 
Responsibility in law of medical examiner, § 87. 
Importance of examiner adopting his manner to patient’s condition, 
§ 90. 
Important that legal and medical officers should, in such cases, act in 
concert, § 90. 
Law as to the manner in which medical witness is to be examined on 
trial, § 92. 
Experts may be asked as to patient’s insanity, § 93. 
And this on an assumed state of facts, § 94. 
Law as to witnesses not experts, § 94. 
Books on insanity not generally admissible, ¢ 94. 
2d. AT WHAT TIME, § 95. 
(1.) Time of act, § 95. 
(2.) At trial, § 97. 
(3.) At and after sentence, § 98. 
3d. By wHart rests, § 100. 
(1.) Physiognomy, § 100. 
Relations of the different features, § 101. 
(2.) Bodily health and temperament, § 102. 
State of bowels, § 102. 
Physical disorganization, § 103. 
Insensibility to pain and cold, § 104. 
Irregularities in action of senses, § 105. 
Change in disposition, § 106. 
(3.) Hereditary tendency, § 107. 
Importance of this test, § 108. 
Admissible in point of law, § 108. 
Opinion of Gibson, C. J., § 108. 
(4.) Conversation and deportment, § 110. 
Necessity of great circumspection in this respect, § 110. 
Cases illustrating this, § 111. 
(5.) Nature of act, § 112. 
(a) Insensibility, § 112. 
(b) Its incongruity with antecedents, § 113. 
(c) Its motivelessness, § 114, 
(d) Its inconsequentiality, § 115. 


Ill. FROM WHAT MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. 
lst. Emorions, § 116. 
(1.) Remorse, § 116. 
(2.) Anger, § 118. 
(3.) Shame, § 122. 
(4.) Grief, § 124. 
(5.) Homesickness (Nostalgia), § 125. 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS.—ANALYTICAL TABLE, [BOOK I, 


2d. SimuLatep insanity, § 127. 

Necessity for close examination, § 127. 

Tests to be applied, § 128. 

Delirium most usually counterfeited, but the most difficult, § 129. 

Physiognomy and health to be examined, § 130. 

Case to be compared with other recorded cases, § 131. 

Simulation not to be inferred from absence of a trace of insanity at the 
examination, § 132. 

Causes why such signs may be suppressed, § 132. 

Pretended insanity frequently turns into real, § 133. 

How examination is to be conducted, 2 134. 

Patient to be brought into a succession of relations, §§ 135-8. 

To be furnished with pen, ink, and paper, and other methods of exa- 
mination, §§ 135-8. 

Insania Occulta, features of, § 139. 

Necessity of guarding against, § 139. 


IV. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH DERANGEMENT OF THE 
SENSES AND DISEASE, § 140. 

Ist. DEAF Anp Dump, § 140. 

2d. Buinp, § 141. 

3d. Epiieptics, § 142. 

Peculiar tendency of epilepsy to insanity, § 142. 
Nature of epilepsy, § 143. 
Distinction between the several classes, § 144. 
Different stages of the disease, § 145. 
Actions committed during attack, not valid, § 146. 
Rule as to intermediate stages, § 147. 
Tests laid down by Clarus, § 148. 


V. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP, § 149. 
General effect of sleep on the senses, § 149. 
Ist. SoMNOLENTIA OR SLEEP-DRUNKENNESS, § 151. 
2d. SomnamsBttism, § 159. 


VI. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS AFFECTING THE TEMPERAMENT, § 163. 
Ist. DEpREssion, § 163. 
2d. Hypocuonpria, § 166. 
od. Hysteria, § 169. 
4th. Metancuony, § 170. 


Vil. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS AFFECTING THE MORAL SYSTEM, § 174. 
Ist. GENERAL MORAL MANIA, § 174. 
Effect of, § 174. 
General symptoms, § 175. 
Illustrations, § 176. 
2d. Monomant, § 177. 7 
Doctrine of Mania sine Delirio, § 178. 
Difference of opinion as to its existence, § 178. 
Authorities sustaining it, § 179. 
ce rejecting it, § 183. 
Tests to be applied to it, § 184 (3). 
Its legal relations, § 184 (5). 
(1.) Homicidal mania, § 186. 
Cases where Esquirol supposes it to exist, § 186. 
Precautions necessary in its recognition, § 190. 
Tests suggested by Dr. Ray, § 190. 
2 4 Dr. Taylor, § 190. 
Dr. Mayo’s objections to the entire theory, § 191. 
(2.) Kleptomania—(morbid propensity to steal), § 192. 
(3.) Pyromania—(morbid incendiary propensity), § 195. 
How far recognized in England, § 197. 
Necessary tests, 3 198. 
(4.) Aidoiomania—(morbid sexual propensity), § 199. 
(5.) Pseudonomania—(morbid lying propensity}, § 202. 
(6.) Oikeiomania—(morbid state of domestic affections), § 204. 
(7.) Suicidal mania—(morbid propensity to self-destruction), § 206. 
Tendency to this in cases of melancholy, &c., § 207. 
Legal consequences in actions against life insurers, § 208. 


‘ 


BOOK I. ] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS.—ANALYTICAL TABLE, 


(8.) Fanatico-mania, § 209. 
(a): Supernatural or pseudo- nab demoniacal possession. 
a'. A priori improbability of such possession, § 209. 
b'. Solubility of the instances of such possession by na- 
tural tests. 
a®, Disease, § 210. “ 
b2. Morbid imitative sympathy, § 211. 
c?, Legerdemain and fraud, § 212. 
d’, Mistake of senses, § 213. 
e?. Guess work, § 214. 
Jf?. Natural phenomena at present inexplicable, § 215. 
ce’. Historical evidence of such possession, § 216. 
(b) Religious insanity. 
a'. Christianity, taken in its practical sense, has no ten- 
dency to produce insanity, § 217. 
- What is called religious insanity is produced 
a*, By a departure from practical Christianity. 
a’, Reliance on frames and emotions, § 218. 
b3- Appeal to unscriptural supernaturalism, § 219, 
c3, Appeal to the selfish element, 3 219 (a). 
b?, By constitutional idiosyncrasies, § 219 (6). 
(c) Fanatico-mania as a defence, § 219 (c). 
(9) Politico-mania, § 220. 
How far an epidemic, § 221. 
Causes likely to generate it, 3 221. 


Vill. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH PROSTRATION, § 222. 
Ist. Ipiocy, § 222. 
Nature of, § 222. 
Physical incidents of, §§ 223-5-6. 
Cretinism, § 228. 
2d. Imprciuiry, § 229. 
With concomitant insanity, § 230. 
Original, § 230. 
Supervening, § 230. 
Specious, § 230. 
With confusion of mind, § 230. 
Without insanity, § 231. 
Distinction between innocent and malignant imbecility, § 232. 
2d. DrementtA, § 234. 


IX. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS ACCOMPANIED WITH DELIRIUM, § 235. 
lst. GENERAL DeEtirnium, § 235. 
(a) Depressed delirium, § 236. 
(b) Maniacal delirium, § 237. 
(c) Delirium tremens, § 238. 
(d) Puerperal mania, § 239. 
2d. ParriaL Dexirium, § 240. 


X. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH DELUSIONS AND HALLU- 
CINATIONS, § 241. 

Ist. GENERAL, § 241. 
Marked by general derangement of the perceptive faculties, § 241. 
Various phases it assumes, § 242. 
Tests of Ellinger, § 243. 
Effect of general delusion, § 244. 

2d. Partiat, § 245. 
Delusions and hallucinations, § 245. 
When there is no other sign of mental unsoundness, § 246. 
When mental unsoundness has made some progress, § 247. 
In cases of drunkenness, &c., § 248. 
In cases of developed insanity, § 249. 
Causes of delusions, § 250. 
Abercrombie’s classification, § 252. 
Hallucination in regard to a change into, or a possession by, wild ani- 

mals, § 253. 


XI. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH LUCID INTERVALS, § 254, 
9) 


§ 1] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED LEGALLY. [BOOK I. 


XII. TREATMENT OF INSANE CRIMINALS, § 259. 
Necessity of separate places of confinement i in which insane criminals can ‘be 
placed, § 259. 

(1.) For Rerrisvrion, § 260. 

In most, if not all, cases of crime resulting from insane impulse, there 
is original responsibility, § 260. 

Insanity, in most cases, the result of moral excess, §§ 261-9. 
Qualified responsibility of lunatics, §§ 261-9. 

(2.) For Prevention, § 270. 
Mischief to society if monomaniacs are suffered to go at large, § 270. 
Necessity of restraint, § 271. 

(3.) For Exampte, § 272. 
Contagiousness of unchecked crime, § 272. 

(4.) For Rerorm, § 273. 


Impossibility of patient recovering when permitted to run at large, 
§ 273. 


Injury to the community from the want of secondary punishments, 
the result being acquittals of dangerous parties, from unwill- 
ingness to see the severer penalties inflicted, § 274. 
Ordinary penitentiaries inadequate, § 275. 
And so of ordinary lunatic asylums, § 276. 
(5.) Concluding remarks on the remodelling of our present system. 


CHAPTER I. 
MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED LEGALLY.(a) 


§ 1. Three relations exist in which mental unsoundness becomes a subject 
of inquiry in the courts of the United States :— 
I. Capacity to perform particular acts for the disposal of property, such as 
making contracts or gifts, and executing deeds or wills, in which cases the 

question is brought up by contesting the validity of the particular act itself. 

IT. General business capacity, in which case the question arises upon a 
petition to the chancellor or proper judicial officer of the jurisdiction, for a 
decree pronouncing the party to be incapable from lunacy or habitual drunken- 
ness, of managing his estate, and transferring the custody of it to a com- 
mittee. 

Ii. Responsibility for crime. 

In each of these relations the tests of unsoundness are distinct. In the 
first, as will presently be seen, a very modified degree of incapacity will be © 
sufficient, when accompanied by fraud, imposition or over-exercise of au- 
thority, to set aside a contract or to invalidate a will. In the second, a much 
less degree of general capacity is sufficient, than is necessary in the third; for 
there must always be a number of cases in which a party is morally capable of 
crime, and yet intellectually incapable of business. Keeping these facts in 
view, it is proposed to discuss the subject under the following heads :— 

I. What degree of unsoundness invalidates a contract or will. 

Ist. Imbecility generally, and herein of fraud and compulsion. 
2d. Partial insanity. 

3d. Lucid intervals. 

4th. Intoxication. 


(a) As to the general meaning of the term “ mental unsoundness,” see the authori- 
ties collected in 1 Beck’s Med. Jur. (11th edition) p. 764. 


6 


BOOK I.] WHAT INVALIDATES A CONTRACT OR WILL. [$ 8 


II. What is necessary to be proved in order to deprive a party of the man- 
agement of his estate. 


III. What degree of unsoundness avoids responsibility for crime. 


£ 


J. WHAT DEGREE OF UNSOUNDNESS INVALIDATES A CONTRACT OR WILL. 


§ 2. With regard to lunatics or idiots, in the popular sense, there can be no 
question in this connection. Upon them the law affixes its visible stamp, and 
by virtue of a commission of lunacy,(aa) to be considered under the next head, 
pronounces them incapable of transferring property. Nor to invalidate their 
acts is it necessary that a decree of lunacy should have been actually pro- 
nounced. The madman, even though his madness be a mere temporary deli- 
rium, cannot, by an executory contract,(b) bind himself either in person or in 
property ; and consequently in such a class of cases the judgment of the law 
must relieve him from responsibility. In this respect the test is the same in 
the criminal and the civil courts. There are, however, a large class of cases 
in which, as has been noticed, a contract or a will will be declared void, but 
in which there is a sufficient degree of intellect to create a responsibility for 
crime. These may be ranked as follows :-— 

Ist. Imbecility generally, and herein of fraud and compulsion. 

2d. Partial insanity. 

3d. Lucid intervals. 

4th. Intoxication. 


Ist. Imbectlity generally, and herein of fraud and compulsion. 


§ 3. Of this an illustration may be found in Lord Portsmouth’s case, which 
has been too often erroneously supposed by medical writers to sustain the 
position, that mere mental debility is enough, by itself, to avoid even the most 
solemn contract. Lord Portsmouth was married for the second time in March, 
1818, to a young woman who was the daughter of one of his trustees, the 
solicitor of the family, under whose charge he was at the time living. From 
earliest childhood he had displayed great weakness, both moral and mental, 
being cruel, timid, and fickle in his management of his household, and exceed- 
ingly capricious in his tastes. Upon his arrival at twenty-one, however, his 


(aa) A prior inquisition of lunacy is competent, but not. conclusive evidence of inca- 
pacity (Whitenack v. Striker, 1 Green, C. R. 8), but even when the jury find that the 
lunacy was prior to the disputed act, and without lucid intervals, the finding may be 
collaterally impeached. (Bannatyne v. Bannatyne, 15 Jur. 864; 14 English R. 581.) 

(6) It should always be borne in mind, that in point of practice there is a great dis- 
tinction between contracts executed (i. e., those which have already been performed), 
and contracts executory (i. e., those whose performance is sought to be enforced). 
The latter a court will not in general lend its aid to execute, when the party sought to 
be affected was at the time a lunatic. But on the other hand, when in good faith a 
party makes a contract with a lunatic, supposing him to be of sound mind, and it is 
impossible to restore the parties to their original position, the contract cannot after- 
wards be rescinded and the purchase money or other consideration recovered back. 
(See Beavan v. M‘Donnell, 24 English Rep. 486; 8. C. 9 Wels. H. & G. 310; Molton v. 
Camroux, 2 Exch. R. 487, 4 Exch. R. 17; see also cases cited, 9 Wels H. & G. 314, x.) 
See post, § 11. : 


§ 3] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED LEGALLY. [BOOK I. 


incapacity was such, as to induce his family to take steps to put him under 
the charge of a committee, and at their instance he joined with his father in 
suffering common recoveries, and making a new settlement of. the estate. It 
was not disputed that he mixed in society generally, corresponded with his 
friends, and settled his own accounts with his steward. His first marriage 
was in 1799, and took place under his family’s directions, with a lady several 
years older than himself, who it was understood took a general supervision of 
his affairs. In the settlement made at that marriage the father of his second 
wife was one of the trustees. The first wife died in November, 1813, and in 
February, 1814, Lord Portsmouth went down to London with his medical 
attendant, and being left in his trustee’s hands, a week afterwards contracted 
a second marriage to the trustee’s daughter. In 1823, not until after the birth 
of a child, which took place in 1822, a commission was issued to inquire into 
_ his lunacy, the result of which, after a long contest, was a finding that he was 
of unsound mind, and had been so since January, 1809. The committee ap- 
pointed under this procedure immediately filed a petition in the Ecclesiastical 
Court to annul the second marriage. Sir John Nicholl, in deciding the case, 
said: “That considerable weakness of mind, circumvented by proportionate 
fraud, will vitiate the fact of marriage, whether the fraud is practised on his 
ward by a party who stands in the relation of a guardian, as in the case of 
Harford against Morris,(c) which was decided principally on the ground of 
fraud; or whether it is effected by a trustee, procuring the solemnization of the 
marriage of his own daughter with a person of very weak mind, over whom 
he has acquired great ascendency. A person incapable from weakness of 
detecting the fraud, and of resisting the ascendency practised in obtaining his 
consent to the contract, can hardly be considered as binding himself in point 
of law by such an act. At all events, the circumstances preceding and attend- 
ing the marriage itself may materially tend to show that the contracting party 
was of unsound mind, and was so considered and treated by the parties engaged 
in fraudulently effecting the marriage. In respect to Lord Portsmouth’s un- 
soundness of mind, the case set up is of a mixed nature, not absolute idiocy, 
but weakness of understanding—not continued insanity, but delusions and irra- 
tionality on particular subjects. Absolute idiocy, or constant insanity, would 
have carried with them their own security; for in either case, the forms pre- 
ceding, and the ceremony itself, could not have been gone through without 
exposure and detection; but here a mixture of both, by no means uncommon, 
is set up—considerable natural weakness, growing at length from being left to 
itself and uncontrolled, into practices so irrational and unnatural as in some 
instances to be bordering on idiocy, and in others to be attended with actual 
delusion—a perversion of mind—a deranged imagination—a fancy and belief 
of the existence of things which no rational being, no person possessed of his 
powers of reason and judgment, could possibly believe to exist. * * * It 
appeared that in February, 1814, Lord Portsmouth was brought to London 
by his medical attendant, and delivered up to his trustees, Hanson being one, 
and then in town—that day week he was married to the daughter of Mr. 


(c) 2 Hag. Cons. R. 423. 


BOOK I.] IMBECILITY, AND HEREIN OF FRAUD AND COMPULSION. [§ 4 


Hanson. The confidential solicitor of the family, one of the trustees, who had 
a great ascendency over him, who owed him every possible protection, married 
him to one of his daughters! It is unnecessary to state the jealousy with 
which the law looks at all transactions between parties standing in these rela- 
tions to each other. The whole transaction will bear but one interpretation : 
every part of it is the act of the Hansons! Lord Portsmouth is a mere instru- 
ment in their hands, to go through with the necessary forms; the settlement 
is begun in forty-eight hours after Lord Portsmouth’s arrival in London! 
The contents of that settlement; the mode in which it was prepared; the 
concealment of the whole from the friends and the other trustees who were in 
town, some in the same house with Lord Portsmouth, all these particulars 
bear the same character. The necessary forms are gone through with, but in 
support of these mere forms, not a witness is produced to show that this 
nobleman was conducting himself as a man understanding what he was doing, 
or capable of judging, or acting as a free and intelligent agent ; nothing tending 
to show he was a person of unsound mind; nothing in his conduct inconsistent 
with unsoundness of mind; every circumstance conspires to prove that he was 
the mere puppet of the Hanson family, and that the celebration of this 
marriage was brought about by a conspiracy among them to circumvent Lord 
Portsmouth, over whom they, and particularly the father, had a complete 
ascendency, so as to destroy all free agency and rational consent on his part to 
this marriage. A marriage so had, wants the essential ingredient to make 
the contract valid—the consent of a free and rational agent. The marriage 
itself, and the circumstances immediately connected with it, do not tend to 
establish restored sanity ; it was neither ‘a rational act’ nor was it ‘rationally 
done’—the whole ‘sounds to folly’ and negatives sanity of mind. The Han- 
sons, in the mode of planning and conducting the transaction, show that they 
treated and considered Lord Portsmouth as a person of unsound mind, and 
Lord Portsmouth in submitting and acquiescing, and not resisting, confirms 
his own incompetency. Even if no actual unsoundness of mind, strictly so 
called—if no insane derangement existed—if only weakness of mind—and all 
admit that he was weak—yet considering the passiveness and timidity of his 
character on the one hand—the influence and relation of Hanson, his trustee, 
on the other—and the clandestinity and other marks of fraud which accom- 
panied the whole transaction—I am by no means prepared to say, that without 
actual derangement in the strict sense, the marriage would not be invalid— 
but in my judgment Lord Portsmouth was of unsound mind, as well as 
circumvented by fraud.’’(d) 

§ 4. While, therefore, the learned judge before whom this case was heard, 
came to the conclusion that Lord Portsmouth was of ‘‘unsound mind,’ the 
position was broadly taken by him that weakness alone, when circumvented 
by fraud, would be sufficient to invalidate even so solemn a contract as mar- 
riage, and on this position his decision in part rested. Still more unequivocal 
was the decree of the Privy Council in dismissing an appeal from the Court 
of Chancery of the Isle of Man, setting aside two deeds, on the ground that 


(d) Portsmouth v. Portsmouth, 1 Hag. Ec. R. 355. 


§ 5] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED LEGALLY. [BOOK I. 


the grantor in both of them was of ‘unsound mind at the time he executed 
them, and that they were obtained from him by fraud and undue means. The 
evidence showed that the grantor, an old man, feeble both in body and mind, 
separated from all his relations, without a friend to advise him, and surrounded 
by those only who were contriving to get his fortune, conveyed away nearly 
all that he was possessed of, even the house he lived in, to persons not related 
to him, either in blood or connection : and all his estate in lease was to become 
the property of the same strangers after his death. The consideration of 
£100 was inserted for conveying away property worth £1400; and this was 
not to be paid to the grantor, but to his executor after his death, without any 
interest being charged on it in the meantime. Lord Wynford, in giving the 
opinion of the Privy Council, said, that the law would ‘‘not assist a man who 
‘is capable of taking care of his own interests, except in cases where he has 
- been imposed upon by deceit, against which ordinary prudence could not protect 
him. If a person of ordinary understanding, on whom no fraud has been 
practised, makes an improvident bargain, no court of justice can release him 
from it. Inadequacy of consideration is not a substantial ground for setting 
aside a conveyance of property. But those who, from imbecility of mind, are 
incapable of taking care of themselves, are under the special protection of the 
law. The strongest mind cannot always contend with deceit and falsehood ; 
a bargain, therefore, into which a weak one is drawn under the influence of 
either of these, ought not to be held valid, for the law requires that good faith 
should be observed in all transactions between man and man. If this convey- — 
ance could be impeached on the ground of the imbecility of the grantor only, 
a sufficient case has not been made out to render it invalid; for the imbecility 
must be such as to justify the jury, under a commission of lunacy, in putting 
his property and person under the protection of the Chancellor; but a degree 
of weakness of intellect far below that which would justify such a proceeding, 
coupled with other circumstances to show that the weakness, such as tt was, 
had been taken advantage of, will be sufficient to set aside any important 
deed.”’(e) This same view has been uniformly acted on in the English and 
American courts, and it is expressed by Mr. Justice Story with his usual 
precision.(/) ‘The acts and contracts of persons who are of weak under- 
standings, and who are thereby liable to impositions, will be held void in 
courts of equity, if the nature of the act or contract justify the conclusion, 
that the party has not exercised a deliberate judgment, but has been imposed 
upon, circumvented or overcome by cunning or undue influences.’’(g) When 
articles furnished are suitable necessaries, the estate of a person of weak mind 
is liable, if there be no fraud. (gq) 

§ 5. With even greater emphasis has the same doctrine been announced by 
courts of law in respect to wills. Peculiarly liable as is a dying man, even 
though his intellect be of average strength, to have his comfort destroyed, if 
not his purpose overturned, by those in whose society he is placed, the policy 


(e) Blachford v. Christian, 1 Knapp’s Rep. 73; Shelford on Lunacy, 272. 
(f) 1 Story Eq. Juris. § 238. 

(g) See also 1 Fonbl. Eq. B. 1, ch. 2, §3; Holland v. Miller, 12 La. An. 624. 
(9g) Skidmore v. Romaine, 2 Bradf. (N. Y.) 122. 

10 


BOOK I.| IMPOSITION ON TESTATORS, [§ 5 


of the law has anxiously sought for every safeguard by which such intrusions 
upon the sanctity of dissolution, as well as upon the rights of families, can be 
deprived of motive. ‘The same memory for the making of a will,” agreed all 
the judges of England at an early date, “is not at all times when the party 
can answer to anything with sense, but he ought to have judgment to discern 
and to be of perfect memory, otherwise the will is void.’(h) ‘He ought to 
have a disposing memory,’ said Lord Coke, ‘‘so that he is able to make a 
disposition of his lands with understanding and reason; and that is such a 
memory as the law calls sane and perfect.”’(7) While, therefore, it is only 
necessary that there should be the capacity of reasonable disposition, great 
jealousy has been exercised for the correction of extraneous influence on the 
testator. Thus wills have been set aside when they were preceded by over- 
importunity of friends standing in confidential relations,(j) where the house- 
keeper and physician were shown to have earnestly urged a non-natural scheme 
of distribution ;(%) where the wife in fact dictated the will, the testator being 
at the time unable to speak, she pretending to understand him, and making 
herself the sole devisee for life, and imposing as a devisee in remainder a ficti- 
tious niece ;(/) where one relation produced the disinheritance of another by 
false representations as to his character ;(m) where the testator was old and 
feeble, and the will was made under the directions and to suit the purposes of 
a colored woman in the family,(m) and where a husband exercises coercion. (0) 
In short, whenever the provisions of a will are inconsistent with natural justice, 
it will require strong proof of capacity and volition to sustain it, and slight 
proof of undue influence or fraud to set it aside.(p) Where a presumption of 
imposition exists, e. g., from the fact of the penman of the will taking a pecu- 
niary benefit under it, the courts exact “the most decisive proof of the com- 
plete absence of influence and excitement at the preparation and making of the 
asserted will, and must require unimpeachable evidence of unbiassed volition 


(h) Combe’s case, Moore R. 759. 

({) Marquis of Winchester’s case, 6 Rep. 24; 2 Buls. 211. The same point is put 
with still greater simplicity by Judge Washington: “ Had he a disposing memory— 
was he capable of recollecting the property he was about to bequeathe—the manner of 
distributing it and the objects of his bounty.” (Stevens v. Vanclerc, 4 W. C. C. R. 
262.) Proof, however, of intellect having been impaired by disease, or of intellectual 
feebleness alone, will not avail by itself to defeat a will, when adequate capacity re- 
mains. Sloan v. Maxwell, 2 Green. Ch. 563; Andrews v. Weller, ibid. 604; Dunick 
v. Reichenback, 10 8. & R. 84. The cases will be found enumerated in 1 Powell on 
Devises, 127; Shelford on Lunacy, 275-6; 4 Kent’s Com. 566; 1 Jarman on Wills, 28. 
See also Converse v. Converse, 21 Vt. 168; Horne v. Horne, 9 Ired. 99; Harrison v. 
Rowan, 3 W. C. C. R. 580; Grabil v. Barr, 5 Barr, 441; Denn v. Johnson, 2 South. 
454; Kinne v. Kinne, 9 Conn. 102; Ford v. Ford, 7 Humph. 92; Howard v. Coke, 7 
B. Monr. 665; Blanchard v. Nestle, 3 Denio, 37; Modern Probate of Wills, 91. In 
Scotland an arbitrary test is applied, it being there provided that no settlement or 
gift executed after the commencement of the disease of which a person dies, except 
those in the ordinary administration of the estate, shall be valid. If the testator sur- 
vives sixty days afterwards, or has been to market unsupported, the will is validated. 
Bell’s Dict. ‘‘ Death Bed.” 

(j) Hacker v. Newborn, Style, 427. (k) Ex parte Fearon, 5 Ves. 633. 

(/) Scribner v. Crane, 2 Paige C. C. R. 147. 

(m) Dietrick v. Dietrick, 5 8.-& R. 207; Nussear v. Arnold, 13 8. & R. 323; Patter- 
son v. Patterson, 6S. & R. 55. 

(n) Denton v. Franklin, 9 B. Monr. 28. (0) Marsh v. Tyrel, 2 Hag. Ec. 84, 141. 

(p) Brydges v. King, 1 Hag. Hc. R. 256; Goble v. Grant, 1 Green C. R. 629; Baker 
v. Lewis, 4 Rawle, 356. fi 


§ 7] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED LEGALLY. [BOOK TI. 


and of clear capacity, and must expect it to be shown by instructions coming 
from the deceased himself.”’(q) To authorize a will in favor of a wife, how- 
ever, to be set aside, the influence alleged to have been exerted must be shown 
to have reached coercion, destroying the husband’s free agency,(7) or fraud 
itself must be proved.(s) In ordinary cases also, it will not be enough to prove 
mere influence, without proof of fraud or contrivance,(¢) or such coercion as 
destroys free agency.(w) ‘Honest intercession and persuasion,” ‘and fair 
and flattering speeches,” though abundantly proved to have been used, do not 
affect the instrument’s validity.(v) ‘The fact of the paper being entirely in a 
party’s handwriting gives a strong presumption of sanity, which is not effaced 
by proof of generally impaired intellect, nor by the fact, that when the paper 
is a will, in it omissions of property exist.(w) The same presumption exists 
when the testator has a distinct recollection, at the time of the execution of 
the will, of the terms he directed at the time it was prepared. (a) 

§ 6. It is obvious, therefore, that no fixed minimum of capacity can be 
determined upon, which will be necessary to sustain a contract or will. 
While, on the one hand, it is clear that a madman or a drunkard, during the 
prevalence of the insane or drunken delusion is totally incompetent for such a 
purpose, it is equally clear that persons whose intellects are abundantly strong 
enough to create an entire responsibility for their acts in a criminal court,(y) 
will yet be held incompetent to pass away their property, when it appears undue 
influence or fraud has been used upon them to produce an unjust result. (yy). 

§ 7. The existence of idiocy, when that alone is set up, can be determined 
by comparatively simple tests. If the pretended idiot can be shown to have 
intelligently performed acts of business during the period in which idiocy is 
claimed to exist, the allegation of incompetency falls, unless fraud or constraint 
be shown. Thus in a case determined in Doctors’ Commons in March, 1852, (z) 
Dr. Lushington said, ‘Before entering upon this branch of the case, I must 
bear in mind what the nature of the case set up in opposition to the will is. 
I must repeat that it is not lunacy—it is not monomania—it is not any species 
of mental disorder, the symptoms of which it may, at periods, be difficult to 
detect ; but the case presented is that of idiocy or imbecility, the characteristic 
of which is permanence, with little or no variation, though often, in case of 
idiots, it does sometimes happen that there will be a greater degree of excite- 
ment demonstrated than at other periods. How is such a case to be met? 
I apprehend, to meet it and to show that such a state of things did not exist 


(q) Dodge v. Meech, 1 Hag. E. R. 620; Barry v. Butlin, 1 Curtis, 637; see 2 Jarman 
on Wills, (Am. ed.) 421. 

(r) Clarke v. Sawyer, 3 Sanf. Ch. R. 351; Gardiner v. Gardiner, 22 Wend. 526. 

(s) Scribner v. Crane, 2 Paige C. R. 147. 

(t) Lowe v. Williamson, 1 Green C. R. 82; Blanchard v. Nestle, 3 Denio, 37; 1 Jar- 
man on Wills (2d Am. ed.) 36; 1 Williamson on Exs. (2d Am. ed.) 37. 

(u) Brown v. Mollison, 3 Wh. 129; Potts v. House, 6 Georg. 324; Woodward v. 
James, 3 Strob. 552; see 1 Jarman on Wills (2d Am. ed.) 36. 

(v) 1 Jarman on Wills (2d Am. ed.) 37. 

(w) M‘Daniel’s Will, 2 J. J. Marsh, 331; Fullock v. Allison, 3 Hag. 527. 

(x) Hathorn ». King, 8 Mass. 371. 

(y) See M‘Taggart v. Thompson, 2 Harris, 149. 

(yy) Chevalier v. Whatley, 12 La. An. 651. 

(z) Bannatyne v. Bannatyne, 16 Jur. 864, 14 English R. 581. 

12 


BOOK I.] | COMPETENCY TO MAKE WILLS OR CONTRACTS. [$9 


at any given period, proofs of acts of business are most important evidence. 
Many acts of business could possibly be done by a lunatic, and the lunacy not 
detected ; but it is scarcely possible to predicate the same of an idiot or lunatic, 
or an imbecile person. I shall look, therefore, in the first instance, to the acts 
of business. It is proved by Mr. Falkner, that the deceased kept an account 
with Messrs. Tuckwell, at Bath, for four years, from 1818 to 182i, and during 
all that period, occasionally drew drafts, and all those drafts were paid to 
himself over the counter. According to the evidence, the deceased came him- 
self to the counter, and there is no proof of any one accompanying him on 
such occasions ; he asked for the sum he wanted ; the clerk filled it in, he signed 
it, and took the money. Surely no idiot could have done this, for he must 
have exercised thought to go to the bank, memory and judgment as to the 
thing required; and moreover, his conduct and demeanor could not at such 
times have been as described by the witnesses against the will, or, from the 
glaring colors in which his imbecility is depicted, it must have been discovered, 
und the business never could have been transacted at all. * * * JT con- 
sider these transactions, then, of first rate importance towards solving all the 
difficulties of this case; for here, after the lapse of about thirty years, the court 
has the advantage of facts proved, with the dates duly affixed to them. There 
is, I must say, not the least evidence to show that in any one of these acts of 
business the deceased was assisted by any person whatever, the presumption is 
the other way ; and to put these acts upon the very lowest basis on which they 
can be placed, they do utterly disprove idiocy or imbecility. I will simply 
repeat what I have already indeed said, that those who are afflicted with 
lunacy, sometimes have the management of, and can manage, their pecuniary 
affairs—an idiot, never.”’ 

§ 8. It should be kept in mind, that the question of competency is intimately 
affected by the character of the act or instrument which it is sought to annul. 
A reasonable marriage, such as that of Lord Portsmouth to his first wife, 
entered upon under the advice of his family, and to a person every way compe- 
tent to secure his position and his character from disgrace or injury, may be 
sustained ; while an unsuitable one, to a woman of light character, will be set 
aside, when it appears that it was influenced by overpowering authority or 
trickery. A will, making a just distribution of an estate, will be held per se 
strong evidence of disposing capacity, while one turning the testator’s property 
into an unnatural channel, gives at least some presumption to the contrary. (a) 
This is broadly stated by Sir John Nicholl in a recent case,(b) where he 
declares, that where a will is traced into the hands of a testator whose sanity 
is fairly impeached, but of whose sanity or insanity at the time of doing or 
performing some act with relation to the will, there is no direct evidence, the 
agent is to be inferred rational, or the contrary, from the character of the act.(c) 

§ 9. In all cases except those when the act sought to be annulled was com- 


(a) Stewart v. Lispenard, 26 Wend. 255; Means v. Means, 5 Strobh. 167; Roberts 
v. Trawick, 13 Alab. 68; Couch v. Couch, 7 Alab. 519 ; Bannatyne v. Bannatyne, 16 
Jur. 864, 14 English Rep. 581. 

(b) Scruby v. Fordham, 1 Addams, 90. 

(c) See generally 1 Jarman on Wills (2 Am. ed. ) 69. ie 


$10] © MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED LEGALLY. [BOOK I. 


mitted during actual insanity, the question is not whether the party had a 
capacity to do the particular thing intelligently, but whether he had capacity 
and information enough to comprehend and disregard any attempt which may 
have been mace to coerce or deceive him. Precedents and authority on this 
branch of law, consequently, must stand by themselves, and cannot be con- 
sidered as applying to the more important part of the present chapter, where 
this subject of responsibility for criminal offences is considered. 

Mr. Shelford’s views on this point are worthy of grave consideration. 
“One person,” he says, “seeing a testator in extreme age, or under extreme 
sickness, thinks that if he knows those about him, and can answer an ordinary 
question with respect to the state of his illness, or his wants, such and similar 

matters render him capable of giving effect to a disposition by will, however 
complicated it may be, by the mere formal execution of the instrument; while 
another person may be of opinion, that though a testator, in the ordinary 
management of his affairs, can hold reasonable conversation, can fully compre- 
hend all the usual and simple transactions of life, yet, if he is unable to take 
the active management of all his concerns, however involved those concerns 
may be, or if he is liable to become confused by entering into intricate trans- 
actions, he is totally incapable, and cannot enter into a testamentary disposi- 
tion, however plain and simple it may be. Now, when opinions are formed 
by such opposite standards, it is obvious much contrariety will occur. Sir 
John Nicholl observed that experience in the Ecclesiastical Court teaches us, 
that evidence upon questions of capacity is almost always contradictory, such - 
evidence being commonly that of opinion merely; and this contrariety pro- 
ceeds from the obvious grounds, that of the witnesses, no two, possibly, have 
seen the party whose estate is deposed to, at precisely the same circumstances; 
and that each, again, of the several witnesses, no matter how numerous, 
measures, possibly, testamentary capacity by his own particular standard. 
These sources of discrepancy, and many more might be enumerated, are com- 
mon to all cases of this description. There is an additional source, when the 
transaction of which they have to speak is remote, a circumstance sufficient in 
itself to account for no inconsiderable degree of contrariety of evidence, even 
where the witnesses have to speak of facts merely, and not of opinions formed 
and inferences built upon facts, of which most of the evidence furnished upon 
questions of capacity is commonly made up. If the court, therefore, on ques- 
tions of capacity, is accustomed to rely but little upon such evidence, so far as 
it is that of mere opinion, but to form its own judgment from the facts and 
the conduct of the parties at the time, it becomes it to do so, more peculiarly 
when much of the evidence not merely consists of opinions delivered long sub- 
sequently to the transactions which they profess to have suggested them, upon 
loose recollections, too, and after repeated discussions of the subject matter 
with interested parties.’’(d) 

§ 10. The lowest test of capacity was applied in a very much contested case 

in New York, which is cited at large by Dr. Beck, and which excited great 
interest from the immense property at stake, and the respectability of the 


(d) Shelford on Lunacy, 277-8. See ex parte Vanauken, 2 Stockt. (N. U.) 186. 
14 


BOOK I.] WHAT CONSTITUTES TESTAMENTARY CAPACITY. [$ 11 


parties. It was there ruled—and for the facts it is not necessary to do more 
than refer to the pages of the report, or to Dr. Beck’s excellent summary— 
that where a female had been always under the control of her friends, had 
never attempted to transact business, and manifested intellect and understand- 
ing only to a very low degree, a will executed by her in favor of a relative 
with whom she had spent the latter portion of her life, which was in accord- 
ance with intentions previously expressed by her, which was reasonable in 
itself, and the object of which she understood, was valid, though it did not 
appear that she had given previous instruction for the draft of the will.(e) 
The authority of the case, it is true, is greatly weakened by the fact that it 
was decided by a vote of 12 to 6 of the Court of Errors of New York, which, 
under the constitution then in force, was the Senate of the State, and being 
chiefly a lay court, never possessed high professional authority, and which in 
the present instance reversed a decision to the contrary of the late very able 
Chancellor. Without regarding this case, therefore, as of great weight, so far 
as the authority of the senators who concurred with the majority are concerned, 
it may nevertheless be cited as a powerful illustration of the reluctance felt in 
both the professional and popular mind to overturn a will which in itself is in 
accordance with common sense and proper feeling. 

§ 11. Upon similar principles the contracts of a person claimed to be im- 
becile or lunatic, are to be tested. An important distinction, however, is to 
be noticed in this respect. While on the one hand the courts will not lend 
their aid to execute or carry into effect a contract entered into by an incapa- 
ble person, unless, perhaps, for necessaries,(/) where the fact of incapacity 
was known to the creditor; yet such is not the law when the incapacity was 
unknown, and no advantage has been taken, particularly when the contract 
has been in part executed.(g) ‘‘ Where a person,” says Pollock, C. B.,(h) 
‘‘apparently of sound mind, and not known to be otherwise, enters into a 
contract for the purchase of property which is fair and bona fide, and which is 
executed and completed, and the property, the subject of the matter of the 
contract, has been paid for and fully enjoyed, and cannot be destroyed, so as 
to put the parties in statu quo, such contract cannot afterwards be set aside, 
either by the alleged lunatic, or those who represent him.”’(¢) It is true that 
the leaning of American authority was for some time towards the position 
that the contracts of a lunatic, executed or unexecuted, were per se void, un- 
less for necessaries ;(j) but more recently the justice of the exceptions already 
noticed has been recognized.(é) Nothing, however, but a strong case of 
fairness, innocence, and fulness of consideration, can validate a deed when the 
grantor is insane.(/) | 


(e) See 2 Beck’s Med. Jur. 828, &c.; Stewart v. Lispenard, 26 Wend. 255. 

(f) Chitty on Contracts, 112; Story on Contracts, § 27; Addison on Contracts, 873. 
Skidmore v. Romaine, 2 Bradf. (N. Y.) 122. 

(g) Molton v. Camroux, 4 Exch. 17; 8. C. 2 Exch. R. 49. See ante, § 2. 

(h) 2 Exch. 503. 

(i) See also Beavan v. M’Dowell, 24 English R. 486; 9 Wells, H. and G. 309. 

(j) La Rue v. Giltyson, 4 Barr, 375; Mitchell v. Kingman, 5 Pick. 431; Rice v. 
Peet, 13 Johns. 543; Grant v. Thompson, 4 Connect. 103; Long v. Whidden, 2 N. H. 
435 ; Fitzgerald v. Reed, 9 Sm. & Mar. ; Ceaver v. Phelps, 11 Pick. 304. 

(k) Beals v. See, 10 Barr, 56. 

(1) Desilver’s Est. 5 Rawle, 11; Bonsall v. Chancellor, 5 Wharton R. 37. 

15 


§ 13] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED LEGALLY. [BOOKTI. 


§ 12. Testamentary incapacity does not necessarily presuppose the existence 
of insanity, in its technical sense. Weakness of intellect from extreme old 
age, whether arising from great bodily infirmity, or from intemperance, when 
it disqualifies the testator from knowing or appreciating the nature, effect, or 
consequences of the act he is engaged in, works a similar disability.(m) Great 
caution, indeed, should be used, lest the existence of extreme old age should 
lead the medical witness to presume consequent imbecility. Against such a 
sequence the policy of the law and the interest of humanity unite in protest- 
ing. ‘It is one of the painful consequences of extreme old age,” very beauti- 
fully said Chancellor Kent, in one of his earlier judgments, “‘that it ceases to 
excite interest, and is apt to be left solitary and neglected. The control which 
the law still gives to a man over the disposal of his property, is one of the 
most efficient means which he has in protracted life to command the attention 
due his infirmities. The will of such an aged man ought to be regarded with 
great tenderness, when it appears not to have been procured by fraudulent 
acts, but contains those very dispositions which the circumstances of his situa- 
tion and the course of the natural affections dictated.’ (n) 

In harmony with these views, wills have been sustained when the testator 
was eighty years of age, very deaf, and partially blind ;(0) where he was of 
the same age, and was afflicted with a palsy, so that he could neither write 
nor feed himself ;(p) and when he was between ninety and a hundred, and 
greatly debilitated.(q) It is true that when in old age the testator is shown 
to have been imposed upon or coerced, the will will be set aside; but this | 
rather tends to strengthen than invade the sanctity of the testamentary 
privilege. (7) 

The same view is to be taken of the bodily infirmities peculiar to old age. 
If they produce mental debility, of course, they work incapacity. But their 
mere existence will not be sufficient to produce this result.(77) As long as it 
can be done consistently with public justice, the policy of the law requires that 
the protection to old age, afforded by the right of testamentary disposal, 
should continue unimpaired; and it is permitted to cease only when actual 
wrong would be done to third parties by its continuance, or where by exposing 
the possessor to undue solicitation or to imposition, it proves an annoyance 
rather than an advantage. Nor is this rule without its foundation in the results 
of observation. The truth that the mind is not necessarily affected by bodily 
infirmity, is illustrated by numerous cases, one of the most striking of which 
is that of Dugald Stewart, who when unable from disease to take general ex- 
ercise, to use his right hand, or to articulate distinctly, composed the third 
and fourth volumes of his Philosophy of the Human Mind. 

§ 13. While a person blind, or deaf and dumb, is fully competent to make 
a will, the burden is upon the party setting the will up to prove that the tes- 


(m) Leech v. Leech, 11 Penn. Law J. 177. See in this connection Dr Day’s “ Prac- 
tical Treatise on the Domestic Management of the Most Important Diseases of Advanced 
Life.” T. & W. Boome, London. 1849. 

(n) Van Alst v. Hunter, 5 Johns. Ch. 148. 

(0) Lowe v. Williamson, 1 Green Ch. 82. (p) Reed’s Will, 2 B. Monr. 79. 

(q) Van Alst v. Hunter, 5 Johns. Ch. 148. 

(r) 1 Jarm. on Wills, (2d Am. Ed.) 53. 

(rr) Ex parte Vanauken, 2 Stockt. (N. J.) 186. 

16 


BOOK I.] HOW FAR PARTIAL INSANITY DESTROYS CAPACITY, [§$ 14 


tator knew the contents of the will, and was not imposed upon.(s) It hag 
been questioned whether a person who was both blind and deaf and dumb, is 
competent to execute any instrument requiring consideration, (¢) though in a late 
South Carolina case the possibility of a contrary view seems to be intimated. (w) 
And, however wisely such may have been held to be the law at a time when 
to be deaf, dumb, and blind, was equivalent to being utterly deprived of the 
avenues of perception, such can hardly be considered to be the case now, when 
to that unfortunate class a method of communication has been opened which 
may fit them to sustain and appreciate the relations of society. 


2d. Partial Insanity. 


§ 14. In most of the American States, proof of the existence of partial in- 
sanity is insufficient to defeat a will, unless the will be its direct offspring: pro- 
vided, that, at the time of making the will, the testator be sane in other respects 
upon ordinary subjects.(v) ‘It appears to me,” says Mr. Justice Sergeant, in 
delivering an opinion of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in 1839,(w) 
“that the only question in such a case is, whether the person was of sound 
memory and discretion, considering the act done in all its bearings, and judg- 
ing of the soundness of the mind of the supposed testator by his conduct and 
declarations at the time, and as connected with his previous insanity, and the 
degree of restoration of mind in the interval; and that if the erroneous and 
groundless impressions, received during the time of his delirium, shall retain 
their hold (whether by some physical derangement of the brain, or by some 
indelible stamp on the thinking faculties), that person must be considered still 
under a delusion—the effect continues, and it is only by effects we can judge 
of the existences of the exciting cause—and if he is under a delusion, though 
there be but a partial insanity, yet if tt be in relation to the act in question, 
it is well settled it will invalidate contracts generally, and defeat a will 
which is the direct offspring of this partial insanity.” 

The converse of this result, depending, however, on the same principle, is 
illustrated by a case decided by Judge King, in Philadelphia, in 1851. “A 
monomaniacal delusion,” he said, “‘ inveterately entertained by a testator against 
one who would otherwise have been the natural object of his bounty, and 
shown to be the reason which has excluded him from it, and to have had no 
other existence except the distempered imagination of the testator, would in- 
validate a will made under such influence. And for the very plain reason that 
a will made under the suggestion of such an insane delusion, is not what the 
law requires a will to be, the product of a mind capable of reasoning rightly. 
For although the law recognizes the difference between general and partial 
insanity, yet if the will has been made under the influence of such partial in- 
sanity, and as the product of it, it is as invalid as if made under the effects of 


(s) 1 Jarman on Wills (2d Am. ed.), 48. (t) Ibid. 

(uw) Reynolds v. Reynolds, 1 Spear, 756-7. 

(v) Shelford, Lunacy, 41, 296; 1 Jarm. on Wills (2d Am. ed.), 58. 

(w) Boyd v. Eby, 8 W. 70. : 
2 | 


§ 15] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IN REFERENCE TO WILLS. [BOOK I. 


an insanity never so general. Eccentricities of conduct, absurd opinions, or 
belief in things appearing. to us extravagant, although they may be and are 
evidences of testamentary incapacity, do not constitute it necessarily and in 
themselves. A man may believe in witches and witchcraft, as it seems this 
testator did, or like him he may have believed his health to have been perma- 
nently affected by slow poisons surreptitiously administered to him, and yet 
be competent to make a will, where such will is not shown to have some con- 
nection with such absurd opinions or extravagant belief, and where the mind 
is shown to be in other respects sound and vigorous, and the judgment intelli- 
gent and clear. This testator was upwards of eighty-three years old when he 
died, and consequently received his early impressions when the belief in witches 
and witchcraft still lingered among persons of a much higher social position, 
and of much better education than himself. Colonial America either inherited 
from the mother country, or received from the emigration of continental 
Europe, this absurd notion. Pennsylvania did not so far escape the general 
contagion as to make it very surprising that a man in the condition of life 
occupied by the testator, born before the American Revolution, should have 
participated in it.’’(2) 

§ 15. The English rule was for a long time considered settled on the same 
basis, and was set forth with great fulness by the Prerogative Court, during 
Sir J. Nicholl’s presidency.(y) The question there was as to the testamentary 
capacity of a gentleman named Stott, an eminent electrician, who had an only 
child, against whom he had, without cause, imbibed an uncontrollable disgust 
and aversion, which manifested itself in acts of great cruelty and oppression, — 
and ultimately in a will by which she was cut off in favor of collateral relations. 
Sir J. Nicholl pronounced against the will, saying, ‘‘ The deceased’s state of 
mind at the time of making his will, is intimately, I think, connected with his 
state of mind on the subject matter of his will—understanding by this, the 
disposal, by will, of his property. If the deceased were at all times of unsound 
mind on the ‘subj ect matter of his will, he must have been of unsound mind at 
the time of making his will. To suppose the contrary would be to suppose 
the deceased both sane and insane at the same time and on the same subject ; 
a supposition, I apprehend, equally absurd in a legal and moral point of view. 
And, subject to these considerations, the question in the end to be determined, 
the point at final issue is—not whether the deceased’s insanity in certain other 
particulars, as proved by the daughter, should have the effect of defeating a 
will, generally, of the deceased, or even this identical will—but it is, whether his 
insanity, on the subject of his daughter, as, also proved by the daughter, 
should have the effect of defeating, not so much any will (a will generally), 
of the deceased, as this identical will—and to the decision of that question I 
am to be understood as solely addressing myself in the following observations :— 

‘“‘Now the daughter being in this case the sole next of kin, the deceased’s 
only child, it is quite impossible, I think, to disconnect the daughter from the - 
subject matter of his will, that is of his property—they are subjects, in effect, 
identified. Hence the deceased’s insanity on the subject of his daughter gene- 


(x) Leech v. Leech, 11 Pa. L. J. 179. 
" (y) Dew v. Clark, 1 Addams, 279 ; 2 Ibid. 102; 3 Ibid. 79. 


BOOK IL] HOW FAR PARTIAL INSANITY INCAPACITATES, [$ 15 


rally speaking, being proved at all times, in my judgment, it follows that his 
insanity, at the time of making his will, is also proved, in my judgment, unless 
the contrary is to be inferred from the will itself. But the inference furnished 
by the will itself (and it is for this only that I refer to the disposative part—to 
the contents of the will at all), is quite the other way. For the prominent 
feature of the deceased’s insanity, in respect to the daughter, was aversion or 
antipathy to the daughter, so pleaded and so proved; and the will is a will 
plainly inofficious, so far as regards the daughter, being a will by which she 
is, in effect, disinherited—disinherited, too, in favor of parties nearly utter 
strangers to the deceased (for so it appears), though not remotely connected 
with him by blood, being his sister’s children. Therefore, it follows, that, in 
my judgment, the deceased is proved, upon the whole matter, to have been 
insane at the time of his making this will: which was the daughter’s case. 
* * %* Had the contents of the will furnished a contrary inference—had 
the will, so far as respects the daughter, been in all parts of it, an officious 
will, the conclusion on this head, and so upon the whole case, might have been 
different ; the very contents of the will would in that case have inferred that 
however partially insane (insane on the subject of his daughter), the deceased 
might have been, generally speaking, still, that such partial insanity was not 
in actual operation at the time of his making the will, in which respect the 
the will mzght have been valid. * * * It has been said repeatedly by the 
counsel for the residuary legatees, that this ‘ partial insanity’ is a something un- 
known to the law of England. Nowif it be meant by this, that the law of 
England never deems a person both sane or insane at one and the same time, 
upon one and the same subject, the assertion is a mere truism (as well, indeed, 
in reason as in law), and as such is incapable of being effectively opposed. 
At the same time, as no such sort of partial insanity is set up by the daughter, 
the case of partial insanity which she has really undertaken to sustain, is at 
no risk from the truth of that position, so understood, being conceded. But if, 
‘by that position, it be meant, and intended, that the law of England never 
deems a party both sane and insane at different times, upon the same subject; 
and both sane and insane at the same time upon different subjects—(the most 
usual sense, this last, of the phrase ‘partial insanity,’ and the one in which I 
take it to have been used throughout, by the counsel for the next of kin), 
there can scarcely be a position more destitute of legal foundation ; or rather, 
there can scarcely be one more adverse to the streams and current of legal 
authority.”? The learned judge sustained himself by the authority of Locke, 
who says, “A man who is very sober, and of a right understanding in all 
other things, may in one particular, be as frantic as any man in Bedlam ;” 
and of Lord Hale, who expressly declares “ there is a partial insanityof mind, 
and a total insanity. The former is either in respect to things [quoad hoc, 
vel quoad illud insanire—some persons, that have a competent use of reason 
in respect to some subjects, are yet under a particular dementia in respect of 
some particular discourses, subjects, or applications], or else it is partial in 
respect of degrees ; and this is the condition with very many, especially melan- 
choly persons, who, for the most part, discover their defect in excessive fears 
and grief, and yet are not wholly destitute of the use of reason.” 
19 


Sia MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IN REFERENCE TO WILLS. [BOOK I, 


§ 16. It is true, that when in the same case a bill of review was applied for 
to Lord Chancellor Lyndhurst, he limited with evident caution his approval of 

the judgment of Sir J. Nicholl in such a way as to reserve the question of 
| partial insanity as above stated. ‘I have read his judgment,” he says,(z) 
“with great attention; and I collect from it that his meaning is this: that 
there must be unsoundness of mind to invalidate a will, but that the unsound- 
ness may be evidenced in reference to one or more subjects. All that the 
learned judge meant to convey was, that it was no objection to the imputation 
of unsoundness, that it manifested itself only or principally with reference to 
one particular question, or one particular person.” 

§ 17. But in 1848, in a very remarkable case before the Privy Council an 
opinion was delivered, without dissent, by Lord Brougham, as the judgment 
of himself, Lord Langdale, Dr. Lushington, and Mr. T. Pemberton Leigh, in 
which the notion of partial insanity on one point as consistent with testament- 
ary capacity, was explicitly repudiated.(a) It is true that the case was one 
in which the same result could have been reached even on Sir J. Nicholl’s 
reasoning. The testatrix, who was advanced in years, was excessively penu- 
rious and eccentric, was extremely irritable, wrangled with her servants to an 
excess, at times indulged in very obscene conversation, believed herself the 
object of various amorous enterprises, and among others from Lord Melbourne, 
and Lord J. Russel, who she believed prowled about the house as fishwomen. 
All this, and more, on Sir J. Nicholl’s hypothesis, might have been consistent 
with a testamentary capacity. But in addition to this, it was shown that the 
testatrix had an insane delusion that her brother, whom she disinherited, had 
joined the Catholics, to whom she had an aversion, and. haunted her house, 
also in disguise. Certainly, even on the theory of partial insanity, this, coupled 
as it was with an inquisition of lunacy, would have been enough to have va- 
cated the will. But Lord Brougham, in delivering the judgment of the Privy 
Council, went further. ‘The question being,’’ he said, ‘‘ whether the will was 
duly made by a person of sound mind or not, our inquiry, of course, is, whether 
or not the party possessed his faculties, and possessed them in a healthful state. 
His mental powers may be still subsiding, no disease may have taken them 
away, and yet they may have been affected with disease, and thus may not 
have entitled their possessor to the appellation of a person whose mind was 
sound. 

‘Again, the disease affecting them may have been more or less general; it 
may have extended over a greater or less portion of the understanding, or 
rather, we ought to say, that it may have affected more, or it may have affected 
fewer of the mental faculties. For we must keep always in view that which 
the inaccuracy of ordinary language inclines us to forget, that the mind is one 
and indivisible; that when we speak of its different powers or faculties, as 
memory, consciousness, we speak metaphorically, likening the mind to the 
body, as ifit had members or compartments, whereas, in all accuracy of speech, 
we mean to speak of the mind acting variously, that is, remembering, fancy- 
ing, reflecting, the same mind in all these operations being the agent. We 


(z) 5 Russ. Ch. Cases, 163. (a) Waring v. Waring, 6 Moore P. C. Cases, 349. 
20 


BOOK I.] HOW FAR PARTIAL INSANITY INCAPACITATES. [$17 


therefore cannot in any correctness of language speak of general or partial 
insanity ; but we may most accurately speak of the mind exerting itself in 
consciousness without cloud or imperfection; but being morbid when it fan- 
cies ; and so its owner may have a diseased imagination, or the imagination 
may not be diseased, and yet the memory may be impaired, and the owner be 
said to have lost his memory. In these cases we do not mean that the mind 
has one faculty, as consciousness, sound; while another, as memory or imagi- 
nation is diseased ; but that the mind is sound when reflecting on its own ope- 
rations, and diseased when exercising the combination termed imaginary, or 
casting the retrospect, called recollecting. 

“This view of the subject, though apparently simple, and almost too unques- 
tionable to require, or even to justify a formal statement, is of considerable 
importance when we come to examine cases of what are called, incorrectly, 
‘partial insanity,’ which would be better described by the phrase ‘insanity,’ 
or ‘unsoundness,’ always existing, though only occasionally manifest. 

“Nothing is more certain than the existence of mental disease of this 
description. Nay, by far the greater number of morbid cases belong to this 
class. They have acquired a name ;—the disease called familiarly, as well as 
by physicians, ‘Monomania,’ on the supposition of its being confined, which it 
rarely is, to a single faculty or exercise of the mind: a person shall be of sound 
mind, to all appearance, upon all subjects save one or two, and on these he 
shall be subject to delusions—mistaking for realities the suggestions of his 
imagination. The disease here is said to be in the imagination ; that is, the 
patient’s mind is morbid or unsound when it imagines; healthy and sound 
when it remembers. Nay, he may be of unsound mind when his imagination 
is employed on some subjects, in making some combinations, and sound when 
making others, or making one single kind of combination. Thus he may not 
believe all his fancies to be realities, but only some or one. Of such a person 
we usually predicate that he is of unsound mind only upon certain points. I 
have qualified the proposition thus on purpose; because if the being or essence 
which we term the mind is unsound on one subject, provided that unsoundness 
is at all times existing on that subject, it is quite erroneous to suppose such a 
mind really sound on other subjects. It is only sound in appearance; for if 
the subject of the delusion be presented to it, the unsoundness which is mani- 
fested by believing in the suggestions of fancy, as if they were realities, would 
break out; consequently, it is absurd to speak of this as a really sound mind 
(a mind sound when the subject of the delusion is not presented), as it would 
be to say that a person had not the gout, because, his attention being diverted 
from the pain by some more powerful sensation by which the person was 
affected, he, for the moment, was unconscious of his visitation. It follows, 
from hence, that no confidence can be placed in the acts, or in any act, of a 
diseased mind, however apparently rational that act may be, appear to be, or 
may in reality be. The act in question may be exactly such as a person with- 
out mental infirmity might well do. But there is this difference between the 
two cases: the person uniformly and always of sound mind could not, at the 
moment of the act done, be the prey of morbid delusion, whatever subject was 
presented to his mind; whereas, the person called partially insane—that is to 

21 


$17] . MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IN REFERENCE TO WILLS. [BOOK I. 


say, sometimes appearing to be of sound, and sometimes of unsound mind, 
would inevitably show his subjection to the disease the instant the topic was 
suggested. Therefore, we can, with perfect confidence, rely on the act done 
by the former, because we are sure that no lurking insanity, no particular, or 
partial, or occasional delusion does mingle itself with the person’s act, and 
materially affect it. But we never can rely on the act, however rational in 
appearance, done by the latter, because we have no security that the lurking 
delusion, the real unsoundness, does not mingle itself with, or occasion the act. 
We are wrong in speaking of partial unsoundness; we are less incorrect in 
speaking of occasional unsoundness, we should say that the unsoundness 
always exists, but it requires a reference to the peculiar topic, else it lurks and 
appears not. But the malady is there, and as the mind is one and the same, 
it is really diseased, while apparently sound; and really its acts, whatever 
appearance they may put on, are only the acts of a morbid or unsound mind. 
Unless this reasoning be well founded, we cannot account for the unanimity 
with which men have always agreed in regarding as the acts of an insane mind 
those acts, to all appearance rational, which a person does who labors under 
delusions of a plainly extravagant nature, though there is nothing in the act 
done, and nothing in the conduct of the party while doing it, at all connected 
with the morbid fancies. If these fancies only affect the party now and then ; 
if for some months he is free from them—laboring under them at other times, 
then his acts apparently rational would not be regarded as those of a person 
mentally diseased. But if we were convinced that at the time of doing the 
acts the delusion continued, and was only latent by reason of the mind not 
having been pointed to its subject, and would have instantly shown itself had 
that subject been presented, then the act is at once regarded as that of a mad- 
man. ‘Thus there have been many cases of persons laboring under the delusion 
that they were other than themselves; have believed themselves deceased 
emperors or conquerors; others, supernatural beings. Suppose one, who 
believed himself the Emperor of Germany, and, on all other subjects, was 
apparently of sound mind, did any act requiring mind, memory, and under- 
standing. Suppose he made his will, and either did not sign it (before signing 
was required), or, if he did, signed it with his own name; but suppose we 
were quite convinced that, had any one spoken on the German Diet, or pro- 
ceeded to abuse the German Emperor, the testator’s delusion would at once 
break forth, then we must at once pronounce the will void, but as officious and 
as rational, in every respect, as any deposition of property could be ; of course, 
no one could propound such a will with any hopes of probate, if it happened 
that while making it the delusion had broken out, even although the instru- 
ment bore no marks of its existence at the time of its concoction, it must 
always be a question of evidence, on the whole facts and circumstances of the 
case, whether or not the morbid delusion existed at the time of the factum ; 
that is, whether, had the subject of it been presented, the chord been struck, 
there would have arisen the insane discord which is absent, to all outward 
appearance, from the chord not having been struck. The principles which have 
been laid down do not at all differ from those on which the courts have acted, 
which text writers have construed, and which scientific men, both moralists and 
22 


BOOK I.] HOW FAR PARTIAL INSANITY INCAPACITATES, [$ 19 


physicians, have approved. In the well known case of Dew v. Clark, reported 
3 Addams, 97, but also reported, with the great advantage of the learned 
judge’s corrections, and published separately by Dr. Haggard, we find Sir 
John Nicholl stating that mere eccentricity is not enough to constitute mental 
unsoundness, nor great caprice, nor violence of temper, but that there must be 
an aberration of reason; and he adopts a definition of delusion given by the 
learned counsel in the cause (now a member of this court), deeming it well 
described by the expression that ‘it is a belief of facts which no rational 
person would have believed.’ Perhaps, in a strictly logical view, this defini- 
tion is liable to one exception, or, at least, exposed to one criticism, namely : 
that it gives a consequence for a definition; and it may be more strictly accu- 
rate to term ‘delusion’ the belief of things as realities which exist only in 
the imagination of the patient. The frame or state of mind which indicates 
his incapacity to struggle against such an erroneous belief, constitutes an 
unsound mind. Sir John Nicholl justly adds that such delusions are generally 
attended with eccentricities, often with violence, very often with exaggerated 
Suspicions and jealousies.’” * * * * “The existence of delusions being 
proved, and their continuance proved or assumed, at the date of the factum, 
so that the court is satisfied of the testatrix then laboring under their influence, 
it is wholly immaterial that they do not appear in the will itself. The party 
propounding often approached this point in argument, and repeatedly adverted 
to the fact—perhaps we should say the assertion or assumption—that this 
will betrays no marks of the alleged delusions, or generally of an unsound 
mind. ‘There was a manifest disposition to lay down arule that no person 
laboring under monomania, or partial insanity, can be deemed intestable, unless 
the kind of insanity appears on the face of the will. But there was wanting 
the courage to lay down a proposition which would at once have been rejected, 
and must have been met with the question, Could any court admit to probate 
the will of the man who said (in the case cited by Sir John Nicholl in Dew 
v. Clark), ‘I am the Christ,’ although that will bore no marks whatever of an 
unsound mind, still less of the dreadful delusion under which the party labored ?”’ 

§ 18. It may therefore be considered as the present law of England, that a 
person partially insane is incompetent, so far as the making of wills or con- 
tracts is concerned, though as yet there has been no attempt to adopt the rule 
in this country. In fact its practical operation would be attended with many 
difficulties. It is true there are many cases, such as that just commented on, 
in which the particular monomania overshadows the entire intellect, or where 
it at least infringes upon the peculiar province of testamentary capacity. But 
it cannot be denied that in practice, cases of partial insanity or monomania 
frequently occur, in which there is an inflection of reason so definite and ap- 
preciable, as to make it impossible to exclude it from the general class of de- 
lusions, and yet which is found to be perfectly consistent with right reason, 
and with recognized business capacity in other respects. These cases will 
briefly be noticed. 

§ 19. In the first place may be considered that common species of halluci- 
nation by which the mind, on being presented with a particular object, groups 
round it in a kind of reverie, the circumstances by which it is ordinarily asso- 

23 


‘§ 21] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IN REFERENCE TO WILLS. [BOOK I. 


ciated, and then assumes these circumstances as substantive existing facts. 
This is familiar to every one in the common process of a dream. “ Thus,” 
says Sir Walter Scott, “a dreamer hears a noise not sufficiently loud to awaken 
him entirely ; at the same time something accidentally touches him. These 
impressions instantly form a part of his dreams, and adapt themselves to the 
tenor of the ideas that occupy his mind, whatever they may be. Nothing is 
more remarkable than the rapidity with which the imagination furnishes a 
complete explanation of this interruption to sleep, according to the manner 
in which ideas are presented by the dream, even without requiring a moment’s 
respite for this operation. For example, if a duel is the subject of the dream, 
the noise that is really heard becomes the discharge of the pistols of the com- 
batants. If an orator, in his dream, is making a speech, the noise becomes 
the plaudits of his supposed auditory. If the dreamer is transported in his 
dreams to the midst of ruins, the noise appears that of the fall of some por- 
tion of the walls. In a word, an explanatory system is adopted, in which the 
rapidity of thought is so great, that if we suppose the noise heard to be the 
first efforts of some one to awaken the sleeper, the explanation, although re- 
quiring a certain train of deductions, is usually finished and complete before 
a second effort has perfectly awakened the sleeper. There exists in the suc- 
cession of ideas during sleep, an intuition so rapid, that it recalls the vision 
in which the prophet Mohammed saw all the wonders of heaven and hell, 
although the water contained in the jar, which was upset when his ecstasy 
commenced, was not completely emptied when he recovered the use of his or-. 
dinary faculties.” 

§ 20. The same process of association exists in many temperaments when 
the faculties are awake, and the hallucination becomes so blended with the 
reality as to become part of the texture of actual consciousness. 

A vivid illustration of this—though in this instance the hallucination was 
fleeting while for the time entire—is cited from Wigan by De Boismont.(b) “I 
was in Paris,” says the former, ‘‘at a soirée given by M. Bellart, some days 
before the execution of the Prince of Moskowa. The usher, having the name 
of M. Maréchal azné, announced M. le Maréchal Ney. An electric shudder 
ran through the assembly, and, for my part, I own that the resemblance to the 
prince was for a moment as perfect to my eyes as reality.” 

§ 21. An instance of hallucination, produced by association, of a much 
more permanent character, occurred to the present writer. Having occasion 
to receive a check as a dividend, for an amount which was readily remembered, 
as it was the same as had been received on the same day for several previous 
years, he deposited it, as he supposed, with the teller of the particular bank, 
which may be called bank A., where he kept an account. It so happened that 
at the opposite wing of the same building, with an entrance precisely similar, 
stood another bank, which may be called bank B. He went by mistake into the 
latter bank, and at once, supposing himself to be in the former, he invested it 
with the same drapery which it would have had if his supposition had been 
correct. Not having his bank-book with him, he presented the check to the 


(b) Rational History of Hallucination, 106. 
24 


BOOK I.] HOW DELUSIONS AFFECT TESTAMENTARY CAPACITY. [§ 23 


receiving teller, asking him to credit him with it as a deposit. It so happened 
that it had been his custom to hold a conversation in reference to a particular 
matter in which they had a common interest with the teller of bank A. When 
some weeks afterwards he discovered, on applying to bank A. for the entry in 
his own book of the deposit, that no such deposit had been noted by the teller, 
he turned back to the particular day when the check was received, of which 
the day and the amount was accurately planted on his memory, for the reasons 
already mentioned, and the actual fact of the deposit was brought to his recol- 
lection, grouped with the hallucination that it was bank A. that he had gone 
into—that it was the teller of bank A. whom he met—and that the particular 
inquiry so frequently before put to him in bank A. had been put to him then. 
The fact had been that on forming for himself an arbitrary and fictitious 
stand-point, he grouped around it the associations which would have attended 
the reality. So fixed, indeed, was his belief in the reality of the whole scene, 
that he would have testified to it under oath with as much positiveness as to 
any fact in his recollection. It was not until some time had expired that his 
mistake was discovered, and then only upon his accidentally being in bank B. 
and receiving an inquiry from the teller whether he meant to follow up the 
isolated deposit he had made on the particular day. 

§ 22. Dr. Johnson was confident that he heard his deceased mother’s voice, 
crying ‘‘Samuel;’”’ nor was this hallucination ever corrected; and yet no one 
would maintain that he was incapable of making a will. 

§ 28. Lord Castlereagh, a short time before his very solemn death, and 
under every sanction which could exclude jesting, gave a narrative of a sup- 
posed apparition, in which he firmly believed, and which exercised a material 
influence on his life. When in the Irish Parliament, he went to visit a friend 
at a castle in the North of Ireland. Shown into a dark and venerable cham- 
ber, where there existed every material which would excite a superstitious 
imagination, having dismissed his valet, he went to bed. Hardly, however, 
was his candle extinguished when he became aware of a glimmer of light in 
his room. No fire had been lighted—the curtains were closed—and no expla- 
nation affording itself of this phenomenon, he rose from the bed, when, to his 
surprise, on turning to the point whence the light proceeded, he perceived the 
figure of a young and beautiful child, with a halo encircling its brow. With 
perfect confidence in the reality of the object, but believing it had been got up 
artificially as a joke, he followed it until it nestled in the arch of the great 
chimney, and at last sunk beneath the fireboard. The next morning he sought 
in vain for a clue by which the mystery could be dispelled. It was a subject 
which his host evidently shunned. On putting the question pointedly, how- 
ever, Lord Castlereagh was informed that it was true that such a spectre as 
that had been reported in former times to have appeared under the title of the 
‘“‘Radiant Child.” Once again the phantom appeared to the same noble and 
capable statesman—but no longer, it is said, with a radiant crown. This 
last appearance was not long before his own self-destruction, and yet, if the 
exterior alone was considered, when he was at the height of his power and 
glory. Certainly the spectre can now be easily explained, because a man who 
is weak enough to commit suicide, is not too strong to be haunted in a dream 

25 


§ 26] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IN REFERENCE TO WILLS. [BOOK I. 


by an apparition of whose traditional reputation he had undoubtedly heard, 
though the recollection afterwards escaped him. And yet we have here a case 
of an hallucination so entire as to produce partial insanity°on that point, and 
perhaps to have been a motive power in his own suicide. Still, it would hardly 
have been maintained that Lord Castlereagh, than whom no man of his day 
exhibited, when in public life, greater coolness or business clearness, was inca- 
pable, because of this single delusion, of making a contract or will. 

§ 24. It is immaterial, so far as the principle is concerned, whether the 
hallucination be the result of a morbid imagination, as was the case with Lord 
Castlereagh, or of imposition on the part of others. In either case, if the 
hallucination be groundless and absurd, the seizing upon it by the mind as an 
item of faith, equally constitutes partial insanity. 

§ 25. A butcher in full health, many years ago, as was related by an 
eminent physician of Philadelphia, was on his way to the city, when he was 
met by a party of medical students, who determined to see what would be the 
effect on him of an attempt to persuade him that he was affected with the 
premonitory symptoms of a fever then prevalent. At different points, one by 
one, they accosted him with inquiries as to what was the cause of his paleness, 
of the livid state of his skin, &c., and as to whether he was aware that marks 
of the epidemic were on him, &c. At first he sturdily repelled the supposition, 
but gradually became frightened, and at last returned home to be attacked by 
the very disease which had been attributed to him. Hearing that their experi- 
ment had been carried too far, his tormenters set to work in earnest to unde- 
ceive him; but it was to late. “You are joking now; or you are trying to 
cure a dying man by a trick,’’ was his reply. ‘You were right at first; you 
cannot deceive me now by telling me it was a hoax.”’ 

It was the firm belief of Lord Herbert, of Cherbury, that a divine vision 
had indicated to him the correctness of a particular course of religious specu- 
lation which, on the faith of the supposed vision, he published, and which he 
made the basis of his future action. The second Lord Lyttleton was equally 
persuaded that a divine warning had admonished him of his approaching 
death. And no less confident, though less serious in its consequences, was 
the conviction of Philip, second Earl of Chesterfield, of the reality of a similar 
preternatural interference. One night, in the year 1652, he saw something 
white, like a spread sheet, at the head of his bed. He tried to seize it, but it 
slid away and disappeared. His thoughts immediately turning to his wife, 
who was at Networth, with her father, he hurried there, but was met by a ser- 
vant, with a letter from his wife, which informed him that precisely the same 
apparition had appeared to her, and had been the cause of the journey of the 
messenger whom she had dispatched to inquire as to his health. 

§ 26. Abercrombie gives an illustration of habitual hallucination which at 
the same time was consistent with reason. The patient, when he met a person 
in the street, was uncertain whether the latter was a real person or a phantom, 
though with close observation he was able to detect the dissimilarity. The 
features of the real person would be more decided and more complete than 
those of the phantom; but the power of discrimination by this process was 
too uncertain to be relied on, and the only test of which the patient felt cer- 

26 


BOOK I.] HOW DELUSIONS AFFECT TESTAMENTARY CAPAcITy. [§ 80 


tain was that of the voice, footstep, or touch. The phantom had none of 
these; the substance, of course, had all. He had the faculty of recalling his 
visions at will, by powerfully fixing his attention on the conceptions of his 
mind, but while the hallucination could be invoked at will, it could not be 
arbitrarily dispelled. That it was a hallucination, he was perfectly convinced ; 
and that it was entirely consistent with general reason was demonstrated by 
his clearness of head and business capacity. 

§ 27. A recent case in this country illustrates the same position with 
remarkable point. A merchant who had for years managed with shrewdness 
and success an extensive business, became thoroughly imbued with the spirit 
rapping and spirit conversing hallucination. Though he conducted his busi- 
ness as well as those who were not thus afflicted, his family conceived that 
this and cognate eccentricities made him a fit subject for a commission of 
lunacy. This he soon discovered, and laid his plans accordingly. He had 
theretofore done a cash business, and his punctuality and accuracy had won 
him extensive credit. He immediately proceeded to buy a large stock of goods 
from a number of the most sagacious business men within his reach, and gave 
long notes in exchange. ‘I do not know how it strikes you,’’ was the way 
he broached the matter to his family, ‘‘but whatever may have been your 
chances once, they are but light now. All I have to do is to subpena my 
friends to whom I have just given my notes, and you may depend upon it, 
they will not only testify strongly as to their opinion of my sanity, but will 
bring that opinion down to this particular hour.” 

§ 28. If the principle announced by Lord Brougham be correct, in no one 
of the preceding cases could the party affected be considered as possessed of 
testamentary capacity, or the capacity to contract. ‘‘ Insane on one point, in- 
sane on all,”? would certainly disfranchise multitudes who are now considered 
practically competent to discharge all the business relations of life. Of such 
a doctrine it is difficult to estimate the perilous consequences. A party who 
cannot be compelled, on the ground of lunacy, to complete his own contract, 
cannot compel others to complete theirs, and the practical operations of society 
would be therefore seriously deranged. 

§ 29. The cases which have just been noticed, comprise chiefly those in 
which, while the hallucination is positive, the practical inflection of conduct 
produced thereby is slight. This, however, cannot be said to be the case with 
those instances in which a supposed supernatural vision or monitor is received 
as a guide on the most momentous actions of life. Napoleon declared on 
many critical occasions that he was conscious of the preternatural vision of a 
star, which sometimes even appeared in his own cabinet, by which he allowed 
himself to be guided. Bernadotte, beyond doubt, on one important movement 
at least, was swerved from his course by the vision of an old woman. Con- 
stantine felt or feigned a similar impressibility. These cases, it is true, may 
be suspected, but suspicion cannot be thus cast on the multitudes of brave men 
who were driven in border or highland contests from the battle field by a 
threatening wraith, or who were encouraged to the wildest sacrifices by the 
beckoning of an imaginary finger or the invocations of a preternatural voice. 

§ 30. There are, however, other cases in which there is a general morbid 


27 


§ 32] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IN REFERENCE TO WILLS. [BOOK I. 


derangement of all, or of a material portion of the organs. To these, as well 
as to the great mass of instances where hallucination forms the groundwork, 
the observations of De Boismont, on the case of a man who supposed that he 
had sunk all his wealth at the bottom of a well, apply with great force. ‘It 
may be asked whether, in the state of mind in which the patient was, whose 
history we have related, he was capable of making a will. This is a very diffi- 
cult question ; but its solution is not an impossibility. When the conduct of 
the individual does not depart from received usages, when it is not controlled 
by one of those false ideas that make him hate his relations and friends with- 
out any motive, and when he regulates his expenses prudently, we do not 
think that whimsical actions, or words, the results of an erroneous belief, but 
having no influence on the prominent acts of his life, should deprive a person 
of his civil liberties, and of the power of making his will.” 

§ 31. Nor should it be forgotten that the effects of such incapacitation 
would be most cruel to the sufferer himself. Society is prone enough to make 
eccentricities and weaknesses the subject of contempt, ridicule or insult. The 
courts should be cautious how, by taking away the power to insure respect, 
they thus increase the misfortune of a class into which no man can assure 
himself he may not fall—which includes almost the whole of those whose lot 
it is to reach extreme old age—and which already carries a burden sufficiently 
heavy. If such persons cannot reward by their bounty those by whom they 
are treated with tenderness, and by whose means their comfort is guarded, they 
will lose, in most instances, the only means remaining to them of self preser- - 
vation. The law which thus deprives them of their own means of self sup- 
port, should tender them in return a refuge by which, by public sanction, they 
could exact that attention which their own influence no longer enables them 
to secure. This, however, is certainly not done now, nor could it be done on 
any intelligible basis, without consigning a large proportion of the most effi- 
cient members of society to an asylum. As society at present stands, the only 
remedy seems to be to throw the same tender guardianship around the feeble 
minded and the eccentric, as in a passage already cited has been so touchingly 
invoked by Chancellor Kent for the old. 

§ 32. In this country, as has already been seen, the law continues to be, 
that a vein of partial insanity does not affect testamentary capacity, except 
where it enters into the texture of the will. This has been expressly held to 
be the case with regard to mere eccentricities, no matter how extravagant, 
such as a belief in witches, or in the loss of health from the application of 
slow poison surreptitiously administered.(c) When they enter into the sub- 
ject matter of the will, however, it of course falls.(d) And a will, otherwise 
capable of being sustained, was upheld, notwithstanding it appeared that the 
testator believed in reference to a future state of existence that there were de- 
grees of happiness therein correspondent to and sympathizing with the circles 
of society on earth—that asa man stood in the latter, so he stood in the 
former—and that there his position would be very much determined by the 
amount of property which he had acquired here. (e) 7 


(c) Leech v. Leech, 11 Penns. Law J. 177; Lee v. Lee, 4 M’Cord, 183. 
(d) Johnson v. Moore, 1 Litt. 371. (e) Gass v. Gass, 3 Humph. 278. 
28 


BOOK I.] CAPACITY TO MAKE WILLS AND TESTAMENTS. [$ 84 


3d. Lucid Intervals.(ee) 


§ 33. Of course, a person who is actually at the time a lunatic, cannot bind 
himself civilly, and so far as this, there is no ground for discussion. When a 
party is once proved to have been at the time insane, all question is at an end. 
The difficulty, however, is to the fact of time. Unless what in the courts 
has been called habetwal insanity be shown, 2. e., such insanity as is, in its 
nature, continuous and chronic, the fact of the existence of a prior period of 
lunacy does not suffice even to throw the burden of proof on the party setting 
up competency.(/) The case, however, is otherwise when such habitual in- 
sanity is shown to have existed; in which case the presumption is that the 
party was insane at the time, and the burthen is on those seeking to prove the 
contrary.(f7) “If youcan establish,” says Sir Wm. Wynne, as cited by Mr. 
Jarman,(g) “that the party afflicted habitually by a malady of the mind has 
intermissions, and if there was an intermission of the disorder at the time of 
the act; that being proved, is sufficient, and the general habitual insanity 
will not affect it ; but the effect of it is this: it inverts the order of proof and 
presumption; for, until proof of habitual insanity, the presumption is, the 
party agent, like all human creatures, was rational ; but when an habitual 
insanity in the mind of the person who does the act is established, then the 
party who would take advantage of the fact of an interval of reason must 
prove it.’”’ And in a recent Massachusetts case, Dewey, J., said, ‘Neither 
observation nor experience shows us that persons who are insane from the 
effect of some violent disease, do not usually recover the right use of their 
mental faculties. Such cases are not unusual, and the return of a sound mind 
may be anticipated from the subsiding or removal of the disease which has 
prostrated their minds. It is not, therefore, to be stated as an unqualified 
maxim of the law, ‘ once insane, presumed to be always insane ;’ but reference 
must be had to the peculiar circumstances connected with the insanity of an 
individual, in deciding upon its effects upon the burthen of proof, or how far 
it may authorize the jury to infer that the same condition or state of mind 
attaches to the individual at a later period. There must be kept in view the 
distinction between the inferences to be drawn from proof of an habitual or 
apparently confirmed insanity, and that which may be only temporary.’’(h) 

§ 34. In case of idiocy, a slightly different rule seems laid down. Thus, in 
a late case, the evidence showed that the deceased was, in 1815, placed in con- 
finement as a lunatic, and there remained till 1817, when he was released. In 
1820, about which time he was proved to have committed certain rational acts 
of business,(2h) he made a rational will. In 1822 he was again placed in 
confinement, and so remained till his death, in 1849. In 1833 he was found 


(ee) See for the psychological view of this question, post, § 254. 

(f) Ackey v. Stephens, 8 Ind. 411; Menkins v. Lightner, 18 Ill. 282. 

(ff) Ibid. Hoge v. Fisher, 1 P. C. C. R. 163 ; Whitenack v. Strykee, 1 Green, C. R. 8; 
Harrison v. Rowan, 3 W. C. C. R. 580; Gable v. Grant, 2 Green, C. R. 629 ; Stevens 
v. Vancleve, 4 Wash. C. C. R. 262; Jackson v. Vandusen, 5 Johns. 144; Kelly v. 
Webster, 8 Shep. 46; 1 Jarm. on Wills (2d Am. ed.), 65. 

(g) 1 Jarm. on Wills (2d Am. ed.), 65. (h) Hix v. Whittemore, 4 Metc. 545. 

(hh) See ante, § 7. aa 


§ 387] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IN REFERENCE TO. WILLS, [BOOK I. 


on a commission, to have been of unsound mind, without lucid intervals, since 
1815. The will was sustained on the ground that though it is otherwise with 
regard to lunacy, yet when idiocy is set up, it is disproved by contemporaneous 
intelligent acts of business. (7) 

§ 35. Where no extraneous influence is shown to have been exerted, the 
character of the act itself, as has already been noticed, goes far to determine 
the capacity of the party at the particular time. In a very late case(j) Dr. 
Lushington said, ‘In the opinion of a very great judge, Sir William Wynne, 
in the colebrated case of Cartwright v. Cartwright, he said where a rational 
act was done in arational manner, such was the strongest and best proof which 
could arise even as to a lucid interval. Now, I cannot say that I subscribe 
altogether to this observation of Sir William Wynne, for I do not, but it is 

entitled to great weight; and, to a certain extent, a rational act done in a 
rational manner, though not, I think, the strongest and best proof of a lucid 
interval, does contribute to the establishment of a lucid interval.”’ 


Ath. Intoxication. 


§ 36. As has been already incidentally observed, intoxication, when at the 
time prevailing, renders a party incompetent to make a contract or execute a 
will.(77) It is true that most of the cases go on the ground of express or 
implied fraud, so far as acts inter vivos are concerned; for it is certainly 
only a little less culpable to enforce a bargain made with a drunken man than ~ 
it is to make him drunk on purpose to secure it.(¢) But the general position 
is well expressed by Pothier:(/) ‘‘Drunkenness,” he says, “‘ when it goes so 
far as absolutely to destroy the reason, renders a person, so long as it con- 
tinues, incapable of contracting, since it renders him incapable of consent.”’(m) 
So rigorously has this doctrine been applied, that it was even held that 
drunkenness is a good defence by an indorser of a note against an innocent 
and bona fide holder ;(n) though when a man is sober enough to write his 
own name correctly, it will require strong evidence of stupefaction or delirium 
to induce a jury to sustain his irresponsibility against an innocent third party. 
But drunkenness, though it is a shield, cannot be made an offensive weapon ; 
and the law will not permit a man to use his drunkenness as a means of cheat- 
ing others. Thus, a man who after buying goods when drunk retained them 
when sober, was held responsible for the price.(o) 

§ 37. The distinction in this respect is thus stated by Vice-Chancellor 
Stuart : ‘The principles acted upon in Cook v. Clayworth were that a party 
being in liquor when he entered into an agreement, was no reason for the 
court to refuse a decree for specific performance, and they pointed out the rule 
to be acted on in these cases. In Cory v. Cory, and, subsequently, in Nagle 
v. Baylor, the same rule had been acted upon. The course of the court had 


(7) Bannantyne v. Bannantyne, 16 Jur. 864, 14 English R. 581. (7) Ibid. 
(jj) See Menkins v. Lightner, 18 Ill. 282. 
(k) Parke, B., Gore v. Gibson, 13 M. & W. 626; 2 Greenleaf on Ev. § 170; Pitt v. 
Smith, 3 Campb. 33; Fenton v. Halloway, 13 Stark, 126. (1) Obligations, N. 49. 
(m) See also Chitty on Contracts, 112; Story on Contracts, 27. 
(n) Sentance v. Poole, 3 C. & P. 1. (0) Alderson, B., Gore v. Gibson, ut supra. 
30 


BOOK I.] HOW FAR INTOXICATION AFFECTS CIVIL CAPACITY. [§ 39 


been, in cases of this kind, that it would not assist a person who had obtained 
or wished to get rid of an agreement or deed on the mere ground of intoxica- 
tion; but only where any contrivance was used to draw him in to drink, or 
any unfair advantage taken of his situation, or in that extreme state of intoxi- 
cation which deprived a man of his reason, did the court interfere. The court 
was disinclined to interfere in such cases; and if a bill were filed to enforce an 
agreement and it appeared that no fraud had been used, the duty of the court 
was to dismiss the bill.’’(p) 

§ 38. In actions, however, for torts (¢. e., cases where the gist is personal 
injury), drunkenness is no defence to the merits. Thus, if a man is sued for 
injury to my property or person, it is no defence that he was drunk at the 
time, for the policy of the law is both to redress such wrongs and to discoun- 
tenance intoxication.(q) And the plaintiff may even introduce the fact of 
drunkenness as an aggravating item, when the question is whether proper 
care was used in avoiding an accident. Thus, in a suit for injury to the plain- 
tiff by running a sleigh against him, a very eminent American judge, Gibson, 
C. J., said, ‘“‘ The evidence of intoxication ought to have been received, not 
because the legal consequences of a drunken man’s acts are different from 
those of a sober man’s acts, but because, where the evidence of negligence is 
nearly balanced, the fact of drunkenness might turn the scale, inasmuch as a 
man partially bereft of his faculties would be less observant than if he were 
sober, and less regardful of the safety of others. For this purpose, but cer- 
tainly not to inflame the damages, the evidence ought to have been ad- 
mitted.’”’(r) 

§ 39. Drunkenness to such an extent as to render a party unconscious of 
what he is engaged in, or drunkenness even to a slight degree, when its effect 
is to render a party subject to the influence of others, avoids a will ;(s) though 
the mere fact of the testator being’at the time under the influence of liquor, 
will not suffice, unless consequent disability be proved.(¢) Long continued 
prior habits of intoxication, also, will not of themselves afford a presumption 
of incapacity, unless the testator was proved to have been drunk at the time. (2) 
The reason of this distinction between drunkenness and insanity is well pointed 
out by Sir John Nicholl. Insanity, he argued, may often be latent, whereas 
there can scarcely be such a thing as latent ebriety; and, consequently, all 
that is required to be shown, in ordinary cases, is the absence of excitement 
at the time of the act done; at least, the absence of excitement in any such 
degree as would vitiate the act done; ‘‘for,’’ he said, ‘I suppose it will be 
readily conceded that, under a mere slight degree of that excitement, the 
memory and the understanding may be, in substance, as correct as in the total 
absence of any exciting cause. Whether, where the excitement in some degree 
is proved to have actually subsisted at the time of the act done, it did or did 


(p) Stuart, V. C., Shaw v. Thackeray, 23 Eng. Reports, 21. 

(q) Ray. Med. Jur. 292; Co. Lit. 247 (a) ; 4 Rep. 124 (b); 4 Bl. Com. 25. 

(r) Wynn v. Allard, 5 W. & S. 525. (s) Shelford on Lunacy, 274, 304. 

(t) Shelford on Lunacy, 276; Starret v. Douglass, 2 Yeates, 48 ; Andress v. Weller, 
2 Green, C. R. 604; Gardner v. Gardner, 21 Wend. 526. 

(wu) Ibid., Black v. Ellis, 3 Hill, 8. C. 68; Ayrey v. Hill, 3 Addams, 206; Shelford 
on Lunacy, 276. 

31 


§ 41] COMMISSIONS OF LUNACY. [BOOK I. 


not subsist in the requisite degree to vitiate the act done, must depend, in 
each case, upon a due consideration of all the circumstances of that case in 
particular ; it belonging to a description of cases that admits of no more 
definite rule, applicable to the determination of them, than the one I have 
suggested, that I am aware of.’’(v) Where the will was executed under the 
influence of drink intentionally and fraudulently administered, of course it falls, 
by the operation of a rule already noticed with regard to contracts ; but where 
such is not the case, actual derangement of the reasoning faculties, arising by 
undue excitement, must be shown.(w) Certainly the effect would be most 
deleterious if the mere existence of excitement produced by stimulants was 
held to vitiate any act performed during its continuance. 


II. WHAT IS NECESSARY TO BE PROVED IN ORDER TO DEPRIVE A PARTY OF 
THE MANAGEMENT OF HIS ESTATE. 


§ 40. In most of the United States, as in England, process exists by which, 
when a party is incapable of the management of his estate, whether from 
mental unsoundness or from habitual drunkenness, a committee may be ap- 
pointed, to whom the custody of his property is committed. It would be out 
of place to set forth here the statutes by which this process is defined and 
settled ; it is enough now to notice the general scheme of practice which exists 
in England, and which has been, with the exceptions of only slight alterations 
of detail, adopted in this country. 

§ 41. When there is reason to believe that a party, from unsoundness of 
mind or habitual drunkenness, is incapable of managing his affairs, a petition 
lies, generally from any person interested in his person or estate, for the issu- 
ing of a commission. Upon the reception of the petition, the court directs a 
commission to issue to one or more persons—generally required to be learned 
in the law—directing the inquiry by commissioner and jury, as to the facts of 
the petition. The commissioner being thus authorized, directs a precept to 
the sheriff, commanding him to summon a jury, who, when they meet, hear 
testimony—on both sides if desired—on the matter submitted to them, and 
after being charged by the commissioner as to the law of the case, return a 
finding as to whether, from the lunacy or habitual drunkenness complained of, 
the respondent is incapable of managing his estate. Should the finding be in 
the affirmative, the court will appoint a committee who will take charge of 
the respondent’s estate,(x) subject, however, to the absolute right(y) of the 
respondent to traverse the finding, 7. e., to put in a formal denial of it, in which 
case the question is determined before a court and jury, in the same way with 
any contested fact. Whether the alleged lunatic really is capable of volition 
as to a traverse, and desires that a traverse should be entered, will be deter- 


(v) 1 Jarman on Wills (2d ed.), 54. 
(w) Wheeler v. Alderson, 3 Hagg. 602; 1 Jarman on Wills (2d ed.), 54-5. 
(x) See as to the practice in regard to the appointment and removal of committees, 
Black’s Est. 6 Harris, 434; Hulings v. Laird, 9 Harris, 268. 
(y) Cumming in Re. 11 Eng. Law and Eq. 202. 
32 


BOOK I.] COMMISSIONS OF LUNACY. [$ 43 


mined, it seems, by the chancellor himself by personal examination or other- 
wise. (2) 

§ 42. It will be seen that the point at issue under a commission of lunacy 
or habitual drunkenness, is the general, and not the partial or particular 
incompetency of the party who is the subject of the inquiry. It is a matter 
of some moment, also, that the fullest opportunity of examination be given. 
When a particular instrument is sought to be vacated, or a particular crime 
to be excused, the testimony of the medical witness is necessarily drawn from 
but casual observation, nade in most cases at a time when he had no reason 
to suspect the existence of the disease. Great incentives to fraud also exist, 
and it is well known how acute must be the penetration, and how sharp the 
tests which are not sometimes baffled by the simulation of mental unsoundness. 
On the other hand, a commission of lunacy is executed with deliberation, after 
a calm and full review of the previous life of the party under consideration. 
Nor is he likely himself to aid the inquiry by any undue sympathy, for his 
interests and his pride are both enlisted in resisting his moral and intellectual 
disfranchisement. It becomes, therefore, a simple test, Is the respondent pre- 
vented by mental unsoundness or habitual drunkenness from managing his 
own estate? If not, no matter how responsible he may be for crime, or capable 
at particular times of making a bargain, the finding must be against him. 
Upon a recovery of competency, the commission, on due cause shown, will be 
superseded. (a) 

§ 43. “In commissions of lunacy,’’ says Dr. Winslow, ‘‘the witness must 
not only be prepared to give an opinion as to the then state of mind of the 
party, and competency to take care of his person and manage his affairs, but 
he must be prepared occasionally to pronounce judgment as to a prior ques- 
tionable condition of brain and mind. The alleged lunatic may, under the 
exercise of undue influence, have previously alienated his property by will, or 
been induced to execute other important documents. The witness will be 
called upon to depose as to the probable state of the brain at the time, and 
as to the length of the alleged existing attack of insanity. Well-marked 
symptoms of organic cerebral disease may be present, and it will in some cases 
be an important point to decide, whether such a condition of physical ill health 
has not been of some years’ duration, impairing the mental vigor, destroying 
all power of rational conduct and healthy continuity of thought, and thus 
interfering with a right exercise of the judgment and affections in the legitimate 
disposal of property.’’(d) 

In a case which attracted much popular attention at the time,(c) Chief 
Baron Pollock declared, that ‘‘no person ought to be confined in a lunatic 
asylum unless dangerous to himself and others.”” This dictum, which certainly 
is inconsistent with the necessities of medical practice, has been combated and 


(z) Cumming in Re. 11 Eng. Law and Eq. 202. 

(a) See Lackey v. Lackey, 2 B. Monr. 478 ; Matter of Russel, 1 Barbour C. R. 38 ; 
Matter of Barbour, 2 ib. 97; Matter of Mason, 1 ib. 436; John Beaumont’s case, 1 
Wharton R. 52. 

(>) Winslow on Medico-Legal Evidence in cases of Insanity, 129, 130. 

(c) Nottridge v. Ripley, before Chief Baron Pollock, sitting at Nisi Prius, June, 1849, 
reported in full in Journ. of Psyc. Med. vol. 2, p. 630. 

3 39 


§ 44] COMMISSIONS OF DRUNKENNESS. [BOOK I. 


exploded with great ability by very eminent psychological authority,(d) and 
has not been followed by the current of American judicial opinion. There are 
necessarily cases when the safety of property and the health of the patient 
himself, require confinement in an asylum, though there be no danger of vio- 
lence to himself and others, and it is not likely that the existence of such cases 
will be again judicially questioned. Whether the confinement, in any parti- 
cular case, was proper or not, will be for the court and jury, if an action of 
false imprisonment be brought, to determine specially. And the law in such 
a case undoubtedly is, that confinement is justifiable, if either the safety of the 
patient or others require it, or it is necessary for his restoration to health. (e) 

§ 44. In respect to drunkenness, the law is, that while occasional acts of 
intoxication will not justify a finding of “habitual” drunkenness, yet on the 
other hand, it is not necessary for such a finding that the party should be 
constantly in an intoxicated state. Thus, in Pennsylvania, Knox, P. J., in 
putting the case upon a traverse to the jury, said: ‘‘ Neither was it necessary 
to make out the case that a person should be constantly in an intoxicated 
state, that a man might be an habitual drunkard, and yet be sober at times for 
days and weeks together. That the question was; had the traverser a fixed 
habit of drunkenness? Was he habituated to intoxication whenever the 
opportunity offered? The question is one of fact for the jury to find, but the 
court has no hesitation in saying, that the man who is intoxicated or drunk 
the one-half of his time, should be pronounced an habitual drunkard.’”? And 
in the Supreme Court, Rogers, J., said: ‘To constitute an habitual drunkard, 
it is not necessary that a man should be always drunk. It is impossible to 
lay down any fixed rule as to when a man shall be deemed an habitual drunk- 
ard. It must depend upon the decision of the jury under the direction of the 
court. It may, however, be safely said, that to bring a man within the 
meaning of the act, it is not necessary that he should always be drunk. Occa- 
sional acts of drunkenness, as the judge says, do not make one an habitual 
drunkard. Nor is it necessary he should be continually in an intoxicated 
state. A man may be an habitual drunkard, and yet be sober for days and 
weeks together. The only rule is, has he a fixed habit of drunkenness? Was 
he habituated to intemperance whenever the opportunity offered? We agree 
that a man who is intoxicated or drunk one-half his time is an habitual drunk- 
ard, and should be pronounced such. We also concur with the court, that if 
the jury found the traverser to have been at the date of the inquisition an 
habitual drunkard, it was necessary to decide whether he was capable or inca- 
pable of managing his estate. His incapacity in that event is a conclusion of 
law. It is not necessary to say, it is a presumptio juris et de jure; but, at 
least, it throws the burden of proof of capacity on the traversers. Indeed, it 
may be well doubted, whether his management or mismanagement of his estate 
is a matter of inquiry. It is very certain, under the act of the 13th of June, 


(d) See a remonstrance with the Lord Chief Baron, touching the case of Nottridge v. 
Ripley, by John Conolly, M. D., 1849. A letter to the Lord Chancellor on the defect 
of the law regulating the custody of lunatics, by Charles Curten Cooper, London, 
1849. Psychological Review, vol. 2, p. 564; ib. vol. 3, p. 14. A letter to the Right 
Hon. Lord Ashley, M. P., relative to the case of Nottridge v. Ripley, Dundee, 1849. 

(e) Hinchman »v. Ritchie, Brightley R. 143. 

34 


BOOK I.] UNSOUNDNESS— RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [$ 45 


1836, proceedings may be instituted against an habitual drunkard who has no 
estate. But this cannot be if the mismanagement of it be necessary. It is 
well said, that there must be an evidence of squandering property, to support 
a proceeding to declare an individual an habitual drunkard, else the object of 
the act in many cases would be defeated. For it is precautionary in its 
design, and hence a disposition of mind or body which might lead to the 
wasting of an estate, is sufficient to justify the enforcement of its provisions. (/) 
It is indeed impossible that a man can be an habitual drunkard without waste 
or mismanagement, as the very act of drunkenness is itself waste. In this 
case, even if required, the evidence was full and plenary to this point.’’(g) 


Ill. WHAT DEGREE OF UNSOUNDNESS AVOIDS RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. 


§ 45. The consideration to be given to this species of defence is thus justly 
and humanely stated by Parker, C. J., of New Hampshire, in a charge to 
the grand jury: ‘The public papers, in giving reports of trials, often say, ‘the 
defence was, as usual, insanity,’ or make use of some other expression, indicat- 
ing that this species of defence is resorted to, in desperation, for the purpose of 
aiding in the escape of criminals. Such opinions are propagated, in many in- 
stances, by those whose feelings are too much enlisted, or whose ignorance re- 
specting the subject is too great, to permit them to form a dispassionate and 
intelligent judgment; and they have a very pernicious tendency, inasmuch as 
they excite the public mind, and the unfortunate individual who is really 
entitled to the benefit of such defence is thereby sometimes deprived of a fair 
trial. They tend to make the defence of insanity odious, to create an impres- 
sion against its truth in the outset, and thus to bias the mind of the jury 
against the prisoner, and to induce them to give little heed to the evidence, 
in the very cases where the greatest care and attention and impartiality are 
necessary for the development of truth and the attainment of justice. 

‘“‘We all concur in the doctrine of the law, that for acts committed during a 
period of insanity, and induced by it, the party is not responsible; that’ when 
the criminal mind is wanting—when, instead of being guided by the reason 
which God bestowed, the individual is excited and led on by insane fury and 
impulse, or by the aberrations of a wandering intellect, or a morbid and dis- 
eased imagination, or a false and distorted vision and perception of things— 
punishment should not follow the act as for an offence committed ; that when 
the faculty of distinguishing between right and wrong is wanting, the indi- 
vidual ought not to be held as a moral and accountable agent. As well, nay, 
much better, might we, as was formerly done in France, institute prosecutions 
against the brute creation for offences committed by them, and hang a beast 
for homicide, than to prosecute and condemn a human being who is deprived 
of his reason; for in such case there is no hope of restoration to a right mind, 
and a reinstating of a fellow-citizen, who has been once lost to the community, 


(f) Sill v. M’Night, 7 W. & Ser. 245. (g) Ludwick v. Com. 6 Harris, 173. 
35 


§ 45] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


in the rights and affections of humanity. But if we imbibe the idea that 
instances of insanity are very rare—that derangement exists only when it 
manifests itself by incoherent language and unrestrained fury—that the de- 
fence, when offered, is probably the last resort of an untiring advocate, who, 
convinced that no real defence can avail, will not hesitate to palm off a pre- 
tended derangement to procure the escape of his client from merited punish- 
ment—if in this way we steel our hearts against all conviction, it is of little 
avail that we agree to the abstract proposition, that insanity does in fact 
furnish a sufficient defence against an accusation for crime. 

“There are undoubtedly instances where this defence is attempted from the 
mere conviction that nothing else will avail—cases where the advocate forgets 
the high duty to which he is called, and excites a prejudice against the case of 
others, by attempting to procure the escape of a criminal under this pretence; 
but such are truly rare, and usually unsuccessful.” (gq) 

The difficulties that have attended the discussion of this branch of the law 
of lunacy have arisen from an attempt to reduce into an inflexible code opinions 
which, while relatively true in their particular connection, were not meant for 
general application. Thus, for instance, when a defendant, in whom there is 
no pretence for mania or homicidal insanity, claims to be exempt from punish- 
ment on the ground of incapacity to distinguish right from wrong, the court 
very properly tells the jury that the question for them to determine is, whether 
he labors under such incapacity or not. The error has been to seize such an 
expression as this as an arbitrary elementary dogma, and to insist on its appli- 
cation to all other cases. Or, take the converse, and suppose the defence is 
merely homicidal insanity. In such a case it would be very proper to tell the 
jury that, unless they believe the homicidal impulse to have been uncontrollable, 
they must convict. And yet nothing would be more unjust than to make this 
proposition, true in itself, a general rule to bear on such cases as idiocy. It 
is proposed to avoid this difficulty by treating this question practically, in the 
only way in which it can arise in courts, and to consider briefly, not what is 
the general limit of moral responsibility in the abstract, but in what cases 
such responsibility ceases to exist.(h) These will be considered as follows :— 


(99) Cited Elwell’s Malpractice, p. 364. 

(h) The difficulty in this respect has been increased by the looseness with which 
legal adjudications are cited by even some of the more eminent text-writers. In fact, 
while the exigencies of counsel and the duty of judges require a constant recourse to 
the text-books on this particular science, in making up such text-books the authorized 
law reports have not been sufficiently relied upon. Dr. Beck, it is true, in his valuable 
treatise, has spread on his pages reports of several of the older cases, and the same 
line of authorities has been more cursorily reviewed by others. And even in the very 
recent edition of Dr. Ray’s work on this particular subject—“The Medical Jurispru- 
dence of Insanity”—a work as remarkable for precision of expression and elegance of 
style as for general judiciousness and accuracy, it is declared that, “judging from the 
few cases that have been reported, the course of practice in the English criminal courts 
has been in strict conformity with the principles laid down by Hale.” The “principles 
laid down by Hale”’ are those which that humane judge and laborious text-writer— 
who prided himself in having never, on speculations of his own, advanced an opinion 
or pronounced a judgment—had drawn from the medical authorities of that day. 
These principles have since then been greatly modified both by legal and medical 
writers ; and it is to be regretted that either class, in reviewing the matter, should 
confine themselves to the earlier authorities, and then declare that the old law con- 
tinues unaltered, “judging from the few cases that have been reported.” The fact is 
that both in this country and in England the cases “‘reported’’ on the subject are not 


36 


BOOK I.] § UNSOUNDNESS—RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME, [$ 45 


1. Where the defendant is incapable of distinguishing right from wrong in 
reference to the particular case. 


“few,” but numerous; and if they had been examined in detail, it would have been 
found that they kept pace with almost equal step with the advance of medical science. 
How far the latter has kept pace with them may be estimated from the fact that Dr. 
Ray, the author of the fullest and most recent work on this vexed subject, has, even 
in his edition of 1853, cited scarcely a single volume of the thousands in which the 
authorized reports of the American Courts are published. It is true that several 
American cases are noticed, and delicate shades of opinion declared to have been 
settled by them, but they are cited from the “notes of counsel,” from “ Niles’ Regis- 
ter,’’ from the “ Dollar Newspaper,” and from “ Zion’s Herald.” Were no authorized 
reports to be had, these references might be received, though even then with great 
allowances ; but in two, at least, of the four cases mentioned, authorized reports, both 
in pamphlet and in aggregate form, have been for some years before the public. Of 
course not even substantial exactness can be secured by the use of evidence not only 
so entirely secondary, but which, at the time it was issued, was meant only for popu- 
lar use. 

Of the mistakes arising from looseness of citation in this respect, we may take as an 

illustration Wood’s case, which is relied upon with much complacency by Dr. Winslow, 

in his late Lectures on Insanity (p. 102), to show that in America “a verdict of lunacy”’ 
will be recorded under circumstances which really show nothing more than vehement 
passion and morbid excitement. In that case, which occurred in Philadelphia in 1838, 
a father shot his daughter in a paroxysm of rage, caused by her improvident marriage. 
The prosecution was abandoned by the attorney-general, under circumstances which 
were not at all connected with the defendant’s sanity or insanity; and a verdict of 
acquittal was rendered, not of lunacy, in the teeth of a charge from the very able and 
humane judge (Judge King) who tried the case, that the defence of insanity had not 
been in any degree substantiated. The verdict is no authority whatever. It was 
produced by circumstances very derogatory to public justice, it was received with 
unbroken disapprobation by the entire community, and it was in direct opposition to 
the charge of the court, instead of being responsive to it. Had the official report of 
the case been resorted to, the last fact, at least, would have been discovered. 

Some degree of the severity of the censure with which the common law has been 
visited in this connection will be abated by the accomplished gentlemen who have 
pronounced it, when they consider these facts. In fact, when the nature of the Com- 
mon LAw—words oftener used than understood—is considered, a much modified view 
will be taken. The common law has been defined to be statutes worn out by time; 
it may more properly be treated as the precipitate of the wisdom of all ages, all pro- 
fessions, all countries. If a question is to be tried involving the most delicate point 
of mechanics, the testimony of experts is taken, and what they declare to be the law 
of philosophy, the judge declares to be the law of the land. If a question of marine 
right is to be determined, the mysterious laws of the sea are invoked—the “sweet 
influences of the Pleiades and the bands of Orion’”—and as taught by science, they 
become part of the common law. And so on a trial where the question at issue was 
whether a certain species of fish was able to surmount obstructions by which a river 
in Maine had been dammed up by parties interested in the soil, it was held that the 
observations of scientific men, versed in this particular topic, were part of the common 
law of the land for the specific case; and that therefore naturalists, who had given 
attention to the habits of this fish under such circumstances, could be called to give 
their opinion on the merits. (Cottrill v. Mason, 3 Fairf. 222. See more fully as to 
cases in which the opinions of experts are evidence, post, § 94.) And the great works 
of the masters in all professions have become also part of the common law. Even by 
a judge of remarkable rigidity as a literal commentator of the old writers, this is freely 
admitted. “I consider the administrators of criminal law greatly indebted to them 
(writers on medical jurisprudence, &c.) for the results of their valuable experience, 
and professional discussions on the subject of insanity ; and I believe that those judges 
who carefully study the medical writers, and pay the most respectful but discriminating 
attention to their scientific researches on the subject, will seldom if ever submit a case 
to a jury in such a way as to hazard the conviction of a deranged man.’’ (Hornblower, 
C. J., 1 Zabriskie, 196.) So that when in any particular instance ignorance may be 
exhibited or injustice done, it must be attributed, not to a want of flexibility in the 
system, but to an imperfect dissemination of truth by those who have assumed its 
guardianship. 

Newspaper and other unofficial reports, in fact, however interesting, are of no legal 
authority, and they should be to a peculiar degree received with the same qualifications 
which have been noticed as required by all nisi prius charges. What a judge tells a 


37 


§ 46] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


9. Where he is acting under an insane delusion as to facts which, if true, 
would have relieved the act from responsibility, or when, in connection with 
_ such: insane delusion, his reasoning powers are so depraved as to make the 
commission of the particular act a natural result of the delusion. 

3. When he is impelled by a morbid and uncontrollable impulse to commit 
the particular act. 

After which will be considered, 

4, The relations of drunkenness to responsibility for crime. 

When other cases arise in which a sober and enlightened medical observa- 
tion declares that there is no real moral responsibility in the patient, the same 
opinion will be adopted by the courts upon trial. 

At present the reported cases may be classed under the preceding heads, to 
which attention is now invited. 


Ist. When the defendant is incapable of distinguishing right from wrong © 
in reference to the particular act. 


§ 46. Under this head may be enumerated persons afflicted with idiocy or 
amentia, or with general mania. It is certain that wherever such incapacity 
is shown to exist, the court will direct an acquittal; or if a jury should con- 
vict in the teeth of such instructions, the court will set the verdict aside. 
The authorities to this effect are so numerous, that a general reference to them 
is all that is here necessary, it being observed at the same time, that while the 
earlier cases lean to the position that such depravation of understanding must 
be general, it is now conceded that it is enough, if it is shown to have existed 
jn reference to the particular act. (7) 

To precisely this effect is the answer of the fifteen judges to the question 
propounded to them by the House of Lords in June, 1843—answers which 
were extra-judicially delivered, and which, therefore, though of weight as opin- 


jury is meant for a particular issue. If the evidence should show an old grudge, his 
duty would undoubtedly be to say to the jury that drunkenness must be left entirely 
out of consideration. If the defendant and the deceased were mere strangers, and the 
defendant in sudden passion, from what, to a man in his state of mind, would be ade- 
quate provocation, killed the deceased, it would be proper,to tell the jury that drunk- 
enness in this case would lower the case to manslaughter. It is plain, however, that 
expressions directed to a particular state of facts, cannot properly be severed from the 
context, and propounded as absolute independent principles applicable to all cases 
whatever. It is only by carefully marshalling the facts that we learn what the opin- 
ion of the judge trying the case really was, and even then the position of the court, 
the opportunities it has possessed for revision and a consultation of authorities after 
argument, and the authenticity and accuracy of the report, enter largely into the 
question how far the opinion so expressed is of weight. 

(7) 1 Inst. 247; Bac. Abr. Idiot. Co. Litt. 247, (a); 1 Russ. on Cr. by Greaves, 13 ; 
1 Hawk. cl. s. 3; 4 Bla. Com. 24; Collinson on Lunacy, 573, 673, (n.); R. v. Oxford, 
9C. & P. 533; Burrow’s Case, 1 Lewin, 238; R. v. Goode, 7 Ad. & El. 536; 67 Hans. 
Par. Deb. 728 ; Bowler’s Case, Hadfield’s Case, Ibid. 480; 1 Russ. 11; 27 How. St. Tr. 
1316 ; Com. v. Rogers, 7 Mete. 500; 7 Bost. Law Rep. 449; Com. v. Mosler, 4 Barr, 267 ; 
Freeman v. People, 4 Denio, 10; State v. Spencer, 1 Zabriskie, 196 ; State v. Gardiner, 
Wright’s Ohio R. 392; Com. v. Farkin, 3 Penn. L. J. 482; Vance v. Com. 2 Virg. C. 
132; M‘Allister v. State, 17 Alab. 434; U. S. v. Shults, 6 McLean, 121; People v. 
Sprague, 2 Parker C. R. 43; State v. Hunting, 21 Mis. (6 Bennet) 464; R. v. Barton, 3 
Cox C. C. 275; R. v. Offord, 5 C.& P. 168; R. v. Higginson, 1 C. & K. 129; R. v. 
Stokes, 3 C. & K. 185; R. v. Layton, 4 Cox, C. C. 149; R. v. Vaughan, 1 Cox, C. C. 80. 


38 


BOOK I.] INSANE DELUSIONS. [§ 48 


ions, are not binding as authority. ‘The jury,” they said, “ ought to be told 
in all cases that every man is presumed to be sane, and to possess a sufficient 
degree of reason to be responsible for his crimes until the contrary be proved 
to their satisfaction ; and that to establish a defence on the ground of insanity, 
it must be clearly proved that at the time of committing the act, the party ac- 
cused was laboring under such a defect of reason, from disease of the mind, as 
not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing, or if he did know 
it, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong.’’(/) 


2d. When the defendant is acting under an insane delusion as to circum- 
stances, which, tf true, would relieve the act from responsibility, or where 
his reasoning powers are so depraved as to make the commission of the 
particular act the natural consequence of the delusion. 


§ 47. The answer of the English judges on this point is worthy of notice. 
The question propounded to them in this respect, was, ‘“‘If a person, under an 
insane delusion as to existing facts, commits an offence in consequence thereof, 
is he thereby excused??? ‘To which question,’’ they replied, ‘“‘the answer 
must of course depend on the nature of the delusion: but, making the same 
assumption as we did before, namely, that he labors under such partial delusion 
only, and is not in other respects insane, we think he must be considered in the 
Same situation as to responsibility, as if the facts with respect to which the 
delusion exists, were real. For example; if under the influence of his delusion, 
he supposes another man to be in the act of attempting to take away his life, 
and he kills that man, as he supposes, in self defence, he would be exempt 
from punishment. If his delusion was, that the deceased had inflicted a 
serious injury to his character and fortune, and he killed him in revenge for 
such supposed injury, he would be liable to punishment.” | 

§ 48. So far as the law thus stated goes—and it is stated with extreme 
caution—it has been always recognized as binding in this country. Even 
where there is no pretence of insanity, it has been held in one State, that if a 
man, though in no danger of serious bodily harm, through fear, alarm, or 
cowardice, kill another under the impression that great bodily injury is about to 
be inflicted on him, it is neither manslaughter nor murder, but self defence ;(/) 
and though this proposition is too broadly stated, as is remarked by Bron- 
son, J.. when commenting on it in a recent case in New York, and should be 
qualified as to make it necessary that there should be facts and circumstances 
existing which would lead the jury to believe that the defendant had reasonable 
(in proportion to his own lights) grounds for his belief, yet with this qualifica- 
tion it is now generally received.(?) And, indeed, as shown by Mr. Justice 
Bronson, in the case just noticed, after the general though tardy acquiescence 


(j) 1 Car. & Kir. 134; 8 Scott, N. R. 595. (k) Granger v. State, 5 Yerger, 459. 

(/) Shorter v. People, 2 Comstock, 197-202, 8. C. 4 Barb. 460; Monroe v. State, 5 
Geo. 85; State v. Scott, 4 Iredell, 409; People v. M’Leod, | Hill, 420; People v. Pine, 
2 Barbour, 168; Roberts v. Slate, 3 Georg. 310; Com. v. Rogers, supra. See generally 
Wharton on Homicide, 216, 7, 8, 9, &c., and Whart. C. L. 1024-8, and a very interest- 
ing series of notes in 7 Bost. Law. Rep. (N. 8.) 575, 689, &. See, also, Sloo’s case, 
reported in 15 Am, Journ. Ins. 33. 


39 


§ 49] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


in Selfridge’s case, where the same view was takan as early as 1805, by Chief 
Justice Parker, of Massachusetts, and after the almost literal incorporation of 
the leading distinctions of the latter case in the revised Statutes of New York, 
as well as into the judicial system of most of the States, the point must be 
considered as finally at rest. Perhaps the doctrine, as laid down originally in 
Selfridge’s case, would have met with a much earlier acquiescence had not the 
supposed political bias of the court in that extraordinary trial, and the remark- 
able laxity shown in the framing of the bill and in the adjustment of bail, led 
to a deep-seated professional prejudice which struck at even such parts of the 
charge as were indisputably sound.(m) 

In Levett’s case, which has never been questioned, and which has been sanc- 
tioned by the most rigid of the common law jurists, it was held a sufficient 
defence to an indictment for murder, that the mortal blow was struck by the 
defendant under the delusion that the deceased was a robber, who had entered 
the house.(mm) 

§ 49. In none of the cases which have just been noticed, is the actual exist- 
ence of danger an essential ingredient, and certainly, as the intentions of an 
assailant are incapable of positive ascertainment, such a danger can never be 
absolutely shown to exist. It is true that when the point has not been directly 
before the judicial mind, dicta have been thrown out to the effect, that the 
danger must be such as to alarm a reasonable man, but whenever the requisite 
state of facts has been presented, courts have not hesitated to say that the 
danger must be estimated, not by the jury’s standard, but by that of the defend- 
ant himself. Thus, a very enlightened and learned judge in Pennsylvania, 
one who would be among the last to weaken any of the sanctions of human 
life, in a late case directed the jury to take into consideration ‘‘the relative 
characters, as individuals,’’ of the deceased and the defendant, and, in deter- 
mining whether the danger really was imminent or not, to inquire ‘‘ whether 
the deceased was bold, strong, and of a violent and vindictive character, and 
the defendant much weaker, and of a timid disposition.”?” And to the same 
effect will be found the cases in other American Courts elsewhere more parti- 
cularly noticed.(mmm) 


(m) In a former work (Wharton’s C. L. 2d ed. 390), the present writer went into 
a critical examination of Selfridge’s case, and advanced the opinion that the verdict, 
as well as the preliminary proceedings, were inconsistent with a just appreciation 
of human life, and with the dignity of public justice. This view is by no means re- 
tracted; and the gradual development of the political correspondence of those days 
shows that an approval of Selfridge’s course—the shooting down by a man of thirty of 
a lad of eighteen, then an undergraduate in Harvard College, because the latter 
thought proper to suppose that the former, whose father he had just posted, might be 
ready to avenge the insult—was made a party test. Indeed, John Adams (Cunning. 
Cor. 70) tells us that “the great political parties in the State were arranged under 
their respective standards on the simple question of the guilt or innocence of an indi- 
vidual under a criminal accusation.” But it is due to the excellent jurist who pre- 
sided at the trial to say that, however, in the reception and adjustment of bail—two 
thousand dollars—he may have been influenced by those political heats to which even 
the bench in those times was subject, his charge is a fair statement of the English com- 
mon law, as adapted to our social condition. And however great may have been the 
zeal with which the case has been assailed, it is now impossible to refuse to recognize 
it as having been largely and definitely influential in settling this branch of American 
Jurisprudence. 

(mm) Levett’s case, Cro. Car. 438, 1 Hale, 42, 474, Wharton’s C. L. § 18, 1027. 

(mmm) See Wh. C. L. § 641, &c., 1026-7. 

40 


BOOK I.] INSANE DELUSIONS, [§ 51 


§ 50. If, therefore, a delusion that a party is in danger, whether such delu- 
sion be the result of insanity or of physical causes, is a justification of violence 
adequate to remove the supposed danger—and the answer of the English 
judges on this point corresponds with our own— it is difficult to avoid the con- 
clusion, that a delusion as to the amount of force necessary to obviate the 
imagined attack should be equally potent. Thus, for instance, it is stated by 
the English judges, that if the party is under an insane delusion that the de- 
ceased is about to take his life, and he kills him to prevent it, he is to be 
exempt from punishment. The gist of this position consists in the delusion. 
If, therefore, by an insane delusion, or depravation of the reasoning faculty, 
the defendant insanely believes, either that the imagined evil is so intolerable 
as to make life-taking necessary or justifiable in order to avert it, or that 
while the evil is of a lesser grade, life-taking is an appropriate and just way of 
getting rid of it, the same reasoning applies. The principle may logically be 
stated thus :— 

1. Any species of insane delusion exempts from punishment the perpetrator 
of an act committed under its influence. 

2. The belief, unfounded in fact, that a party is in immediate danger of his 
life from another, is such a delusion. 

Or the belief that taking the life of another is the appropriate remedy for 
a minor though imagined evil, is also such a delusion. 

3. Therefore, homicide, under either of these beliefs, is not liable to punish- 
ment. (7) 

§ 51. The minor premise, it will at once be seen, may be varied, without 
weakening the conclusion, by inserting in its place any insane delusion, the 
existence of which would deprive the act of guilty consciousness. That an 
insane delusion, as to the value or meaning of human life, will have this effect, 
even though the party himself knows when committing the act that he is 
doing wrong, and is violating the laws of the land, is illustrated by Lord 
Erskine, in a well-known case: ‘Let me suppose,’”’ he said, “the character of 
an insane delusion consisted in the belief that some given person was any 
brute animal, or an inanimate being (and such cases have existed), and that 
upon the trial of such a lunatic for murder, you, being on your oaths, were 
convinced, upon the uncontradicted evidence of one hundred persons, that he 
believed the man he had destroyed to have been a potter’s vessel; that it was 
quite impossible to doubt that fact, although to other intents and purposes 
he was sane—answering, reasoning, acting as men not in any manner tainted 
with insanity converse and reason and conduct themselves. Suppose, further, 
that he believed the man whom he destroyed, but whom he destroyed as a 
potter’s vessel, to be the property of another, and that he had malice against 
such supposed person, and that he meant to injure him, knowing the act he 
was doing to be malicious and injurious; and that, in short, he had full know- 


(n) It is important that by “punishment,” as here used, should be understood such 
punishment as is inflicted on persons of sound mind. It is essential, however, to the 
policy of the present more humane mode of treatment for the insane, that, in all cases 
where a party is acquitted on ground of insanity, strict confinement should be directed, 
in such a way as will exempt the community from any probable recurrence of such 
delirious outrages. This will hereafter be more fully considered: post, §§ 259-276. 

4] 


§ 51] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


ledge of all principles of good and evil; yet would it be possible to convict 
such a person of murder, if, from the influence of the disease, he was ignorant 
_ of the relation in which he stood to the man he had destroyed, and was utterly 
unconscious that he had struck at the life of a human being ?’’(0) 

An instance of an hallucination, founded on an intended auricular decep- 
tion, is given in Charles Brockden Brown’s novel of Wieland, and is well 
known to be founded on facts. A man of excessively morbid temperament is 
so wrought upon by ventriloquism, as to believe himself under supernatural 
command to kill his wife. He does so under the stress of what he conceives 
to be a pure legal necessity. A similar case may be supposed in a sincere be- 
liever in spirit-rapping, who is ordered by the medium to commit a violation 
of the law. In this case the medium is the principal in the first degree, but 
the actual perpetrator of the act, under the present condition of the law, is 
entitled to an acquittal on the ground of insanity. At the same time it is 
very important that in all such cases future restraint should be applied, until 
a sound condition of the reason be restored. Similar delusions in case of 
sleep-drunkenness have been held to confer irresponsibility.(00) 

A man fancies himself to be the Grand Lama or Alexander the Great, and 
supposes that his neighbor is brought before him for an invasion of his sove- 
reignty, and he cuts off his head or throttles him. He knows he is doing 
wrong; perhaps, from a sense of guilt, he conceals the body: he may have a 
clear perception of the legal consequences of the act. According to Mr. Wigan, 
such an association of a consciousness of the objective guilt and consequences 
of an act with an insane delusion, as to its subjective relation, is readily ex- 
plained on the principle of the duality of the human mind; but however this ~ 
may be, it is a matter in which all observers agree that the lunatic is, in most 
instances, conscious of the moral relations of his conduct.(p) Nor, even 
under the severe sanction of the older English text writers (who have, by their 
failure to reach this point, demonstrated how dangerous it is, with our im- 
perfect experience, to attempt to codify or dogmatize the laws into a few 
absolute propositions), has this truth evaded the practical recognition of the 
courts. ‘Thus, in a case where it was proved that the defendant had taken the 
life of another under the notion that he was set about with a conspiracy to 
subject him to imprisonment and death, Lord Lyndhurst, while quoting with 
apparent entire acquiescence, Hale’s doctrine, as affirmed by Sir James Mans- 
field in Bellingham’s case, thought it not too liberal a sweep for him to tell 
the jury that they might “acquit the prisoner on the ground of insanity, if he 
did not know, when he committed the act, what the effect of it was with refer- 
ence to the crime of murder.’”’ Now an acquittal would be easy enough if it 
be necessary, in order to create responsibility, that the party should know the 
effect of the act with reference to a question whose meaning, even to the court 
itself, appears to have been enveloped in so much mist. But there can be no 


(0) Winslow on Plea of Insanity, 6. (00) Post, § 151, &e. 

(p) Wigan on Insanity, &c., London, 1844, 65 ; Winslow, Plea of Insanity, 16; Ray. 
Med. Jur. of Ins. § 17 ; Siebold Gericht, Med. § 219; Pinel, Traité sur alienation men- 
tale, 2d ed., Par. 1809, 156; Riel, Fieberlehre, 4 Bd. 396; Groos, Die Lehre von der 
Mania sine Delirio, Heidelberg, 1830; De Boismont on Halluc., Phil. 1853, 506. 


42 


BOOK I.] HOMICIDAL MANIA. [§$ 58 


doubt, after careful examination of the whole case, that the point Lord Lynd- 
hurst decided was, that a man who, under an insane delusion, shoots another, 
is irresponsible when the act is the product of the delusion. Such, indeed, on 
general reasoning, must be held to be the law in this country, and such will 
it be held to be when any particular case arises which requires its application. 
The fact that against this view militate certain expressions—obiter dicta—in 
recorded opinions, as well as in the answers of the English judges, will not 
prevent its practical recognition, any more than Lord Lyndhurst was pre- 
vented, by the first class of authorities, from advising the acquittal of Offord, 
and afterwards maintaining that that acquittal was consistent with the very 
precedents now cited against it. 

§ 52. The delusion, however, must go to the root of the crime; or, in other 
words, the crime must have been the result of the delusion. Dr. Caspar(q) 
has given us a pregnant illustration of this: A merchant, named Schraber, 
was convicted of cheating by false pretences and false information, and was 
sentenced to imprisonment for six years. On an application to the court to 
reconsider the sentence, insanity was set up, and it appeared that the prisoner 
either felt or feigned a belief that he was a legitimate son of the late Duke Charles 
of Mecklenberg Strelitz; which certainly, if not a mere fiction, was an insane 
delusion. Much reason existed to believe that the whole thing was simulated; 
but independently of this, the court was clear that as the mania, if real, had 
no connection with his crime, it formed no ground for a revision of the sen- 
tence. Partial insanity, it is clear, does not exonerate when the reason is not 
affected as to the particular act. (qq) 


3d. Where the defendant is impelled by a morbid and uncontrollable impulse 
to commit the particular act.(7r) 


§ 53. The questions propounded to the English judges related solely to the 
doctrine of insane delusions; and the replies, though containing general ex- 
pressions, can hardly, even in England, be considered as authoritative in a case 
where the defence is monomaniac impulse. In this country, the effect of such 
a defence, as distinguished from that of insane delusion, has been the subject 
of special consideration. The first case in which it was gravely considered is 
that of Commonwealth v. Rodgers, before the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, 
in the spring of 1844.(rr) Chief Justice Shaw—whose conservative tenden- 
cies on the great sanctions of human life cannot be suspected—found himself, 
in preparing his charge, embarrassed by the conflict between the dogmas of the 
older judges and the necessities of the particular case, and there is an evident 
struggle on his part to preserve as much as he could of the letter of the former 


(q) Wochenschrift, Gr. 31-32. 

(qq) State v. Hunting, 21 Miss. (6 Bennett), 464; Bovard v. State, 30 Miss. (1 
George), 600; Com. v. Mosler, 4 Barr, 266. 

(r) The editors of the 11th edition of Beck’s Medical Jurisprudence (vol. 1, p. 741) 
give some valuable remarks as to the difficulties attending the nomenclature of this 
species of derangement. 

(rr) This case is reported with great fulness, in pamphlet shape, by Messrs. Bemes & 
Bigelow, and is incorporated, in a condensed form, in the 7th volume of Metcalf’s Re- 
ports, p. 500. 

43 


§ 53] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


and at the same time to establish a principle by which the latter could be 
properly respected. He begins—we cite from the authorized report—by 
laying down two propositions of great breadth. ‘In order to constitute a 
crime,” he says, ‘‘a person must have intelligence and capacity enough to 
have a criminal intent and purpose; and if his reason and mental powers are 
either so deficient that he has no will, no conscience, ov controlling mental 
power, or if, through the overwhelming violence of mental disease, his intel- 
lectual power is for the time obliterated, he is not a responsible moral agent, 
and is not punishable for criminal acts. These extremes,’ he then proceeds 
to state, “are easily distinguished, and not to be mistaken. The difficulty 
lies between these extremes, in the cases of partial insanity, where the mind 
may be clouded and weakened, but not incapable of remembering, reasoning, 
and judging; or so perverted by insane delusion, as to act under false impres- 
sions and influences.’’? ‘To such cases—to those where the mind is not ‘‘inca- 
pable of judging,” &c., and to those where it acts “under false impressions 
and influences,’’—and to such alone, he applies the “right and wrong” test ; 
reserving it toa very small sphere of action, since the defence of insanity 
would scarcely be ventured where there was both a capacity to judge, reason, 
and remember, and a freedom from false ‘‘ impressions and influences.” Taking 
up the particular defence of monomania, which was that advanced in the case 
before him, he proceeds to state the law, with a liberality in entire accordance 
with the weight of medical authority. ‘This’? (monomania) “may operate 
as an excuse for a criminal act in one of two modes. 1. Hither the delusion 
is such that the person under its influence has a real and firm belief of some 
fact, not true in itself, but which, if it were true, would excuse his act : as where 
the belief is that the party killed had an immediate design upon his life, and under 
that belief the insane man kills in supposed self-defence. A common instance 
is where he fully believes that the act he is doing is done by the immediate 
command of God, and he acts under the delusive but sincere belief that what 
he is doing, is by the command of a superior power, which supersedes all 
human laws, and the laws of nature. 2. Or this state of delusion indicates, 
to an experienced person, that the mind is in a diseased state; that the known 
tendency of that diseased state of the mind is to break out into sudden parox- 
ysms of violence, venting itself in homicide, or other violent acts towards friend 
and foe indiscriminately ; so that, although there were no previous indications 
of violence, yet the subsequent act connecting itself with the previous symp- 
toms and indications, will enable an experienced person to say, that the 
outbreak was of such a character that, for the time being, it must have 
overborne memory and reason; that the act was the result of the disease and 
not of a mind capable of choosing; in short, that it was the result of uncon- 
trollable impulse, and not of a person acted on by motives, and governed by 
will.” * * * “ Are the facts of such a character, taken in connection 
with the opinion of professional witnesses, as to induce the jury to believe 
that the accused was laboring for days under monomonia, attended with delusion, 
and did thus indicate such a diseased state of the mind, that the act of killing 
the warden was to be considered as an outbreak or paroxysm of disease, which 
44 


BOOK I.] HOMICIDAL MANIA. [$ 55 


for the time being overwhelmed and superseded reason and judgment so that 
the diseased was not an accountable agent? If such was the case, the accused 
is entitled to an acquittal.” 

§ 54. In the fall of 1846, a similar defence was started before three of the 
judges of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, then holding an Oyer and Ter- 
miner in Philadelphia. In his charge to the jury, Chief Justice Gibson—a 
most able judge, thoroughly disciplined in and wedded to the common law, 
but at the same time endowed with a remarkable zest for and a mastery over 
collateral sciences—after, in the first place, vehemently repudiating the doctrine 
that partial insanity excuses anything but its direct results, and sliding, in 
reference to such cases, into the “right and wrong” test, proceeds: ‘‘But there 
is a moral or homicidal insanity, consisting of an irresistible inclination to 
kill or to commit some other particular offence.(s) There may be an unseen 
ligament pressing on the mind, drawing it to consequences which vt sees but 
cannot avoid, and placing it under a coercion which, while its results are 
clearly perceived, is incapable of resistance. ‘The doctrine which acknowledges 
this mania is dangerous in its relations, and can be recognized only in the 
clearest cases. It ought to be shown to have been habitual, or at least to 
have evinced itself in more than a single instance. It is seldom directed 
against a particular individual; but that it may be so, is proved by the case 
of the young woman who was deluded by an irresistible impulse to destroy 
her child, though aware of the heinous nature of the act. The frequency of 
this constitutional malady is fortunately small, and it is better to confine it 
within the strictest limits. If juries were to allow it as a general motive, 
operating in cases of this character, its recognition would destroy social order 
as well as personal safety. ‘To establish it as a justification in any particular 
case, it is necessary either to show, by clear proofs, its contemporaneous 
existence evinced by present circumstances, or the existence of an habitual 
tendency developed in previous cases, becoming in itself a second nature.’ (ss) 

§ 55. In a still earlier case in Pennsylvania, Judge Lewis, then presiding 
in Lycoming County, and now Chief Justice of Pennsylvania, a judge by whom 
the subject of medical jurisprudence has received peculiar and careful attention 
—recognized the same doctrine, though with even greater reluctance. ‘‘ Moral 
insanity arises from the existence of some of the natural propensities in such 
violence, that it is impossible not to yield to them. It bears a striking re- 
semblance to vice, which is said to consist in an undue excitement of the pas- 
sions and will, and in their irregular or crooked actions leading to crime. It 
is therefore to be received with the utmost scrutiny. It is not generally ad- 
mitted in legal tribunals as a species of insanity which relieves from responsi- 
bility for crime, and it ought never to be admitted as a defence, until it is shown 
that these propensities exist in such violence, as to subjugate the intellect, 
control the will, and render it impossible for the party to do otherwise than 
yield. Where its existence is fully established, this species of insanity relieves 


(s) The charge was oral, having been reported by the present writer, and but 
hastily revised by the judge himself, which may account for the want of literal exact- 
ness in this and other expressions. 

(ss) Com. v. Mosler, 4 Barr, 266. . 

4 


§ 55] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


from accountability to human laws. But this state of mind is not to be pre- 
sumed without evidence, nor does it usually occur without some premonitory 
Symptoms indicating its approach.’’(¢) 

In Ohio, it has been laid down, though with much hesitation, “that there 


(t) The same view was, some years after, repeated by the same enlightened and 
able judge; Lewis Cr. Law, 404; and by Judge Edmonds (2 Am. Jour. of Ins.): Judge 
Whiting (Freeman’s Trial—Pamph.). In 1858,in John Freeth’s case, tried before the 
Philadelphia Oyer and Terminer, Judge Ludlow charged the jury partly as follows :— 

“ Besides the kinds of insanity to which I have already referred, and which strictly 
speaking affect the mind only, we have moral or homicidal insanity, which seems to 
be an irresistible inclination to kill, or to commit some other particular offence. We are 
obliged by the force of authority to say to you, that there is such a disease known to 
the law as homicidal insanity ; what it is, or in what it consists, no lawyer or judge 
has ever yet been able to explain with precision; physicians, especially those having 
charge of the insane, gradually, it would seem, come to the conclusion, that all wicked 
men are mad, and many of the judges have so far fallen into the same error as to 
render it possible for any man to escape the penalty which the law affixes to crime. 

“We do not intend to be understood as expressing the opinion that in some instances 
human beings are not afflicted with a homicidal mania, but we do intend to say that 
a defence consisting exclusively of this species of insanity, has frequently been made 
the means by which a notorious offender has escaped punishment. What, then, is 
that form of disease, denominated homicidal mania, which will excuse one for having 
committed a murder ? 

“Chief Justice Gibson calls it, ‘that unseen ligament pressing on the mind, and 
drawing it to consequences which it sees but cannot avoid, and placing it under a coer- 
cion which, while its results are clearly perceived, is incapable of resistance’— an 
irresistible inclination to kill.’ 

“Tf by moral insanity is to be understood only a disordered or perverted state of the 
affections or moral powers of the mind, it cannot be too soon discarded as affording 
any shield from punishment for crime; if it can be truly said that one who indulges 
in violent emotions, such as remorse, anger, Shame, grief, and the like, is afflicted with 
homicidal insanity, it will be difficult, yes, impossible, to say where sanity ends and 
insanity begins; for, by way of illustration, the man who is lashed into fury by a fit 
of anger is in one sense insane. ; 

‘As a general rule it will be found that instances are rare of cases of homicidal 
insanity occurring wherein the mania is not of a general nature, and results in a desire 
to kill any and every person who may chance to fall within the range of the maniac’s 
malevolence; as it is general, so also is it based upon ¢maginary and not real wrongs ; 
if it is directed against a particular person (as is sometimes the case), then also the 
cause of the act will generally be imaginary; when, therefore, the jury find from the 
evidence that the act has been the result of an imaginary but real wrong, they will 
take care to examine with great caution into the circumstances of the case, so that 
with the real. wrong, they may not also discover revenge, anger, and kindred emotions 
of the mind to be the real motive which has occasioned the homicidal act. 

‘* Orfila has said, ‘that the mind is always greatly troubled when it is agitated by 
anger, tormented by an unfortunate love, bewildered by jealousy, overcome by despair, 
haunted by terror, or corrupted by an unconquerable desire for vengeance. Then, as 
is commonly said, a man is no longer master of himself, his reason is affected, his 
ideas are in disorder, he is like a madman. But in all these cases a man does not lose 
his knowledge of the real relations of things; he may exaggerate his misfortune, but 
this misfortune is real, and if it carry him to commit a criminal act, this act is perfectly 
well-motived.’ 

‘The man who has a clear conception of the various relations of life, and the real 
relation of things, is not often afflicted with insanity of any description. He may 
become angry, and in a fit of temper kill his enemy, or even his friend, but this is not, 
and I hope never will be, called in courts of justice insanity. Again, one who is really 
driven on by an uncontrollable impulse to the commission of a crime, will be able to 
show its ‘contemporaneous existence evinced by present circumstances, or the exist- 
ence of an habitual tendency developed in particular cases, and becoming in itself a 
second nature,’ and ought further to show that the mania ‘was habitual, or that it 
had evinced itself in more than one instance.’ 

“Chief Justice Lewis has said that moral insanity ‘ bears a striking resemblance to . 
vice;’ and further, ‘it ought never to be admitted as a defence until it is shown that 
these propensities exist in such violence as to subjugate the intellect, control the will, 
and render it impossible for the party to do otherwise than yield.’ And again, ‘this 


46 


BOOK I.] HOMICIDAL MANIA. [$ 55 


is no authority for holding that mere moral insanity, as it is sometimes 
called, exonerates from responsibility. Chief Justice Shaw’s charge in Abner 


state of mind is not to be presumed without evidence, nor does it usually occur 
without some premonitory symptoms indicating its approach.’ 

‘Gentlemen of the jury, we say to you, as the result of our reflections on this branch 
of the subject, that if the prisoner was actuated by an irresistible inclination to kill, 
and was utterly unable to control his will, or subjugate his intellect, and was not 
actuated by anger, jealousy, revenge, and kindred evil passions, he is entitled to an 
acquittal, provided the jury believe that the state of mind now referred to has been 
proven to have existed, without doubt, and to their satisfaction.” —Am. Journ. of Insan., 
vol. xv. p. 303. 

In Huntington’s case, the defendant was tried in New York, in 1858, for forgery. 
Judge Capron charged the jury partly as follows :— 

“The law, as at present administered, regards insanity, whether general or partial, 
as a derangement of the mind, the intellect, the reasoning and appreciating principle, 
the spring of motives and passions. To constitute a complete defence, insanity, if 
partial, must be such in degree as wholly to deprive the accused of the guide of reason 
in regard to the act with which he is charged, and of the knowledge that he is doing 
wrong in committing it. If, though somewhat deranged, he is yet able to distinguish 
right from wrong in the particular case in which crime is imputed to him, and to know 
that he is doing wrong, the act is criminal in law, and he is liable to punishment. 
But it is insisted for the prisoner that insanity, either general or partial, may exist, 
and the subject be totally unable to control his actions, while his intellect, or knowing 
and reasoning powers, suffer no notable lesion; it is claimed that persons thus afflicted 
may be capable of reasoning or supporting an argument on any subject within their 
sphere of knowledge. * * * * This afiliction has received the name of Moral 
Insanity, because the natural feelings, affections, inclinations, temper, or moral dispo- 
sitions, only are perverted, while the mind, the seat of volition and motive, remains 
unimpaired. I will not positively assert that this theory is not sound: it may be 
reconcilable with moral responsibility for human conduct; but Iam not reluctant to 
confess my own mental inability to appreciate the harmony between the two proposi- 
tions, if it exist.’’ 

Under this charge the prisoner was found guilty, and sentenced to the State prison. 

So in Spear’s case (Am. Journ. for Insan., p. 218), Judge Allen told the jury that 
there must be evidence, in order to acquit, of “a lesion of the intellect and reasoning 
powers, or of some derangement or disease affecting the mind and judgment.” (Post, 
§ 198.) 

Daniel E. Sickles was tried in the U. 8. Circuit Court for the District of Columbia, 
in 1859, for the murder of Philip B. Key. The defence was mania, produced by the 
defendant discovering an adulterous connection between his wife and the deceased. 
The following statement of the legal points adjudicated is taken from Elwell’s Mal- 
practice, p. 391 :— } 

“Mr. Brady claimed that the immediate circumstances attending the seduction of 
Mr. Sickles’ wife, and the death of Key, were of so atrocious a nature as to overwhelm 
the mind of Sickles instantaneously, and thus render him irresponsible for the crime 
of murder. He therefore drew up the following propositions, and requested the court 
to embody them in its charge to the jury :— 

“¢], If, from the whole evidence, the jury believe that Mr. Sickles committed the 
act, but at the time of doing so was under the influence of a diseased mind, and was 
really unconscious that he was committing a crime, he is not in law guilty of murder. 

“<¢2. If the jury believe that from any predisposing cause the prisoner’s mind was 
impaired, and at the time of killing Mr. Key he became, or was mentally incapable of 
governing himself in reference to Mr. Key, as the debaucher of his wife, and at the 
time of committing said act was, by reason of such cause, unconscious that he was 
committing a crime as to said Mr. Key, he is not guilty of any offence whatever. 

“¢3, It is for the jury to say what was the state of the prisoner’s mind as to the 
capacity to decide upon the criminality of the particular act in question—the homi- 
cide—at the moment it occurred, and what was the condition of the parties respectively 
as to being armed or not at the same moment. These are open questions for the jury, 
as are any other questions which may arise upon the consideration of the evidence, 
the whole of which is to be taken into view by the jury. 

“¢4, The law does not require that the insanity which absolves from crime should 
exist for any definite period, but only that it exists at the moment when the act oc- 
curred with which the accused stands charged. _ 

“¢5. If the jury have any doubt as to the case, either in reference to the homicide 
or the question of sanity, Mr. Sickles should be acquitted.’ : 

4 


§ 55] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


Rodger’s case, and Judge Birchard’s charge in Clark’s case, 12 Ohio, 424, are 
quite as favorable to the defence of insanity as the authorities warrant. I 


“These propositions were argued at great length by counsel, especially by Mr. Brady, 
who contended that the great sorrow that had fallen upon Mr. Sickles, had, in fact, 
dethroned his intellect, and, for the moment, he was not accountable for what he did. 
CrawrorD, J., charged as follows on these propositions :— 

‘¢<¢The court is asked to give to the jury certain instructions, whether on the part 
of the United States or on the defence. The first instruction asked for by the United 
States, embodies the law of this case on the particular branch of it to which it relates, 
and is granted with some explanatory remarks as to insanity, with a reference to 
which the prayer closes. A great English judge has said, on the trial of Oxford, who 
shot at the Queen of England, “ That if the prisoner was laboring under some control- 
ling disease which was, in truth, the acting power within him which he could not 
resist, then he will not be responsible.”” And again: “The question is, whether he 
was laboring under that species of insanity which satisfies you that he was quite un- 
aware of the nature, character, and consequences of the act he was committing, or, in 
other words, whether he was under the influence of a diseased mind, and was really 
unconscious at the time he was committing the act that that was acrime. A man is 
not to be excused from responsibility if he has capacity and reason sufficient to enable 
him to distinguish between right and wrong as to the particular act he is doing; a 
knowledge and consciousness that the act he is doing is wrong and criminal, and will 
subject him to punishment. In order to be responsible, he must have sufficient power 
of memory to recollect the relation in which he stands to others, and in which others 
stand to him; that the act he is doing is contrary to the plain dictates of justice and 
right, injurious to others, and a violation of the dictates of duty. On the contrary, 
although he may be laboring under a partial insanity, if he still understands the 
nature and character of his act and its consequences, if he has a knowledge that it is 
wrong and criminal, and a mental power sufficient to apply that knowledge to his own 
case, and to know that if he does the act, he will do wrong and receive punishment, 
such partial insanity is not sufficient to exempt him from responsibility for criminal 
acts.”” Now we come to those asked on the part of the defence, the first of which is 
in these words :— . 

“¢TIn reply to the ninth instruction, the court responds thus: “It is for the jury to 
say what was the state of Mr. Sickles’ mind as to the capacity to decide upon the 
criminality of the homicide, receiving the law as given to them in relation to the 
degree of insanity, whether it will or will not excuse, they (the jury) finding the fact 
of the existence or non-existence of such degree of insanity.” 

“¢The tenth prayer reads thus: ‘‘The law does not require that the insanity which 
absolves from crime should exist for any definite period, but only that it exist at the 
moment when the act occurred with which the accused stands charged.” That in- 
struction is granted. The time when the insanity is to operate is the moment when 
the crime charged upon the party was committed, if committed at all. The eleventh 
and last instruction asked reads this way: ‘“‘If the jury have any doubt as to the 
case, either in reference to the homicide or question of insanity, Mr. Sickles should be 
acquitted.” 

“¢This instruction, as I mentioned in referring to prayer four of the United States, 
will be answered in conjunction with it. 

“ “Tt does not appear to be questioned that if a doubt is entertained by the jury, the 
prisoner is to have the benefit of it. As to the sanity or insanity of the prisoner at 
the moment of committing the act charged, it is argued by the United States that every 
man being presumed to be sane, the presumption must be overcome by evidence satis- 
factory to the jury that he was insane when the deed was done. 

‘““«This is not the first time this inquiry has engaged my attention. The point was 
made and decided at the June Term, 1858, in case of the United States v. Devlins, 
when the court gave the following opinion, which I read from my notes of the trial: 
“This prayer is based on the idea that the jury must be satisfied, beyond all reason- 
able doubt, of the insanity of the party for whom the defence is set up; precisely as 
the United States are bound to prove the guilt of a defendant to warrant a conviction. 
I am well aware, and it has appeared on this argument, that it has been held by a 
court of high rank and reputation that there must be a preponderance of evidence in 
favor of the defence of insanity to overcome the presumption of law that every killing 
is a murder; and that the same court has said that if there is an equilibrium, includ- 
ing, I suppose, the presumption mentioned of evidence, the presumption of the de- 
fendant’s innocence makes the preponderance in his favor.” 

‘““¢ Whether a man is insane or not, is a matter of fact; what degree of insanity will 
relieve him from responsibility is a matter of law, the jury finding the fact of the 


48 


BOOK I.] HOMICIDAL MANIA. [$ 57 


will not say that they are more so; for, rightly understood, they do not convey 
the idea that mere moral insanity constitutes a defence.’’ (¢¢) 

§ 56. In all cases where clear proof is not presented of the existence of such 
a malady—difficult though such proof be to secure—it is important to keep in 
mind the striking observations of Lord Brougham, when the question was in 
discussion in the House of Lords. ‘‘With respect to the point, of a person 
being an accountable being, that was, an accountable being to the law of the 
land, a great confusion had pervaded the minds of some persons whom he was 
indisposed to call reasoners, who considered accountability in its moral sense, 
as mixing itself up with the only kind of accountableness with which they, as 
human legislators, had to do, or of which they could take cognizance. He 
could conceive of the case of a human being of a weakly constituted mind, who 
might by long brooding over real or fancied wrongs, work up so perverted a 
feeling of hatred against an individual that danger might occur. He might 
not be deluded as to the actual existence of injuries he had received, but he 
might grievously and grossly exaggerate them, and they might so operate 
upon a weakly framed mind and intellect as to produce crime. He could 
conceive that the Maker of that man, in his infinite mercy, having regard to 
the object of his creation, might deem him not an object for punishment. But 
that man was accountable to human tribunals in a totally different sense. 
Man punished crime for the purpose of practically deterring others from 
offending, by committing a repetition of the like act. It was in that sense 
only that he had anything to do with the doctrine of accountable and not 
accountable. He could conceive a person whom the Deity might not deem 
accountable, but who might be perfectly accountable to human laws.’’(w) 

§ 57. Chief Justice Hornblower, it is true, in a charge, which bears the 
impress of his single authority, not having been reviewed by the court in 
bane, took still more decided ground, involving an emphatic disclaimer of 
moral insanity 7n foto. At the same time he rejects in a manner quite unex- 
ampled for its summariness, all the old tests, and reduces the inquiry to a 
point which, after all, leaves the widest margin. ‘In my judgment, the true 
question to be put to the jury is, whether the prisoner was insane at the time 
of committing the act; and in answer to that question there is little danger 


degree too. Under the instruction of the court, murder can be committed only by a 
sane man. Everybody is presumed to be sane who is charged with a crime, but when 
evidence is adduced that a prisoner is insane, and conflicting testimony makes a ques- 
tion for the jury, they are to decide it like every other matter of fact, and if they 
should say or conclude that there is uncertainty, that they cannot determine whether 
the defendant was or is not so insane as to protect him, how can they render a verdict 
that a sane man perpetrated this crime, and that no other can? 

“ ¢ Nor is this plain view of the question unsupported by authority. In the case of 
the Queen v. Ley, in 1840, Lewin’s C. C., p. 239, on a preliminary trial to ascertain 
whether a defendant was sufficiently sane to go before a petit jury on an indictment, 
Hutwock, B., said to the jury: “If there be a doubt as to the prisoner’s sanity, and 
the surgeon says it is doubtful, you cannot say he is in a fit state to be put on trial. 
This opinion was approved in the People v. Freeman, vol. 4, Denio’s Report, p. 9. 
This is a strong case, for the witness did not say the prisoner was insane, but only 
that it was doubtful whether it was so or not. The humane, and, I will add, just 
doctrine, that a reasonable doubt should avail a prisoner, belongs to a defence of in- 
sanity, as much, in my opinion, as to any other matter of fact.’” 

(tt) Thurman, J., Farrar v. State, 2, Ohio St. R. 54; see Warden’s Forensic View, 
p- 498. (uw) Hans. Par. Deb. saa 728. 

9 


§ 59] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


of a jury’s giving a negative answer, and convicting a prisoner who is proved 
to be insane on the subject matter relating to or connected with the criminal 
act, or proved to be so far and so generally deranged as to render it difficult, 
or almost impossible, to discriminate between his sane and insane acts.’’(v) 
Had the most liberal doctrine of the psychologists been given instead of this, 
the jury could hardly have been allowed greater latitude. 

§ 58. It is important not to confound the moral or impulsive insanity re- 
cognized by the courts with the mania sine delirio of Pinel. An analysis of 
the cases will show, it is submitted, that in all the instances where this species 
of insanity is admitted as a defence, there was mental unsoundness either proved 
or presumed. The strongest instance is where Judge Story once refused to 
allow the conviction of a young woman who in a fit of puerperal mania threw 
her infant overboard, though she was perfectly conscious of the enormity of 
the act.(w) But here there was delirium as well as homicidal impulse. 

§ 59. The consideration of the psychological soundness of the doctrine of 
manta sine delirio, is reserved to a future section.(7) It will be there shown 
that among psychologists, as well as those who have had the most enlightened 
experience in the management of the insane, there is such a conflict of opinion 
as to the existence of this mania as to deprive the rendition of experts in this 
respect of any authoritative weight in courts of justice. On one point, how- 
ever, all persons versed in the treatment of the insane agree, and this is a pro- 
test against the right and wrong test. But the difference in this respect 
between medical and legal authority is not so great as at first appears. If the 
courts should be supposed to hold that a perception that the act is wrong 
makes a lunatic responsible, then it is admitted that the conflict is irrecon- 
cilable. But if the language of the more recent decisions be closely scanned, 
it will be seen that the test applied may be resolved into this: is the party so 
free from delusion or perversion as to be able to take a sane view of the right 
and wrong of the particular act? He may know that it is what society calls 
wrong, and vet he may believe himself impelled to the act by sufficient counter 
considerations. In all this, on his own false premises, he may reason soundly. 
He may give every proof (e. g. by concealment or subterfuge) of what would 
be popularly called a knowledge of right and wrong. All this, however, will 
not in itself confer responsibility. He may nevertheless be insane. (xx) 


(v) State v. Spencer, 1 Zabriskie, 196. (w) U.S. v. Hewson, 7 Bost. Law Rep. 361. 

(x) Post, § 177, &c. 

(xx) In New York, in Freeman’s case, Beardsley, C. J., said, “ That a state of gen- 
eral insanity, the mental powers being wholly perverted or obliterated, would neces- 
sarily preclude a trial; for a being in that deplorable condition can make no defence 
whatever. Not so, however, where the disease is partial, and confined to one subject, 
other than the imputed crime, and contemplated trial. A person in this condition 
may be fully competent to understand his situation in respect to the alleged offence, 
and to conduct his defence with discretion and reason. Of this the jury must judge, 
and they should be instructed, that if such is found to be his condition, it will be their 
duty to pronounce him sane. In the case at bar, the court professed to furnish a 
single criterion of sanity, that is, a capacity to distinguish between right and wrong. 
This, as a test of insanity, is by no means invariably correct ; for, while a person has 
avery just perception of the moral qualities of most actions, he may, at the same 
time, as to some one in particular, be absolutely insane, and consequently as to this 
be incapable. of judging accurately between right and wrong. If the delusion extends 
to the alleged crime, or the contemplated trial, the party manifestly is not in a fit con- 

50 


BOOK I.] HOMICIDAL MANIA, [$ 60 


§ 60. To the illustrations adduced by others of the coexistence of a know- 
ledge that an act was wrong with its commission under circumstances which 
confer entire irresponsibility, the present writer may be permitted to add one 
within the range of his own experience. A man named John Billman, who 
had been sent to the Eastern Penitentiary of Pennsylvania for horse stealing, 


dition to make his defence, however sound his mind may be in other respects ; still 
the insanity of such a person being only partial, not general, a jury, under a charge 
like that given by the court below on this case, might find the prisoner sane, for in 
some respects he would be capable of distinguishing between right and wrong. Had 
the instruction been, that the prisoner was to be deemed sane, if he had a knowledge 
of right and wrong in respect to the crime with which he stood charged, there would 
have been but little fear that the jury could be misled, for a person who justly appre- 
hends the nature of a charge made against him, can hardly be supposed to be inca- 
pable of defending himself in regard to it inarational way. At the same time it 
would be well to impress distinctly on the minds of jurors, that they are to gauge the 
mental capacity of the prisoner, in order to determine whether he is so far sane as to 
be competent in mind to make his defence, if he has one; for, unless his faculties are 
equal to that task, he is not in a fit condition to be put on histrial. For the purpose 
of such a question, the law regards a person thus disabled by disease, as non compos 
mentis, and he should be pronounced unhesitatingly insane, within the true extent and 
meaning of this statute. 

‘* Where insanity is interposed as a defence to an indictment for an alleged crime, 
the inquiry is always brought down to the single question of a capacity to distinguish 
between right and wrong at the time when the act was done. In such case, the jury 
should be instructed that, ‘it must be clearly shown that at the time of committing 
the act, the party accused was laboring under such a defect of reason, from disease 
of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing; or if he 
did know it, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong. The mode of put- 
ting the latter part of the question to the jury, on these occasions, has generally been 
whether the accused at the time of doing the act, knew the difference between right 
and wrong; which mode, though rarely, if ever, leading to any mistake with the jury, 
is not deemed so accurate, when put generally and in the abstract, as when put with 
reference to the party’s knowledge of right and wrong in respect to the very act with 
which he is charged.’ This is the rule laid down by all the English judges but one, 
in the late case of McNaghton, while pending in the House of Lords. (10 C. & F. 210.) 
In the case of Oxford, Lord Denman, C. J., charged the jury in this manner: ‘The 
question is, whether the prisoner was laboring under that species of insanity which 
satisfies you that he was quite unaware of the nature or character and consequences 
of the act he was committing ; or, in other words, whether he was under the influence 
of a diseased mind, and was really unconscious, at the time he was committing the 
act, that it was a crime.’ The insanity must be such as to deprive the party charged 
with crime, of the use of reason in regard to the act done. He may be deranged on 
other subjects, but if capable of distinguishing between right and wrong in the par- 
ticular act done by him, he is justly liable to be punished as acriminal. Such is the 
undoubted rule of the common law on this subject. Partial insanity is not, by that 
law, necessarily an excuse for crime, and can only be so where it deprives the party 
of his reason in regard to the act charged to be criminal. Nor, in my judgment, was 
the statute on this subject intended to abrogate or qualify the common lawrule. The 
words of the statute are: ‘No act done by a person in a state of insanity can be pun- 
ished as an offence.’ The clause is very comprehensive in its terms, and at first 
blush, might seem to exempt from punishment every act done by a person who is 
insane upon any subject whatever. This would, indeed, be a mighty change in the 
law, as it would afford absolute impunity to every person in aninsane state, although 
his disease might be confined to a single and isolated subject. Ifthis is the meaning 
of the statute, jurors are no longer to inquire whether the party was insane ‘in respect 
to the very act with which he is charged,’ but whether he was insane in regard to any 
act or subject whatever; and if they find such to have been his condition, render a 
verdict of not guilty. But the statute is not so understood by me. I interpret it as I 
should have done if the words had been ‘no act done by a person in a state of insanity 
in respect to such act, can be punished as anoffence.’ The act, in my judgment, must 
be an insane act, and not merely the act of aninsane person. This was plainly the rule 
before the statute was passed, and although that took place more than sixteen years 
since, I am not aware that it has, at any time, been held or intimated by. any judicial 
tribunal, that the statute had abrogated, or in any respect modified, this principle of 
the common law.”” (Freeman v. People, 4 Denio, p. 27.) a 


§ 61] RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. [BOOK I. 


murdered his keeper under circumstances of great brutality, and yet with so 
much ingenuity as to elude suspicions of his intentions, and almost conceal his 
flight. He hung a noose on the outside of the small window which is placed 
in the door of the cells to enable persons outside to look in. He then induced 
the keeper, in order to look at something on the floor directly at the foot of 
the door, to put his head entirely through. The noose was then drawn, and 
but for an accident, the man would have been suffocated. Notwithstanding this 
attempt, the same keeper was inveigled into the cell alone, a few days after- 
wards, on the pretence of Billman being sick, and was there killed by a blow 
on the head with a piece of washboard. Billman undressed him; changed 
clothes with him; placed him on the bed in such a position as to induce the 
general appearance of his being there himself; traversed in his assumed garb, 
the corridor with an unconcerned air; addressed an apparently careless question 
to the gate-keeper, and sauntered listlessly down the street on which the gate 
opened. He was, however, soon caught; but his insanity was so indisputable, 
that the prosecuting authorities, after having instituted a careful and skilful 
medical examination, became convinced of his irresponsibility, and united upon 
the trial in asking a verdict of acquittal on the ground of insanity. He was 
then remanded to confinement, under the Pennsylvania practice; and some 
time afterwards, when in a communicative mood, disclosed the fact of his 
having several years back murdered his father under circumstances which he 
detailed with great minuteness and zest. Inquiries were instituted, and it was 
found that he had told the truth. The father had been found strangled in his 
bed; the son had been arrested for the crime; but so artfully had he contrived 
the homicide, that he was acquitted through an alibi, got up by means of a 
rapid ride at midnight, and a feigned sleep in a chamber, into which he had 
clambered by a window. Here, then, was not only a sense of guilt, but a 
keen appreciation of the consequences of exposure, and an abundance of evi- 
dence of long harbored intention and intelligent design. 

A still more emphatic illustration of the same sense of accountability among 
lunatics, as a class, is to be found in an anecdote related by Dr. Winslow.(a) 
When Martin set York Minster on fire, a conversation took place among the 
inmates of a neighboring lunatic asylum, having reference to this general topic. 
The question was whether Martin would be hanged, when, in the course of the 
discourse, one madman announced to the others a position, in which they all 
acquiesced, that Martin would not be hanged, because he was ‘‘one of them- 
selves.” It certainly will not be maintained that a consciousness of the legal 
relations of crime, such as this remark exhibited, confers responsibility where 
it does not otherwise exist. 

§ 61. Perhaps the conflicting authorities which have been noticed above 
may be thus reconciled :— 

Moral insanity is a defence to an indictment, when 

1. It is connected with and depends on a cognate mental derangement, which 
may be either substantively proved, or implied from the intensity of the moral 
disorder.(b) 


i (a) Lectures, &c. 108. (b) See post, § 178, &c. 


BOOK I.] CRIMINAL RESPONSIBILITY OF DRUNKARDS. [$ 62 


2. It is accompanied by such an exaggerated and morbid view of the par- 
ticular act as to make the party incapable of a healthy judgment of right 
and wrong in reference to that act. It is not necessary that the party should 
be ignorant that the particular act was wrong. He may know this, and yet 
his judgment may be so perverted by morbid counter-considerations as to pre- 
vent him from forming an accurate moral judgment on the premises. 

3. It involves an impulse which for the time destroys free agency. 

When, however, the alleged insanity consists in nothing more than a strong 
inclination to commit a wrong act, which the party understands to be wrong, 
and when there is no mental derangement by which the relations of this act 
are confused, then this is mere badness or malice, which, when connected with 
an overt act, makes the party criminally responsible. 


IV. How INTOXICATION AFFECTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIME. 


The law in this connection may be summed up as follows :— 

Ist. Insanity produced by delirium tremens affects responsibility in the same 
way as insanity produced by any other cause. 

2d. Insanity immediately produced by intoxication does not destroy respon- 
sibility if the patient, when sane and responsible, makes himself intoxicated. 

3d. While drunkenness per se is no defence to the fact of guilt, yet when 
the question of intent or premeditation is concerned, it becomes a material 
item of consideration. 


Ist. Insanity produced by delirium tremens affects the responsibility in the 
same way as insanity produced by any other cause. 


§ 62. If a man who, laboring under delirium tremens, kill another, is made 
responsible, there is scarcely any species of insanity which, on like principles, 
would not be subjected to the severest penalties of criminal law. ‘It may be 
the immediate effect,’ says Dr. Ray,(c) ‘‘of an excess, or series of excesses, in 
those who are not habitually intemperate, as well as in those who are; but it 
most commonly occurs in habitual drinkers, after a few days’ total abstinence 
from spirituous liquors. It is also very liable to occur in this latter class 
when laboring under other diseases, or severe external injuries, that give rise 
to any degree of constitutional disturbance. The approach of the disease is 
generally indicated by a slight tremor and faltering of the hands and lower 
extremities, a tremulousness of the voice, a certain restlessness and sense of 
anxiety which the patient knows not how to describe or account for, disturbed 
sleep, and impaired appetite. These symptoms having continued two or three 
days, at the end of which time they have obviously increased in severity, the 
patient ceases to sleep altogether, and soon becomes delirious. At first the 
delirium is not constant, the mind wandering during the night, but, during the 
day, when its attention is fixed, capable of rational discourse. It is not long, 


(c) Med. Jur. 438. 
53 


§ 63] CRIMINAL RESPONSIBILITY OF DRUNKARDS. [BOOK I. 


however, before it becomes constant, and constitutes the most prominent feature 
of the disease. Occasionally the delirium occurs at an earlier period of the 
disease, and may even be the first symptom of any disorder. This state of 
‘watchfulness and delirium continues three or four days, when, if the patient 
recover, it is succeeded by sleep, which at first appears in uneasy and irregular 
naps, and lastly in long, sound, and refreshing slumbers. When sleep does 
not supervene about this period, the disease is fatal; and whether subjected to 
medical treatment or left to itself, neither its symptoms nor its duration are 
materially modified. The character of the delirium in this disease is peculiar, 
bearing a stronger resemblance than any other form of mental derangement 
to dreaming. It would seem as if the dreams which disturb and harass the 
mind during the imperfect sleep that precedes the explosion of the disease 
continue to occupy it when awake, being then viewed as realities, instead of 
dreams. The patient imagines himself, for instance, to be in some peculiar 
situation, or engaged in certain occupations, according to each individual’s 
habits and profession; and his discourse and conduct are conformed to this de- 
lusion, with this striking peculiarity, however, that he is thwarted at every step, 
and is constantly meeting with obstacles that defy his utmost efforts to remove. 
Almost invariably the patient manifests, more or less, feelings of suspicion or 
fear, laboring under continual apprehension of being made the victim of sinister 
designs and practices. He imagines that certain people have conspired to rob 
or murder him, and insists that he can hear them in an adjoining apartment 
arranging their plans and preparing to rush into his room; or that he is in a 
strange place, where he is forcibly detained, and prevented from going to his 
own home. One of the most common hallucinations is to be constantly seeing 
devils, snakes, vermin, and all manner of unclean things around him and about 
him, and filling every nook and corner of his apartment. The extreme terror 
which these delusions often inspire produces in the countenance an unutterable 
expression of anguish, and, in the hope of escaping from his fancied tor- 
mentors, the wretched patient endeavors to cut his throat or jump from the 
window. Under the influence of these terrible apprehensions he sometimes 
murders his wife or attendant, whom his disordered imagination identifies with 
his enemies, though he is generally tractable, and not inclined to be mis- 
chievous. After perpetrating an act of this kind, he generally gives some 
illusive reason for his conduct, rejoices in his success, and expresses his regret 
at not having done it before.”’(cc) 

§ 63. As far as concerns temporary incapacity, therefore, deliriwm tremens 
acts in the same way as any other delirium, and when complete, destroys the 
moral as well as the intellectual responsibility. The only question, therefore, 
is whether there is anything in the sowrce from which it is derived which re- 
quires that it should be exempted from the general rule by which delirium 
forms a good defence to an indictment for a criminal offence. In the dicta of 
one or two of the older law writers, this exception is sought to be sustained 
on the ground that a drunkard, in every stage, is a voluntary demon, and that 
he can no more use his consequent mania as a defence, than can the man who 


(cc) See an interesting case of Oinomania in 8 Amer. Journ. of Insan. 3. 


54 


BOOK I.] DELIRIUM TREMENS. WHEN A DEFENCE, [S$ 65 


kills another by a sword allege that it was the sword, and not himself, that 
was the guilty agent. But to this the answer is threefold: (1) that delirium 
tremens is not the intended result of drink in the same way that drunken- 
ness is; (2) that there is no possibility that deliriwm tremens can be volun- 
tarily generated in order to afford a cloak for a particular crime; (3) that, so 
far as original cause is concerned, it is not peculiar in being the offspring of 
indiscretion or guilt, for such is the case with almost every other species of 
insanity. These points scarcely need to be expanded. The fact is, delirium 
tremens runs the same course with most of the other classes of insanity known 
in the criminal courts. It is the result, like most other manias, of prior vicious 
indulgence; but it differs from intoxication in being shunned rather than 
courted by the patient, and in being incapable of voluntary assumption for the 
purpose of covering guilt. 

§ 64. Reason, therefore, undoubtedly teaches us that a person who is inca- 
pacitated from moral and intellectual agency, by reason of delirium tremens; 
is irresponsible; and such is the law, as decided in repeated instances. (d) 
Thus, in the leading American case, Story, J., declared criminal responsibility 
not to attach where the delirium is the “remote consequence” of voluntary 
intoxication, “ superinduced by the antecedent exhaustion of the party, arising 
from gross and habitual drunkenness. However criminal,’’ he proceeded to 
say, ‘in a moral point of view, such an indulgence is, and however justly a 
party may be responsible for his acts arising from it, to Almighty God, human 
tribunals are generally restricted from punishing them, since they are not the 
acts of a reasonable being. Had the crime been committed when Drew (the 
defendant) was in a fit of intoxication, he would have been liable to be con- 
victed of murder. As he was not then intoxicated, but merely insane from an 
abstinence from liquor, he cannot be pronounced guilty of the offence. The 
law looks to the immediate, and not to the remote cause; to the actual state 
of the party, and not to the causes which remotely produced it. Many species 
of insanity arise, remotely, from what, in a moral view, is a criminal neglect 
or fault of the party ; as from religious melancholy, undue exposure, extrava- 
gant pride, ambition, &e. Yet such insanity has always been deemed a suf- 
ficient excuse for any crime done under its influence.” 

§ 65. In a still earlier case of at least equal authority, the court told the 
jury that if they “should be satisfied by the evidence, that the prisoner, at the 
time of committing the act charged in the indictment, was in such a state of 
mental insanity not produced by the immediate effects of intoxicating drinks, 
as not to have been conscious of the moral turpitude of the act, they should 
find him not guilty.”(e) And expressly to this very point is a more recent 
case, where a federal judge of high authority told the jury that if the defendant 
was ‘so far insane as not to know the nature of the act, nor whether it was 
wrong or not, he is not punishable, although such delirium tremens is pro- 


(d) U. §. v. Drew, 5 Mason, U. 8. Rep. 28; Bennett v. State, Mart. & Yerg. 133; 
Cornwell v. State, ibid. 14; Maconnehey v. State, 5 Ohio (N. 8.) 77, Carter v. State, 
12 Texas, 500; R. v. Thomas, 8 C. & P. 820; R. v. Meakin, 7 C. & P. 299; Rennie’s 
case, 1 Lew. C. C. 76; 1 Hale, 32; 1 Rus. on Cr. 7; 4 Black. Com. 26. 

(e) U.S. v. Clarke, 2 Cranch, C. C. R. 158. 


59 


§ 65] CRIMINAL RESPONSIBILITY OF DRUNKARDS. [BOOK I. 


duced by the voluntary use of intoxicating liquors.”(/) When delirium tre- 


(f) U.S. v. McGlue, 1 Curtis,C.C.R.1. This case we give in full :— 

’ The prisoner, who was second officer on board the barque Lewis, was indicted for the 
murder of the first officer of that vessel while on board. The defence was insanity. 
The other facts appear in the charge of the court. 

Curtis, J. The prisoner is indicted for the murder of Charles A. Johnson. It is 
incumbent on the government to prove the truth of every fact in the indictment 
necessary in point of law to constitute the offence. These facts are in part contro- 
verted, and in part, as I understand the course of the trial, not controverted ; and it 
will be useful to separate the one from the other.. That there was an unlawful killing 
of Mr. Johnson ; that the mortal wound was inflicted by the prisoner at the bar; that 
this wound was given and the death took place on board of the barque Lewis ; that 
Johnson was the first, and the prisoner the second officer of that vessel at the time of 
the occurrence ; that the vessel at that time was either on the high seas, as is charged 
in one count, or upon waters within the dominion of the Sultan of Muscat, as is charged 
in another count; and that the prisoner was first brought into this district after the 
commission of the alleged offence—do not appear to be denied; and the evidence is 
certainly sufficient to warrant you in finding all these facts. It is not upon a denial 
of either of these facts that the defence is rested, but upon the allegation by the 
defendant, that at the time the act was done he was so far insane as to be criminally 
irresponsible for his act. And this brings you to consider the remaining allegation in 
the indictment which involves this defence. It is essential to the crime of murder 
that the killing should be from what the law denominates malice aforethought, and 
the government must prove this allegation. 

‘Now, if you believe the evidence, there can be no question, that the killing was 
malicious, provided the prisoner was at the time in such a condition as to be capable, 
in law, of malice. If he was then so insane that the law holds him irresponsible, it 
deems him incapable of entertaining legal malice; and one main inquiry in this case 
is, whether the prisoner, when he struck the blow, was so far insane as to be held by 
the law irresponsible for intentionally killing Mr. Johnson. 

Some observations have been made by the counsel of each side respecting the cha- 
racter of this defence. On the one side it is urged that the defence of insanity has 
become of alarming frequency, and that there is reason to believe that it is resorted 
to by great criminals to shield them from the just consequences of their crimes ; that 
there exist in the community certain theories concerning what is called moral insanity, 
brought forward on trials of this kind, tending to subvert the criminal law, and render 
crimes likely not to be punished. On the other hand, the inhumanity and injustice 
of holding him guilty of murder who was not at the time of the act a reasonable being, 
have been brought before you in the most striking forms. 

These observations of the counsel on both sides are worthy of your attention, and 
their effect should be to cause you to follow steadily, carefully, and exactly, the rules 
of law upon this subject. The general question, whether the prisoner’s state of mind 
when he struck the blow was such as to exempt him from legal responsibility, is a 
question of fact for your decision. But there are certain rules of law which you are 
bound to apply, and the court, upon its responsibility, is to lay down; and these rules, 
when applied, will conduct you to the only safe decision. 

You will observe, then, that this defence of insanity is to be tested and governed 
by principles of law, and not by any loose general notions which may be afloat in the 
community, or even the speculations of men of science ; and I now proceed to state to 
you such of them as are applicable to this case. 

The first is, that the defendant must be presumed to be sane till his insanity is 
proved. Men, in general, are sufficiently sane to be responsible for their acts. To 
be irresponsible because of insanity is an exception to that general rule. And before 
any man can claim the benefit of such an exception, he must prove that he is within it. 

You will, therefore, take it to be the law, that the prisoner is not to be acquitted 
upon the ground of insanity, unless upon the whole evidence you are satisfied that he 
was insane when he struck the blow. 

The next inquiry is, What is meant by insanity? What is it which exempts from 
punishment, because its existence is inconsistent with a criminal intent? Clearly, it 
is not every kind and degree of insanity which is sufficient. There are, undoubtedly, 
persons of great general ability, filling important stations in life, who, upon some one 
subject, are insane. And there are others whose minds are such that the conclusions 
of their reason and the results of their judgment are very far from right. And others 
whose passions are so strong, or whose conscience, reason, and judgment are so weak, 
so perverted, that they may, in some sense, be denominated insane. But it is not the 
business of the law to inquire into these peculiarities, but solely whether the person 
accused was capable of having, and did havea criminal intent. If he had, it punishes 


06 


BOOK I.] DELIRIUM TREMENS. WHEN A DEFENCE. [$ 65 


mens is set up as a defence, the prisoner must show that he was under a delirium 


him ; if not, it holds him dispunishable. And it supplies a test, by which the jury 
is to ascertain whether the accused be so far insane as to be irresponsible. That test 
is the capacity to distinguish between right and wrong as to the particular act with 
which he is charged. If he understands the nature of the act, if he knows that it is 
criminal, and that if he does it he deserves punishment, then he is not so far insane 
as to be exempt from responsibility. But if he is under such delusion as not to under- 
stand the nature of the act, and has not reason and judgment to know that he is 
deserving of punishment, then he is not responsible. This is the test which the law 
prescribes, and which you are to apply in the present case. 

It is asserted by the prisoner that when he struck the blow he was suffering under 
a disease known as delirium tremens. He has introduced evidence tending to prove 
his intemperate drinking of ardent spirits during several days before the time in 
question, and also certain effects of this intemperance. Physicians of great eminence, 
and particularly experienced in the observation of this disease, have been examined 
on both sides. They were not allowed to give their opinions upon the case; because 
the case, in point of fact, on which any one might give his opinion, might not be the 
case which you, upon the evidence, would find; and there would be no certain means 
of knowing whether it was so or not. It is not the province of an expert to draw infe- 
rences of fact from evidence, but simply to declare his opinion upon a known or hypo- 
thetical state of facts; and therefore the counsel on each side have put to the physi- 
cians such states of facts as they deem warranted by the evidence, and have taken 
their opinions thereon. If you consider that any of these states of fact put to the 
physicians are proved, then the opinions thereon are admissible evidence, otherwise 
they are not applicable to this case. And here I may remark, that although in general 
witnesses are held to state only facts, and are not allowed to give their opinions in a 
court of law, yet this rule does not exclude the opinions of those whose professions 
and studies, or occupations, have rendered them peculiarly skilful concerning parti- 
cular questions. We take the opinion of physicians in this case for the same reason 
that we resort to them in our own cases out of court, because they are believed to be 
better able to form a correct opinion upon a subject within the scope of their studies 
than men in general. But these opinions, though proper for your consideration, are, 
nevertheless, not binding on you against your own judgment, but should be weighed, 
and especially where they differ, compared by you, and such effect allowed to them 
as you think right. Besides these opinions, the physicians have also described to you 
the symptoms of the disease delirium tremens. They all agree that it is a disease of a 
very strongly marked character, and as little liable to be mistaken as any known in 
medicine. Dr. Bell says the symptoms are— 

“1. Delirium, taking the form of apprehensiveness on the part of the patient. He 
is fearful of something ; imagines demons and snakes around him. In attempting to 
escape, he will attack others as well as injure himself. But he is more apprehensive 
of receiving injury than desirous of inflicting it, except to escape. He is generally 
timid and irresolute, and easily pacified and controlled. 

“2. Sleeplessness. I believe delirium tremens cannot exist without this. 

“<3. Tremulousness, especially of the hands, but showing itself in the limbs and the 
tongue. 

“4, After a time sleep occurs, and reason thus returns; usually the sleep comes 
on in not less than three days, dating from the last sleep. At first it is broken; then 
this is followed by a profound sleep, lasting six or eight hours, from which the patient 
awakes sane.” 

Dr. Stedman, after describing its symptoms substantially as Dr. Bell did, says its 
access may be very sudden, and he has often known it first to manifest itself by the 
patients attacking those about them, regarding them as enemies; that a case may 
terminate in two days, and rarely lasts more than four days. 

Regarding these accounts of the symptoms of this disease, you will inquire whether 
the evidence proves that they existed in this case; and whether the previous habits 
and the intemperate use of ardent spirits, from which this disease springs, are shown; 
and whether the recovery of the prisoner corresponded with the course and termina- 
tion of the disease of delirium tremens as described by the physicians. 

It is not denied, on the part of the government, that the prisoner had drank intem- 
perately of ardent spirits during some days before the occurrence. But it is insisted, 
that he had continued to drink, down to a short time before the homicide; and that 
when he struck the blow it was in a fit of drunken madness. And this renders it 
necessary to instruct you concerning the law upon the state of facts which the prose- 
cutor asserts existed. 

Although delirium tremens is the result of intemperance, and therefore in some sense 


oT 


§ 65] INTOXICATION NO DEFENCE, [BOOK I. 


at the time the act was perpetrated, there being no presumption of its exist- 
ence from the antecedent fits from which he has recovered.(//) 


is voluntarily brought on, yet it is distinguishable, and by the law is distinguished, 
from that madness which sometimes accompanies drunkenness. 

If a person suffering under delirium tremens is so far insane as to render him irre- 
sponsible, the law does not punish him for any crime he may commit. 

But if a person commits a crime while intoxicated, under the immediate influence 
of liquor, the law does punish him, however mad he may have been. It is no excuse, 
but rather an aggravation of his offence, that he first deprived himself of reason before 
he did the act. There would be no security for life or property if men could commit 
crimes with impunity, provided they would first make themselves drunk enough to 
cease to be reasonable beings. And, therefore, it is a very important inquiry in this 
case whether this homicide was committed while the prisoner was suffering under that 
marked disease of delirium tremens, or in a fit of drunken madness. If the prisoner 
while sane made himself intoxicated, and while intoxicated committed a murder by 
reason of insanity, which was one of the consequences of that intoxication, then he is 
responsible in point of law, and must be punished. This is as clearly the law of the 
land as the other rule, which exempts from punishment acts done under delirium 
tremens. It may sometimes be difficult to determine under which rule the accused 
comes. But it is the duty of the jury to ascertain from the evidence on which side 
this case falls, and to decide accordingly. 

It may be material for you to know on which party is the burden of proof in this 
part of the case. It is incumbent on the prisoner to satisfy you that he was insane 
when he struck the blow, for the law presumes every man to be sane till the contrary 
is proved. But if the contrary has been proved, the law does not presume that the 
insanity of the prisoner arose from any particular cause; and it is incumbent on the 
party which asserts that it did arise from a particular cause, and that the prisoner is 
guilty by law, because it arose from that cause, to make out this necessary element in 
the charge to the same extent as every other element in it. For the charge then 
assumes this form—that the prisoner committed a murder, for which, though insane, 
he is responsible, because his insanity was produced by and accompanied a state of 
intoxication. The government must satisfy you of these facts, which are necessary - 
to the guilt of the prisoner in point of law. If you are convinced that the prisoner 
was insane to such an extent as to render him irresponsible, you will acquit him, 
unless you are also convinced that his insanity was produced by intoxication, and 
accompanied that state; in which case you will find him guilty. 

The prisoner was acquitted. 

A note in the American Journal of Insanity, for July, 1856, says— 

“This distinction between delirium tremens and temporary madness, induced by 
intoxication, is laid down in The United States v. Drew, 5 Mason, 28 ; and (in England) 
in John Burroughs’ case, 1 Lewin, C. C. 75. In the latter case, Holroyd, J., said: 
‘Drunkenness is not insanity, nor does it answer to what is termed an unsound mind, 
unless the derangement which it causes becomes fixed and continued by the drunkenness 
being habitual, and thereby rendering the party incapable of distinguishing between right 
and wrong.’ That mere drunkenness is no excuse for crime is very clearly settled by 
many decisions both in this country and in England. Cornwell v. The State, Mart. & 
Y., 147, 149; Burnet v. The State, 133, ib. ; The State v. Turner, 1 Wright’s Ohio, 30; 
The State v. Thompson, ib. 617; Schaller v. The State, 14 Missouri, 502; The State v. 
John, 8 Ired. 330; Pirtle v. The State, 9 Humph. 663; Kelly v. The State, 3 Smedes 
and M. 518; The United States v. Clarke, 2 Cranch, C. C. R.158. But though drunken- 
ness is not of itself a complete defence to crime, as insanity is, yet it may be admissible 
to the jury as evidence of the intent, in certain cases, with which the act was done. 
Thus in Pigman v. The State, 14 Ohio, 555, it was held, on an indictment for passing 
counterfeit money, knowing it to be counterfeit, that the drunkenness of the prisoner 
at the time of passing was proper for the consideration of the jury in determining 
whether he knew the bill to be counterfeit. See also, The State v. McCante, 1 Spears, 
389 ; Pennsylvania v. Fall, Addison, 257; Swan v. The State, 4 Humph. 136; Pirtle 
v. The State, 9 ib. 570; Haile v. The State, 11 ib. 154.—Law Magazine.” 

(7) State v. Sewell, 3 Jones, Law (N. C.) 245. As to general presumption arising 
from prior insanity, see ante, § 33. 


58 


BOOK I.] INTOXICATION NO DEFENCE, [$ 67 


2d. Insanity immediately produced by intoxication does not destroy re- 
sponsibility, where the patient when sane and responsible, made himself 
voluntarily intoxicated. 


§ 66. Drunkenness, so long as it does not prostrate the faculties, cannot be 
distinguished from any other kind of passion. If the man who is maddened 
by an unprovoked attack upon his person, his reputation or his honor, be 
nevertheless criminally responsible—if hot blood form no defence to the fact 
of guilt—it would be a most extraordinary anomaly if drunkenness voluntarily 
assumed should have that effect, independently of all extraneous provocation 
whatever. If, as is pretended—or else there is no ground for the exception— 
drunkenness so incapacitates the reason as to make it at least partially incapable 
of distinguishing between right and wrong, or else so inflames the passions as 
to make restraint insupportable, then comes in the familiar principle that the 
man who voluntarily assumes an attitude or does an act which is likely to 
produce death in others, is responsible for the consequences, even though he 
had at the time no specific intentions to take the life of any one. Thus, if a 
man breaking an unruly horse wilfully ride him among a crowd of persons, the 
probable danger being great and apparent, or if a workman out of sport or 
mischief, slide a plank from the top of a roof into a crowded street, or if a 
manufacturer deliberately and knowingly leave in the cellar of an uninhabited 
house a keg of powder, and death ensue, it is murder at common law.(g) And 
so it must also be held that the steamboat captain who deliberately dashes his 
boat into a crowd of smaller craft, so that life is taken, is in like manner re- 
sponsible. 'There can be no question as to this. The man who voluntarily 
arms himself with weapons of destruction, and then throws them hap-hazard 
among the innocent or unoffending, without even the excuse of specific malice 
or provocation, is at least as dangerous as the assassin who picks out his vic- 
tim in advance. Against the last there may be some checks—against the first 
none. Caution may ward off the one, or innocence escape it, but to the other 
the most innocent and benevolent would be as likely to fall victim as the most 
malevolent. The mind in the last case may be inflamed with revenge—that 
‘“‘Wild Justice,’ as Bacon calls it—which, though no defence, is yet capable 
of being reached by reason and averted by care. But in the former, the mo- 
tive is mere gross and sensual indulgence, and the blow cannot be restrained 
by strength, or avoided by unoffensiveness. 

§ 67. The safety of the community, in fact, requires that this rule should 
be observed. Every murderer would drink to shelter his intended guilt. There 
never could be a conviction for homicide if drunkenness avoid responsi- 
bility.(gg) As it is, most of the premeditated homicides are committed under 
the stimulus of liquor. The guilty purpose is at first sedately conceived, but 
there are few men whose temperaments are so firmly knit as to enable them to 
enter a scene of blood, without first fortifying themselves for the task to be 


(g) See Wharton on Homicide, 45, where these points are fully established. 
(99) See post, § 92. 
59 


§ 69] EFFECT OF INTOXICATION ON CRIME. [BOOK I. 


performed. ‘The head dreads the heart’s cowardice, and seeks to insure against 
it by drink. It will be found in fact that there is scarcely a case of violent 
homicide, in which it does not appear that the defendant thus strengthened 
his nerves for the execution of his guilty plan. If, therefore, drunkenness im- 
parts irresponsibility, there are not only but few convictions which have here- 
tofore taken place which are good, but there will be no convictions at all for 
the future. If the assassin will not take liquor to strengthen his nerves, he 
will to avoid conviction. There would be no species of deliberate homicide, 
under such a dispensation, that would not avoid punishment. It would be 
the indeliberate only that would be made responsible. 

§ 68. The tenor of common and civil law authority to this effect is clear. 
Even the German text writers, who generally attenuate to so wide and thin a 
texture the doctrine of moral responsibility, do not undertake to treat drunken- 
ness as a defence. Sir E. Coke scarcely goes beyond the tenor of civil as well 
as of common law writers, when he says, ‘‘ As for a drunkard who is volun- 
tarvus demon, he hath, as has been said, no privilege thereby, but what hurt 
or ill soever he doth, his drunkenness doth aggravate it. Omne crimen 
ebrietas et incendit et detegit.”’(h) And although now drunkenness cannot 
be said to aggravate a crime in a judicial sense, yet it is well settled that it 
forms no defence to the fact of guilt. Thus Judge Story, in a case already 
cited, after noticing that insanity, as a general rule, produces irresponsibility, 
went on to say: ‘‘ An exception is, when the crime is committed by a party 
while in a fit of intoxication, the law allowing not a man to avail himself of 
the excuse of his own gross vice and misconduct, to shelter himself from the 
legal consequences of such crime.” Lord Hale says: ‘The third sort of mad- 
ness is that which is dementia affectata, namely drunkenness. This vice doth 
deprive a man of his reason, and puts many men into a perfect but temporary 
phrensy ; but by the laws of England, such a person shall have no privileges 
by his voluntarily contracted madness, but shall have the same judgment as if 
he were in his right senses.”’(7) And so Parke, B., a very authoritative 
English crown judge, said to a jury in 1837: ‘I must also tell you, that if a 
man makes himself voluntarily drunk, it is no excuse for any crime he may 
commit whilst he is so; he takes the consequences of his own voluntary act, 
or most crimes would go unpunished.’’(j) And Alderson, B., said in 1836: 
“Tf a man chooses to get drunk, it is his own voluntary act ; it is very different 
from madness which is not caused by any act of the person. That voluntary 
species of madness which it is in a party’s power to abstain from, he must 
answer for.”’(/) In harmony with this is the whole current of English 
authority. (Z) 

§ 69. The law in this country is that drunkenness is no defence to the fac- 
tum of guilt; the only point about which there has been any fluctuation, being 


(Ah) Co. Litt. 247, a. 

(7) 1 Hale, 7; 4 Black. Com. 26; Wharton’s C. L. (3d edition) 92; 1 Gabbett, C. 
L. 9; and see a very learned article in 6 Law Rep. (N. 8.) 554. 

(j) R. v. Thomas, 7 C. & P. 817. 

(k) R. v. Meakin, 7 C. & P. 297, 
@ Burrow’s Case, 1 Lewin C. C. 75; Rennie’s case, 1 Lewin C. C. 76; 1 Russel on 
hits 


60 


BOOK I.] INTOXICATION AS A DEFENCE. [$ 69 


the extent to which evidence of drunkenness is receivable to determine the ex- 
actness of the intent or the extent of deliberation. (m) 


(m) U. 8. v. Clarke, 2 Cranch C. C. R. 158; U. 8. v. M’Glue, 1 Curtis C. C. R.1; 
Kelley v. State, 3 Smedes & Mar. 518; Cornwall v. State, Mar. & Yer. 147; Pirtle v. 
State, 9 Humph. 663; State v. John, 8 Ired. 330; State v. Turner, 1 Wright, 30; 
Schaller v. State, 14 Missouri, 502; Wh. Cr. Law, § 40; Wh. on Homicide, 369. In 
Rogers’ case, which came up in 1858, before the New York Court of Appeals, the law 
was thus stated by Denio, J.: ‘ Wherea principle of law is found to be well established 
by a series of authentic precedents, and especially where, as in this case, there is no 
conflict of authority, it is unnecessary for the judges to vindicate its wisdom or policy. 
It will moreover occur to every mind that the principle mentioned is absolutely essen- 
tial to the protection of life and property. In the forum of conscience there is no 
doubt considerable difference between murder deliberately planned and executed by 
a person of unclouded intellect, and the reckless taking of life by one infuriated by 
intoxication: but human laws are based upon considerations of policy, and look rather 
to the maintenance of personal security and social order, than to accurate discrimina- 
tion as to the moral qualities of individual conduct. But there is in truth no injustice 
in holding a person responsible for his acts committed in a state of voluntary intoxi- 
cation. It is a duty which every one owes to his fellow men, to say nothing of more 
solemn obligations, to preserve, so far as it is in his own power, the inestimable gift of 
reason. If it be perverted or destroyed by fixed disease, though brought on by his 
own Vices, the law holds him not accountable. But if by a voluntary act he tempo- 
rarily casts off the restraints of reason and conscience, no wrong is done him if he is 
considered answerable for any injury which in that state he may do to others, or tu 
society. 

“Before proceeding to examine the judge’s charge, it is necessary to state one other 
principle connected with the subject of intoxication. I am of opinion that in cases of 
homicide, the fact that the accused was under the influence of intoxication may be 
given in evidence in his behalf. The effect which the evidence ought to have upon 
the verdict will depend upon the other circumstances of the case. Thus, in Rex v. 
Carroll, which was a case of murder by stabbing, there was not, as the court consi- 
dered, any provocation on the part of the deceased, and it was held that the circum- 
stance that the prisoner was intoxicated, was not at all material to be considered. 
Rex v. Meakin, was an indictment for stabbing with a fork with intent to murder; and 
it was shown that the prisoner was the worse for liquor. Alderson, Baron, instructed 
the jury that, with regard to the intention, drunkenness might be adverted to accord- 
ing to the nature of the instrument used. ‘If,’ he said, ‘he uses a stick, you could 
not infer a malicious intent so strongly against him if drunk, if he made an intem- 
perate use of it, as you would if he had used a different kind of weapon; but where a 
dangerous instrument is used, which, if used, must produce a grievous bodily harm, 
drunkenness can have no effect upon the consideration of the malicious intent of the 
party.’ In Rex v. Thomas, for malicious stabbing, the person stabbed had struck 
the prisoner twice with his fist, when the latter, being drunk, stabbed him, and the 
jury were charged that drunkenness might be taken into consideration in cases where 
whatthe law deems sufficient provocation has been given, because the question in such 
cases is, whether the fatal act is to be attributed to the passion of anger excited by 
the previous provocation; and that passion, it was said, is more easily excitable in a 
person when in a state of intoxication than when he is sober; so, it was added, where 
the question is, whether words have been uttered with a deliberate purpose, or are 
merely low and idle expressions, the drunkenness of the person uttering them is pro- 
per to be considered. But if there is really a previous determination to resent a slight 
affront in a barbarous manner, the state of drunkenness in which the prisoner was, 
ought not to be regarded, for it would furnish no excuse. 

“It most generally happens in homicides committed by drunken men, that the con- 
dition of the prisoner would explain or give character to some of his language, or some 
part of his conduct, and, therefore, I am of opinion that it would never be correct to 
exclude the proof altogether. That it would sometimes be right to advise the jury that 
it ought to have no influence upon the case, is, I think, clear from the foregoing authori- 
ties. In a case of lengthened premeditation, of lying in wait, or where the death was 
by poisoning, or in the case of wanton killing without any provocation, such an in- 
struction would plainly be proper. 

“‘ Assuming the foregoing positions to be established, I proceed to examine the excep- 
tion to the charge of the judge. It is difficult to know precisely what was meant by 
the request to charge; but I think its sense may be expressed thus: that drunken- 
ness might exist to such a degree, that neither an intention to commit murder, nor a 


61 


§ 70] INTOXICATION AS A DEFENCE. [BOOK I. 


3d. While Intoxication per se ts no defence to the fact of guilt, yet when the 
question of intent or premeditation is concerned, it may be proved for the 
purpose of determining the precise degree. 


§ 70. This position should be very jealously guarded, since, as has already been 
remarked, there are few cases of premeditated violent homicide, in which the 
defendant does not previously nerve himself for the encounter by liquor, and 
there would in future be none at all, if the fact of being in liquor at the time 
is enough to disprove the existence of premeditation. The true view, there- 
fore, would seem to be, not that the fact of liquor having been taken is of any 
‘value at all on the question of intent or premeditation, but that when there is 
no evidence of premeditation aliuwnde, and where the defendant is proved at 
the time of the occurrence to be in a state of mental confusion of which drink 
was the cause, the fact of such mental confusion may be received to show either 
that there was no specific intent to take life, or that there was no positive pre- 
meditation. In the cases arising out of the statutes resolving murder into two 
degrees, in which the distinguishing test is a specific intent to take life, this 
position receives several pregnant illustrations. Thus, in the Philadelphia riot 
cases of 1844, where it was shown that bodies of men were inflamed by sec- 
tarian and local prejudices, and blinded by a wild apprehension of danger to 
such an extent as to make them incapable of discrimination, or of precise or 
specific purpose, it was held that they could not be considered as guilty of 
that species of ‘‘ wilful and deliberate’? murder which constitutes murder in 
the first degree.(n) Precisely analogous to this is the case of the drunkard, 


motive for such an act, could be imputed to the prisoner. It was therefore asked that 
it should be left to the jury to determine whether such a degree of intoxication had 
been shown; and that they should be instructed that if it had, the prisoner should 
be found guilty of manslaughter only. We must lay out of view as inapplicable, the 
case of a person who had become insensible from intoxication, and who was perform- 
ing an act unaccompanied by volition. There was nothing in the evidence to show 
that the prisoner’s conduct was not entirely under the control of his will, or which 
would render it possible for the jury to find that he did not intend to stab the deceased 
with his knife. The mind and will were no doubt more or less perverted by intoxication, 
but there was no evidence tending to show that they were annihilated or suspended. | 
Assuming, therefore, that the request did not refer to such a hypothesis, the only 
other possible meaning is that it supposes the jury legally might find that the prisoner 
was so much intoxicated that he could not be guilty of murder for the want of the 
requisite intention and motive, and the request was that they might be so instructed. 
This would be precisely the same thing as advising them that they might acquit of 
murder on account of the prisoner’s intoxication, if they thought it sufficient in degree. 
It has been shown that this would be opposed to a well-established principle of law. 
The judge was not at liberty so to charge, and the exception to his refusal cannot be 
sustained. What he did charge on the subject of intoxication, was more favorable to 
the prisoner than he had a right to claim. It implies that if he was so far intoxicated 
as to be deprived of his reasoning faculties, it was an excuse for the crime of murder, 
or, aS perhaps it was intended to state, that he could not be guilty of murder. The 
rule which I have endeavored to explain assumes that one may be convicted of mur- 
der, or of other crime, though his mind be reduced by drunkenness to a condition 
which would have called for an acquittal if the obliquity of mind had arisen from any 
other cause. The judge ought to have charged, that if a man makes himself volun- 
tarily drunk, that is no excuse for any crime he may commit while he is so, and that 
he must take the consequence of his own voluntary act. (Rex v. Thomas, supra.) 
The charge, therefore, gave the prisoner the chance of an acquittal to which he was 
not entitled: but this was not an error of which he could take advantage.” 
(n) Wharton on Homicide, 371, 2. 


62 


BOOK I.]| HOW IT AFFECTS THE DEGREE, [$ 70 


who in a fight slays an antagonist without any prior sober premeditation. In 
his intoxication he is incapable of such mental action as the term “ premedi- 
tates’? describes. His mental condition may be such as to deprive him of the 
capacity to form a “specific intent” to take life, or to do anything else. And 
yet at the same time, at common law, the offence would, strictly speaking, fall 
under the head of murder, for it would possess the incident of malice, and 
would be independent of that of provocation. Under such circumstances the 
offence properly is to be ranked as murder in the second degree, and such has 
repeatedly been decided by the courts. (0) 


(0) Com. v. Jones, 1 Leigh, 612; Com. v. Haggerty, Lewis’ C. L. 403; Pirtle v. State, 
9 Hump. 434; Swan v. State, 4 Hump. 131; Penns. v. Fall, Addison, 257; People v. 
Hammill, 2 Parker, C. C. (N. Y.), 223; People v. Robinson, Ibid. 235 ; State v. Har- 
lowe, 2 Mis. (6 Bennett), 446. In a case in Tennessee, the court thus speak: “ Upon 
the trial, there was evidence that the prisoner was intoxicated at the time he com- 
mitted the homicide. Upon the subject of the defendant’s intoxication told the jury 
that ‘voluntary intoxication is no excuse for the commission of crime; on the con- 
trary it is considered by our law as rather an aggravation; yet if the defendant was 
so deeply intoxicated by spirituous liquors at the time of the killing, as to be incapable 
of forming in his mind a design deliberately and premeditately to do the act, the 
killing under such a state of intoxication, would only be murder in the second degree.’ 
It is insisted that his honor did not state the principle upon this subject, as it has 
been ruled by this court. In the case of Swan wv. the State, Judge Reese, who delivered 
the opinion of the court, says: ‘But although drunkenness in point of law constitutes 
no excuse or justification for crime, still, when the nature and essence of a crime is 
made to depend by law, upon the peculiar state and condition of the criminal’s mind 
at the time, and with reference to the act done, drunkenness, as a matter of fact, 
affecting such state and condition of the mind, is a proper subject for consideration 
and inquiry by the jury. The question in such case is, what is the mental status? 
Is it one of self-possession, favorable to a fixed purpose, by deliberation and premedi- 
tation, or did the act spring from existing passion, excited by inadequate provocation, 
acting, it may be, on a peculiar temperament, or upon one already excited by ardent 
spirits? In such a case it matters not that the provocation was inadequate, or the 
spirits voluntarily drank ; the question is, did the act proceed from sudden passion, 
or from deliberation or premeditation? What was the mental status at the time of 
the act, and with reference to the act? To regard the fact of intoxication as meriting 
consideration in such a case, it is not to hold that drunkenness will excuse crime, but 
to inquire whether the very crime which the law refines and punishes, has been in 
point of fact committed. In these remarks the court intend to be understood as dis- 
tinctly indicating, that a degree of drunkenness by which the party was greatly excited, 
and which produced a state of mind unfavorable to deliberation and premeditation, 
although not so excessive as to render the party absolutely incapable of forming a 
deliberate purpose, might be taken into consideration by a jury, in determining whether 
the killing was done with premeditation and deliberation.’ The whole subject was 
ably reviewed by Judge Turley, in the case of Pirtle v. the State. In delivering the 
opinion of the court, in that case, the judge says, at page 671: ‘It will frequently 
happen necessarily, when the killing is of such a character as the common law desig- 
nates as murder, and it has not been perpetrated by means of poison, or by lying in 
wait, that it will be a vexed question, whether the killing has been the result of sud- 
den passion produced by a cause inadequate to mitigate it to manslaughter, but still 
sufficient to mitigate it to murder in the second degree, if it be really the true cause 
of the excitement, or whether it has been the result of premeditation and deliberation ; 
and in all such cases, whatever view is able to cast light upon the mental status of the 
offenders is legitimate proof: and among others, the fact that he was at the time 
drunk; not that this will excuse and mitigate the offence, if it were done wilfully, 
deliberately, maliciously, and premeditately (which it might well be, though the 
perpetrator was drunk at the time) ; but to show that the killing did not spring from 
a premeditated purpose, but sudden passion, excited by inadequate provocation, such 
as might reasonably be expected to arouse sudden passion and heat, to the point of 
taking life, without premeditation and deliberation.’ Here the court explicitly lays 
down the rule to be, that in all cases where the question is between murder in the 
first and murder in the second degree, the fact of drunkenness may be proved, to shed 
light upon the mental status of the offender, and thereby to enable the jury to deter- 
mine whether the killing sprung from a premeditated purpose, or from passion excited by 


§ 71] INTOXICATION AS A DEFENCE, [BOOK I. 


§ 71. The same general view is taken as to the question of ¢ntent. Thus 
in. an Ohio case, it was very properly held, that when the charge was know- 
ingly passing counterfeit money, with intent to cheat, the drunkenness of the 
defendant at the time of the offence was a fit subject for the consideration of 
the jury, there being no ground to suppose that the defendant knew the 
money to be counterfeited before he was drunk.(y) And when the defendant 
was indicted for an attempt to commit suicide by drowning, and it was alleged 
that she was at the time unconscious of the nature of her act from drunken- 
ness, Jervis, C. J., said to the jury: “If the prisoner was so drunk as not to 
know what she was about, how can you find that she intended to destroy 
herself ?”’(q) So again, when the charge was assault with intent to murder, 
Patterson, J., said: ‘‘A person may be so drunk as to be utterly unable to 


inadequate provocation. And the degree of drunkenness which may then shed light 
upon the mental state of the offender, is not alone that excessive state of intoxication, 
which deprives a party of the capacity to frame in his mind a design deliberately and 
premeditately to do an act; for the court says that in the state of drunkenness 
referred to, a party well may be guilty of killing wilfully, deliberately, maliciously, 
and premeditately ; and if he so kill, he is guilty as though he were sober. The 
principle laid down by the court is, that when the question is, can drunkenness be 
taken into consideration, determining whether the party be guilty of murder in the 
second degree, the answer must be, that it cannot; but when the question is, what 
were the actual mental state of the perpetrator, at the time the act was done, was it 
one of deliberation and preparation, then it is competent to show any degree of intoxi- 
cation that may exist, in order that the jury may judge, in view of such intoxication, 
in connection with all the other facts and circumstances, whether the act was pre- 
meditately and deliberately done. The law often implies malice from the manner in 
which the killing was done, or the weapon with which the blow was stricken. In 
such case it is murder, though the perpetrator were drunk. And no degree of drunk- 
enness will excuse in such case, unless by means of drunkenness an habitual or fixed 
madness be caused. The law in such cases does not seek to ascertain the actual state 
of the perpetrator’s mind, for the fact from which is implied having been proved, the 
law presumes its existence, and proof in opposition to this presumption, is irrelevant 
and inadmissible. Hence a party cannot show he was so drunk as not to be capable 
of entertaining a malicious feeling. The conclusion of lawis against him. But when 
the question is, whether a party is guilty of murder in the first degree, it becomes 
indispensable that the jury should form an opinion as to the actual state of mind 
with which this act was done. All murder in the first degree (except that committed 
by poison, and by lying in wait), must be perpetrated wilfully, deliberately, mali- 
ciously, and premeditately. The jury must ascertain as a matter of fact, that the 
accused was in this state of mind when the act was done. Now according to the 
cases of Swan v. The State, and Pirtle v. The State, any fact that will shed light upon 
this subject, may be looked to by them, and may constitute legitimate proof for their 
consideration. And among other facts, any state of drunkenness being proved, it is 
a legitimate subject of inquiry, as to what influence such intoxication might have had 
upon the mind of the offender, in the perpetration of the deed. We know that an 
intoxicated man will often, upon a slight provocation, have his passions excited and 
rashly perpetrate a criminal act. Now, it is unphilosophical for us to assume that 
such a man would, in the given case, be chargeable with the same degree of premedi- 
tation and deliberation that we would ascribe to a sober man, perpetrating the same 
act upon a like provocation. It is in this view of the question, that this court held, 
in Swan’s case, and in Pirtle’s case, that the drunkenness of a party might be looked 
to by the jury, with the other facts in the case, to enable them to decide whether the 
killing were done deliberately and premeditately. But his honor, the Circuit Judge, 
told the jury, that drunkenness was an aggravation of the offence, unless the defendant 
was so deeply intoxicated as to be incapable of forming in his mind a design delibe- 
rately and premeditately to do the act. In this charge there is error, for which the 
judgment must be reversed. Reverse the judgment, and remand the cause for another 
trial.” Hale v. State, 11 Humph. 154. 

(p) Pigman v. State, 14 Ohio, 555; affirmed, but limited, in Nichols v. State, 8 Ohio 
8. R. (N. 8.) See also U. 8. v. Roudenbush, 1 Bald. 514. 

(q) R. v. Moore, reported 6 Law Rep. (N. 8.), 581. 

64 


BOOK I.] EFFECT ON THE QUESTION OF INTENT. ($71 


_ form any intention at all, and yet he may be guilty of very great violence. 
If you are not satisfied that the prisoners, or either of them, had formed a 
positive intention of murdering the child, you may find them guilty of an 
assault.’’ (7) 

Beyond this the advance has been fluctuating. The furthest step taken was 
in an English case, decided in 1819,(s) where Holroyd, J., is reported by Sir 
W. Russell, who adopts his opinion as text law, to have said, that the fact of 
drunkenness might be taken into consideration to determine the question 
whether an act was premeditated or done only with sudden heat and impulse. 
This would make drunkenness an item in every question of provocation or hot 
blood, and would of course open the way to the same difficulties as to general 
policy, which we have already pointed out in another connection. In 1835, 
however, this case was expressly repudiated by Parks, J., who said, in refer- 
ring to Holroyd, J.’s language, as just given, ‘Highly as I respect that late 
excellent judge, I differ from him, and my brother Littledale agrees with 
me. He once acted upon that case, but afterwards retracted his opinion. 
There is no doubt that that case is not law. I think there would be no safety 
in human life, if it were to be considered as law.(¢) But the very next year, 
Alderson, B., in a case of stabbing, retraced at least a part of the retreat 
which had been thus so emphatically sounded. ‘It is my duty to tell you,” 
he said, “that the prisoner being intoxicated, does not alter the nature of the 
offence. Ifa man chooses to get drunk, it is his‘own voluntary act; it is very 
different from a madness which is not caused by any act of the person. That 
voluntary species of madness which it is in a party’s power to abstain from, 
he must answer for. However, with regard to the intention, drunkenness 
may perhaps be adverted to according to the nature of the instrument used. 
If a man uses a stick, you would not infer a malicious intent so strongly 
against him, tf drunk, when he made an intemperate use of ut, as you would 
if he had used a different kind of weapon ; but where a dangerous instrument 
7s used, which, if used, must produce grievous bodily harm, drunkenness 
can have no effect on the consideration of the malicious intent of the party.” (w) 
Perhaps this is doing no more than reiterating the principle we have already 
announced, that when there is evidence of sober premeditation, intermediate 
drunkenness cannot.be received to affect the question of intent; but that, when 
there is no such evidence, it can. And it would hardly be possible to strain 
farther than this the following charge, in 1837, by Parke, B. (to be dis- 
tinguished from Park, J., whose opinion, two years before, has been just 
noticed) —“TI must tell you, that if a man makes himself voluntarily drunk, 
that is no excuse for any crime he may commit while he is so; he must take 
the consequence of his own voluntary act; or most-crimes would otherwise be 
unpunished. But drunkenness may be taken into consideration in cases where 
what the law deems sufficient provocation has been given ; because the question 
is, in such cases, whether the fatal act is to be attributed to the passion of 
anger, excited by the previous provocation, and that passion is more easily 


(r) R. v. Cruse, 8 C. & P..541. (s) R. v. Grindley, 1 Rus. on Cr. 8, note n. 
(4) R.-v.-Carrol,.7 C..&:P. 145. (u) R..v. Meakin, 7 C. & P. 297. 
9) 65 


§ 72] INTOXICATION AS A DEFENCE. [BOOK I. 


excitable in a person when in a state of intoxication, than when he is sober. 
So, where the question is, whether words have been uttered with a deliberate 
_ purpose, or are merely low and idle expressions, the drunkenness of the person 
uttering them is proper to be considered. But if there is really a previous 
determination to resent a slight affront in a barbarous manner, the state of 
drunkenness in which the prisoner was, ought not to be regarded, for it would 
furnish no excuse. You will decide whether the subsequent act does not fur- 
nish the best means of judging what the nature of the previous expression 
really was.’’(v) 

§ 72. The American cases present the same general result, depending in 
principle, if not in terms, on the position that where the encounter was sudden, 
and the defendant, prior to such encounter, had no malice or old grudge, 
intoxication at the time of the encounter, can be taken into consideration, to 
ascertain whether the defendant when under a legal provocation, acted from 
malice or from sudden passion.(w) These cases have been arranged as follows, 
by a late learned writer.(~) 

“In 1848 the question of intoxication was before the Supreme Court of 
Alabama, on an indictment for an assault with intent to kill. The court was 
asked in that case to charge the jury, that, ‘although drunkenness does not 
incapacitate a man from forming a premeditated design of murder, yet as it 
clouds the understanding and excites passion, it might be evidence of passion 
only, and of a want of malice and design.’ ‘This the court refused, but told 
the jury that ‘drunkenness could have no effect in their consideration.’ The 
prisoner excepted, and on the hearing in full court, Chilton, J., declared that 
it was a general rule, that although drunkenness reduces a man to a state of 
temporary insanity, it does not excuse him, or palliate an offence committed 
in a fit of intoxication, and which is the immediate result of it; and that if 
the prisoner had killed the deceased with the deadly weapon (a knife) with 
which he stabbed him, in a state of intoxication, the crime would not have 
been reduced from murder to manslaughter by his intoxication, which must be 
presumed, in absence of contrary evidence, to be voluntary; and the court 
remark, upon the cases of Penna v. Nutall,(y) and Swan v. The State,(z) 
that there it was important to ascertain whether the homicide was that ‘wilful, 
deliberate, malicious and premeditated killing,’ which, by statute, constituted 
murder in the first degree. The mental state required for that crime, being 
one of deliberation and premeditation, the fact of the prisoner’s drunkenness 
was material, not as an excuse for the crime, but to show it had not been 
committed. The State v. Bullock.(a) Possibly this case may have gone too 
far in refusing to allow drunkenness to be given in evidence upon question of 
the intention. The Supreme Court of North Carolina has declared the same 
law. In 1848 a prisoner was indicted for murder. One defence was drunk- 
enness. ‘The judge told the jury that drunkenness would not lessen the 
prisoner’s guilt, if they believed him sane before he became drunk. A new 
trial being moved for, on the ground of misdirection, Battle, J., said: ‘All the 


(v) R. v. Thomas, 7 C. & P. 817. (w) See Schaller v. State, 14 Missouri, 502. 
(x) 6 Law Rep. (N. 8.) 556, &c. (y) Add. 257. (z) 4 Humph. 136. 
(a) 13 Alabama, 413, A. D. 1848. 

66 


BOOK I.] EFFECT ON THE QUESTION OF INTENT. [§ 72 


writers on the criminal law, from the most ancient to the most recent, so far 
as we are aware, declare that voluntary drunkenness will not excuse a crime 
committed by a man otherwise sane, while actlug under its influence. Even 
the cases relied on by the counsel for the prisoner, Rex v. Meakin,(b) Rex v. 
Thomas, (c) all acknowledge the general rule; but they say that when a legal 
provocation is proved, intoxication may be taken into consideration, to ascer- 
tain whether the slayer acted from malice or from sudden passion, excited by 
the provocation. Whether the distinction is a proper one or not we do not 
pretend to say. It has been doubted in England, Rex v. Carroll,(d) and it is a 
dangerous one, and ought to be received with great caution. But whether ad- 
mitted or not, it has no bearing upon the present case. There is not a particle 
of testimony to show that the prisoner was acting, or can be supposed to have 
been acting under a legal provocation ; and there was therefore no cause for 
the application of the principle for which the counsel contends. The State v. 
John.(e) The case of Preble v. State(/) is an important case on this point. 
The defendant was indicted for murder. At the time of the commission of the 
offence he was intoxicated from the use of ardent spirits. ‘And in relation 
thereto the judges charged the jury, that the fact of such drunkenness could 
not be taken into consideration by them, unless the defendant was so far gone 
as not to be conscious of what he was doing, and did not know right from 
wrong.” ‘Out of this charge,” said Turley, J., ‘‘arises the point to be con- 
sidered by the court in this case, and that is, how far drunkenness in law is a 
mitigation or excuse for the commission of offences. This is no new question, 
presented for the first time for consideration, but one of the earliest considera- 
tions in the law of offences; one which has been again and again adjudicated 
by the courts of Great Britain and the United States, and, as we apprehend, 
with a consistent uniformity rarely to be met with in questions of a like interest 
and importance. Upon the subject we have nothing to discover; no new 
principle to lay down; no philosophical investigation to enter into, in relation 
to mental sanity or insanity; but only to ascertain how the law upon this 
subject has been heretofore adjudged, and so to adjudge it ourselves.” ’ 

‘“‘In the case of Cornwall v. The State of Tennessee, (7) the able judge who 
delivered the opinion of the court, in speaking upon this subject, uses the 
following very emphatic language :— 

“*A contrary doctrine ought to be forced nts of circulation, if it has ob- 
tained it, by every friend to virtue, peace, quietness and good government. All 
civilized governments must punish the culprit who relies on so untenable a de- 
fence; and in doing so, they preach a louder lesson of morality to all those 
who are addicted to intoxication, and to parents and guardians, and to youth 
and to society, than comes in the cold abstract from pulpits. To the justice 
and correctness of these remarks, all who have had experience in the annals of 
crime can bear testimony. It is only at the present term of the court that 
we have seen it proven that an offender, a short time before the perpetration 
- of a horrid murder, inquired of a grocery-keeper what kind of liquor would 


(b) 7C. & P. 297. (c) Ibid. 817. 1 Russell on Crimes, 8. (d) 7C. & P. 145. 
(e) 8 Jud. 330. (f) 9 Hump. 663, A.D. 1849. (g) Mar. & Yer. 147, 149. 


67 


§ 73] INTOXICATION AS A DEFENCE. [BOOK I, 


make him drunk soonest, and swallowed thereon a bumper of brandy. We 
have had three cases of murder, and one of an assault with an intent to 
murder, before us at this term of court, in every one of which these are con- 
victions in the Circuit Court and affirmances in this; every one of which is of 
aggravated character, and in every one of which the perpetrator, at the time 
of the commission of the offence, was laboring under dementia affectata, 
drunkenness; an awful illustration of the necessity of holding to the law as it 
has been adjudged upon this subject. There is, in our judgment, no conflict 
of authority upon this point of law; every case which may have such appear- 
ance, being a case of exception, on the application of the rule, or a case of no 
authority upon the subject. Lord Hale, in his work before referred to,(h) 
says: ‘If, by means of drunkenness, an habitual or fixed madness be caused, 
that will be excuse, though it be contracted by the vice and will of the party; 
for this habitual or fixed phrensy puts a man in the same condition as if it 
were contracted at first involuntarily. And it was to this principle the Circuit 
Judge was alluding, when he charged the jury in the present case, that the 
drunkenness of the prisoner could not be taken by them into consideration, 
unless he were so far gone as to be unconscious of what he was doing, and did 
not know right from wrong, in saying which he put the case most favorable 
for the prisoner; for a man may be so intoxicated as to be unconscious of 
what he is doing, and not to know right from wrong; and yet not have con- 
tracted an habitual and fixed phrensy, the result of intemperance, of which 
Lord Hale is speaking above.’ ”’ 

§ 73. In Kelly v. State,(z) the same question came before the High Court 
of Error and Appeals of Mississippi. The court below declined to charge the 
jury that intoxication was evidence of intention in determining whether the 
killing was murder. The prisoner was convicted of manslaughter only, but 
the court above, in remarking upon this question, lays down the law as well 
established, that drunkenness is no excuse for crime, although sometimes held 
proper for consideration, where the sole question is whether the act done was 
premeditated or done only with sudden heat or impulse, which might be as 
truly said of anger or any other excitement arising from sudden provocation 
or peculiar circumstances; that not much importance was to be attached to it, 
as might be conceived from the presumption, which was equally great, that the 
design might have previously existed, and intoxication have been employed to 
nerve the criminal to the commission of the crime; that the law discriminates 
between the delusion of intoxication and the insanity which it may ultimately 
produce. If drunkenness, they said, were to be considered an excuse for crime, 
‘there would be established a complete emancipation from criminal justice. 

The same principle was recognized in North Carolina in State v. M’Cante,(/) 
being somewhat differently applied. The court here held ‘that if a crime was 
‘committed upon a provocation, which, if acted upon instantly by a sober man, 
would mitigate his offence, evidence of intoxication was admissible upon the 
question whether such provocation was, in fact, acted upon when the act was 


(h) P.C.pt.1,ch. 4. See ante, § 67. (i) 3 Smedes & Marshall, 518, A. D. 1844. 
(j) 1 Spear, 384. 
68 


BOOK Ts) EFFECT ON THE QUESTION OF INTENT. [§ 18 


done. If a man uses a stick upon you, you would not infer a malicious intent 
so strongly against him if drunk when he mado an intemperate use of it as 
you would if he had used a different kind of weapon. But where a dangerous 
instrument is used, which if used must produce grievous bodily harm, drunk- 
enness can have no effect on the consideration of the malicious intent of the 
party.” 

In a case in Tennessee, already cited,(/) it was said by Turley, J.: “The 
case of R. v. Grindley, decided at Worcester Sum. Ass., 1819, by Holroyd, J., 
not reported but referred to by Russell in his work upon Crimes, page 8, and 
now insisted upon by the prisoner as putting the Circuit Judge in the wrong 
in his charge to the jury, and holding different principles upon this subject, is 
expressly overruled by Park and Littledale, judges, in the case of R. v. Car- 
roll;(/) and if it were not, it is an anomalous case, and perhaps was not 
intended or considered by Holroyd to be in conflict with principles so well and 
so long settled. The case, as stated by Russell, holds that ‘though voluntary 
drunkenness cannot excuse from the commission of crime, yet when upon a 
charge of murder the material question is whether an act was premeditated or 
done only with sudden heat and impulse, the fact of the party being intoxicated 
is a circumstance proper to be taken into consideration.’ Now, in relation to 
this principle, as thus laid down, it may be observed that cases may arise, even 
of murder at common law, in which it would be proper to receive such proof 
as explanatory of intention. To constitute murder at common law, the killing 
must have been done with malice aforethought} the existence of this malice 
necessarily implies the absence of all circumstances of justification, excuse, or 
mitigation arising from adequate provocation; and this malice is either express 
or implied: express, when it has been perpetrated by poison, lying in wait, or 
other deliberate and premeditated manner; implied, from the nature of the 
weapon, the violence of the assault, and the inadequacy of the provocation. 
It may become important in a case to know whether poison which has been 
imbibed was administered knowingly and designedly or accidentally. And if 
it be wilful, which it is in the case of a medicine, there being two on the table, 
one a poison and the other not, and the poison be administered, is not the fact 
that the person who administered it was drunk at the time legitimate proof 
for the purpose of showing that it was a mistake which a drunken man might 
make, though a sober one would not? This would be, not to protect him 
from the punishment for his crime, but to show that he had not given the 
poison premeditately, and therefore was guilty of no crime. So if the ques- 
tion be whether the killing is murder or manslaughter, the defence being 
adequate provocation, and it be doubtful whether the blow be struck upon the 
provocation or upon an old grudge, it seems to us, proof that the prisoner 
was drunk when he struck the blow is legitimate, not to mitigate the offence, 
but in explanation of the intent—that is, whether the blow was struck upon 
the provocation or upon the old grudge; for the law only mitigates the offence 
to manslaughter, upon adequate provocation, out of compassion to human 
frailty; and therefore, though there be adequate cause for such mitigation, 


(k) Pirtle v. State, 9 Hamp. 663. (1) 7C. & P. 145. 
69 


§ 73] INTOXICATION AS A DEFENCE. [BOOK I. 


yet if, in point of fact, one avail himself of it to appease an old grudge, it is 
murder, and not manslaughter; and in all such cases the question necessarily 
is. whether the blow was stricken premeditately, or upon sudden heat and 
impulse produced by the provocation, and the fact of the self-possession of 
the perpetrator of the crime is very material in a conflict of proof upon the 
subject. If this be the extent of the opinion of Holroyd, in the case of Rex 
v. Grindley, we are not prepared to hold that it is not law. But if it be un- 

derstood to hold that a killing may be mitigated from murder to manslaughter 
in consequence of the drunkenness of the perpetrator, thereby making that 
adequate provocation in the case of a drunken man which could not be so in 
the case of a sober one, we are prepared to hold, with Park and Littledale, 
that it is not law.” 

In 1858, on an indictment for maliciously stabbing with an intent to kill, 
the Supreme Court of Ohio said :— 

‘‘Did the court below err in holding, as it did substantially, that, in a case 
of this kind, the intoxication of the accused had nothing to do with the ques- 
tion of malice ? 

“This is a question much more difficult and serious than the preceding, and 
in respect to which our minds have not been free from doubt; but, after a 
long and somewhat anxious deliberation, we have unanimously come to the 
conclusion that there was no error in the charge of the court below on this 
point. 

‘‘ All authorities agree that@runkenness is no excuse forcrime. Crime, when 
all the acts of hand and mind which constitute it actually exist, is not the less 
criminal when committed by a person intoxicated. A drunken malice is as dan- 
gerous, and may be quite as wicked, as a sober malice; and it is a sorry con- 
solation to a sufferer from a murderous stab, and to a community which is 
responsible for his protection, to be told that the act was done by a man who 
was bound in morals to keep sober, and who had the power to keep sober, 
but who had become voluntarily drunk. Nevertheless, it has been held, in this 
State, that where a peculiar knowledge was an element of the guilty act, re-_ 
quiring nice discrimination and judgment, as in passing a counterfeited bank- 
bill, knowing it to be counterfeited, and where deliberation and premeditation 
are necessary ingredients of the crime, as in murder in the first degree, evi- 
dence of intoxication is admissible, and proper to be taken into consideration 
by the jury, in determining the question as to the guilty knowledge in the one 
case, and as to the deliberation and premeditation in the other. So, if the 
accused was so drunk as not to know what he was doing, the fact of intoxica- 
tion may doubtless be given in evidence for what it is worth for the purpose 
of showing that he did not intend at the time to do what in fact he did do.(m) 
So far as we are advised, there is no reported case in Ohio requiring us to go 
beyond this; and to this extent, on a fair construction of the language of the 
court below in charging the jury, the prisoner, in the case before us, had the 
benefit of the evidence in regard to his state of intoxication. And this, too, 


; (m) Pigman v. The State, 14 Ohio Rep. 555. 
70 | 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS PSYCHOLOGICALLY. [$ 74 


seems to be the full extent to which we are led by the general current of au- 
thorities in other States. (7) 

“We will not say but that, admitting the correctness of these decisions, a re- 
fined and rigid logical theory might not require us to go further. But here 
the authorities authorize us to stop; and here we think a proper regard to 
the public safety in the practical administration of criminal justice requires that 
we should stop. This kind of evidence is at best, and in any case, of danger- 
ous tendency in its practical application. Intoxication is easily simulated. 
It is often voluntarily induced for the sole purpose of nerving a wicked heart 
to the firmness requisite for the commission of a crime soberly premeditated, 
or as an excuse for such a crime. Yet these pre-existing dispositions may be 
difficult or impossible to prove. And when we admit evidence of intoxication 
to rebut a guilty knowledge requiring nice deliberation and judgment, to rebut 
a charge of deliberation and premeditation, and to show that the accused did 
not at the time intend to do the act which he did do, we think we have gone 
far enough; and that, looking to the practical administration of the criminal 
law, a due regard to the public safety requires that the mere question of malice 
should be determined by the circumstances of the case, aside from the fact of 
intoxication, as in other cases.’’(0) 

§ 73 (a). 4th. Burden of proof in insanity.—Where the burden of proof 
lies in a criminal trial where insanity is set up, is considered in another 
work.(p) The rule in civil cases has already been noticed. (q) 


CHAPTER II. 
MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONSIDERED PSYCHOLOGICALLY. 


§ 74. “THE various diseases included in the general term insanity, or men- 
tal derangement,” says Dr. Ray, “may be conveniently arranged under two 
divisions, founded on two very different conditions of the brain ; the first being 
a want of its ordinary development, and the second, some lesion of its structure 
subsequent to its development. In the former of these divisions, we have 
Idiocy and Imbecility, differing from each other only in degree. The various 
affections embraced in the latter general division may be arranged under two 
subdivisions, Mania and Dementia, distinguished by the contrast they present 
in the energy and tone of the mental manifestations. Mania is characterized 
by unnatural exaltation or depression of the faculties, and may be confined to 
the intellectual or to the affective powers, or it may involve them both, and 
these powers may be generally or partially deranged. Dementia depends on 
a more or less complete enfeeblement of the faculties, and may be consecutive 
to injury of the brain, to mania, or to some other disease; or it may be con- 


(n) Com. v. Jones, 1 Leigh, 612; Com. v. Haggerty, Lewis C. L. 403; Pirtle v. The 
State, 9 Humph. 664; Swan v. The State, 4 Humph. 136; Haile v. The ata 11 
Humph. 154; 2 Parker’s (N. Y.) C. Rep. 223-235. 

(0) Nichols v. The State, 8 Ohio State R. (N. 8.) 438-9. 

(p) Wharton’s Criminal ‘Law, § 55, 711. (q) Ante, § 33-35. 

Tl 


§ 75] FLEMMING’S CLASSIFICATION. [BOOK I. 


nected with the decay of old age. These divisions will be more conveniently 
exhibited in the following tabular view :— 


Ipiocy. 1. Resulting from congenital defect. 
Defective 2. Resulting from an obstacle to the development 
development of the faculties, supervening in infancy. 
of the Impeciuity. 1. Resulting from congenital defect. 
faculties. | 2. Resulting from an obstacle to the development 
of the faculties, supervening in infancy. 
INSANITY. ( Tiriuireeeuly 1. General. 
? (2. Partial. 


Lesion of the MANIA. 
faculties 
subsequent 
to their 
development. DEMENTIA. 1. Consecutive to mania, or injuries of the brain. 
L 2. Senile peculiar to old age. (a) 


AFFECTIVE, u soir 


§ 75. The following classification of Flemming, (b) while less simple, is very 
valuable both for the delicate precision of its analysis, and for the important 
aid it affords to the nomenclature of forensic psychology :— 


I. INFIRMITAS. (Geistesschwiche.) Imbecility, the characteristic being the diminution 
in psychical power. 

Ist. As to origin. 

(1.) Primaria sew congenita. (Syn. Idiotismus.) A defective development 
perceptible either at birth or infancy. 

(2.) e morbo, arising from wounds on the head, brain or nervous fevers, or 
epilepsy. 

(3.) Sends, arising from decrease in vitality in the extreme stages of old age. 

2d. As to extent. 

(1.) Infirmitas adstricta. Limited imbecility, the characteristic being dimi- 
nution of particular organic powers. 

(2) Dysmenia. Weakness of memory, the characteristic being the 
feebleness of the reproductive power of the perceptive faculty, 
and the symptoms, an inability to remember things either re- 
cent or remote, distinctly or at all. 

(6) Infirmitasadstricta surdo-mutorum. Imbecility of the deaf and 
dumb. 

(c) Infirmitas adstricta excorum. Imbecility of the blind. 

(2.) Infirmitas sparsa. General weakness of mind, the characteristic being 
the absolute or relative weakness of all the mental and moral func- 
tions, and the symptoms, obtuseness and feebleness of the perceptive 
and attentive powers ; feebleness of comprehension, of ratiocination, 
of imagination, of memory, in a variety of gradations. 

II. VESANTA, (Geistes verwirrung.) Mental confusion, the characteristic being a depravity 
(depravation) of the psychical powers arising from excess or perversion. 

Ist. Vesanta dysthymodes, or dysthyma, disorder of temperament, the characteristic 
being the depravity (depravation) of the psychical powers connected with an 
overpowering disturbance of the temperament. Symptoms; an anomalous 
condition of the sensibility, the mental tone, the inclinations, and the impulses. 
The consequent deliria are the invariable effect of the dysthymia, and depend 
upon the prevailing feeling or sentiment. 

(1.) Dysthymia transitoria seu subita. Sudden dysthymia, the characteristic 
being the suddenness and rapidity of its approach. Symptoms; irri- 
tability, proneness to agitation, irascibility, excessive disgust, fear of 
death, extreme timidity, despair of happiness. It occurs frequently 
in the Stadiwm predromorum of cerebral affections and nervous fevers, 
or of epilepsy and the cognate complaints; and is sometimes, though 
more rarely, accompanied by the sudden suicidal impulse. It should 
be observed that dysthymia remittens sinks in the remission into the 
mere dysaethesis. 

(2.) Dysthymia adstricta, or partial dysthymia, the characteristic being an 
anomalous condition of particular states of feeling, inclinations, and 
impulses. 


(a) Ray on Insanity, 71. 
(>) Psychiatrisches Journal, Bd. I. Hft. 1, p. 112. 


12 


BOOK. I.] FLEMMING’S CLASSIFICATION. [$ 76 


(2) Atra (the Melancholia Lypemonia, of Esquirol), or gloomy 
Dysthymia, the characteristic being sadness, fear, dread, sus- 
picion, malevolence, homesickness (xostalgia), and the wild- 
ness and ferocity of the intoxicated. (Ferocitas et morositas 
ebriosorum. 

(4) Dysthymia candida, cheerful Dysthymia (Melancholia hilaris, 
Cheromanie Chambeyron), the characteristics being hilarity, 
recklessness of manner, raillery, proneness to see all things in 
the most vivacious light. 

(c) Dysthymia mutabilis, variable Dysthymia, the characteristic 
being vacillation between the two foregoing forms. 

(3.) Dysthymia sparsa (apathica), general Dysthymia (Melancholia Atto- 
nita). The characteristics being, apparent obtuseness, dull, heavy 
reveries and abstractions, prevalence of an indistinct sensation of dis- 
comfort, apathy to all extraneous impressions. 

2d. Vesanta Annoetos, or Anoesia. Disturbance of the understanding. The cha- 
racteristics being the depravity (depravation) of the psychical powers, with a 
controlling anomalousness of the intellectual faculties. Symptoms, deliria of 
various kinds, with manifestations of Dysthymia, which, however, are merely 
subordinate. 

(1.) Anoesia Transitoria, or Subita. Sudden Anoesia. The characteristics 
being unexpected appearance and rapid subsidence. - 

(a) Anoesta e febre. Febrile delirium. 

(4) Anoesia e potu nimto (ebrietas). Drunkenness. 

(c) Anoesta ex affectu, madness caused by agitation of mind. 

(d) Anoesta semisomnis. Confusion of mind in sleep. Sleep-drunk- 
enness. 

(e) Anoesta Somnambula, or Spastica ; Somnambulism. 

(2.) Anoesta continua, chronic Anoesia. 

(3.) Anoesta remittens. Remittent Anoesia. 

(4.) Anoesta adstricta, partial Anoesia or Lunacy. The characteristics being 
delirium in particular intellectual departments. 

(a) Anoesta ad sensationes. Hallucinations (deliria of the senses). 
(Var. a fallacia sensuum et hallucinatio ebriosorum), derange- 
ment of the senses consequent on excess of drinking. 

(4) Anoesia ad cogitationes, eccentricity, fixed insane ideas. 

(5.) Azoesia sparsa. General Anoesia or lunacy, the characteristics being 
Deliria in every department of the intellectual faculties. Var. a 
Anoesta potatorum (Delirium tremens). 

3d. Vesania mantaca seu Mania. The characteristic being a depravity (deprava- 
tion) of the psychical functions, with a concurrent anomalousness of the 
emotional and intellectual faculties. The symptoms are a violent and perverse 
temper, inclinations and impulses, with violent deliria, which mutually sustain 
and aggravate each other. 

(1.) Manta transitoria subtta, sudden mania, the characteristic being a sud- 
den breaking out of mania without perceptible premonitory stages, 
and without previous Dysthymia or Anoesia ; generally a crisis in 
sleep, or transition to the second class. 

(2) Mania subita a febre (Deliriwm encephaliticum), sudden deli- 
rium, with feverish symptoms of the brain and nerves. 

(2) Mania subita a potu nimvo, arising from and during intoxication. 

(c) Manta subita ex effectu, mania caused by excessive agitation of 
the affections. 

(2) Manta subita e partu, mania connected with parturition. 

(e) Vania subtto e morbo occulto (vulgo), Amentia occulta, which 
also includes the previous species. 

(2.) Mania continua, permanent mania. 

(3.) Manta remittens, Remittent mania. (Remark—Remittent mania in re- 
mission turns into Anoesia, in some cases immediately into Dysthymia.) 

(4.) Manta adstricta seu instinctiva. Moral Insanity. (Mania sine delirio 
of Pinel; Monomanie instinctive of Mare; Mania affectiva; Folie 
raisonante); the characteristics being insanity, apparently confined to 
specific morbid impulses. This class is almost always connected with 
the symptoms of Manta transitoria seu subita. 

(5.) Mania Sparsa, general mania is the characteristic, being a depravity 
(depravation) of both the moral and intellectual powers. 


§ 76. To Ellinger(c) we are indebted for the following :— 


I. Diseases of the affections, when the affections, sentiments and desires are preponderatingly 
alienated, while the intellectual faculties are affected in an inferior or at least a secon- 
dary degree. 


(c) Ueber die antropologischen Momente der Zurechnungs fahigkeit. Ludwigsburg, 
1846. 
13 


§ 77] PRESENT CLASSIFICATION. [BOOK I. 


(2) Melancholy, the prevalent type being sadness, depression, fear, dread, and 
despair. 


(6) Phrensy, the prevalent type being mirth, mischievousness, anger. 


(c) Volatility (Launenhaftigkeit). Alternation between the two last mentioned 
hases. 
If. Delirium, ehavasatinents and intellectual faculties being equally affected, and both the 
subjective and objective relations alike distorted. 
(a) (6) (c) Characterized by melancholy, phrensy, and the alternation of the two. 
III. Diseases of the intellect, where the affections take a subordinate part and the intellect is 
mainly disordered. 
(a) Partial. 
(4) General. 
(c) Debility, including idiocy and imbecility. 


§ 77. Without attempting a formal analysis, it is now proposed to consider 
the several points in which Psychology comes in contact with the law of the 
land, in the following order :— 


I. GENERAL THEORIES OF MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, § 78. 
1st. PsycHoLogicAL THEORY, § 79. 
2d. SoMATIC THEORY, § 80. 
3d. INTERMEDIATE THEORY, § 81. 
Difficulties attending each of the first two, § 82. 
Question as to moral responsibility of lunatics, § 83. 


II. HOW MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IS TO BE DETECTED, § 86. 
1st. By wuom, § 86. 
Medical expert necessary for this purpose, § 86. 
Great skill and experience needed, § 87. 
Dangers of an inexperienced examiner being bafiled, § 88. 
Responsibility in law of medical examiner, § 89. 
Importance of examiner adapting his manner to patient’s condition, 
§ 90. 
Important thatJegal and medical officers should, in such cases, act in 
common, § 92. 
Manner in which medical witness is to be examined on trial, § 94. 
2d. AT WHAT TIME, § 95. 
(1.) Time of act, § 95. 
(2.) At trial, § 97. 
(3.) On and after sentence, § 98. 
3d. By wHat TEsts, § 100. 
(1.) Physiognomy, § 100. ; 
Relations of the different features, § 101. 
(2.) Bodily health and temperament, § 102. 
State of bowels, § 102. 
Physical disorganization, § 103. 
Insensibility to pain and cold, § 104. 
Irregularities in action of senses, § 105. 
Change in disposition, § 106. 
(3.) Hereditary tendency, § 107. 
Importance of this test, § 108. 
Admissible in point of law, § 108. 
Opinion of Gibson, C. J., 2 108. 
(4.) Conversation and deportment, § 110. 
Necessity of great cireumspection in this respect, § 110. 
Cases illustrating this, § 111. 
(5.) Nature of act, § 112. 
(a) Its insensibility, 3 112. 
(bd) Its incongruity with antecedents, § 113. 
(c) Its motivelessness, § 114. 
(d) Its inconsequentiality, § 115. 


III. FROM WHAT MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. 
1st. Emotions, § 116. 
(1.) Remorse, § 116. 
(2.) Anger, § 118. 
(3.) Shame, § 122, 
(4.) Grief, § 124. 
(5.) Homesickness (Nostalgia), § 125. 
T4 


BOOK I.] ANALYSIS OF MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS. [$ 77 


2d. SrmuLATED insanity, § 127. 

Necessity for close examination, § 127. 

Tests to be applied, § 128. 

Delirium most usually counterfeited, but the most difficult, § 129. 

Physiognomy and health to be examined, § 130. 

Case to be compared with other recorded cases, § 131. 

Simulation not to be inferred from absence of a trace of insanity at 
the examination, § 132. 

Causes why such signs may be suppressed, § 132. 

Pretended insanity frequently turns into real, § 133. 

How examination is to be conducted, § 134. 

Patient to be brought into a succession of relations, § 135-8. 

To be furnished with pen, ink, and paper, and other methods of exa- 
mination, §§ 135-8. 

Insania Occulta, features of, § 139. 

Necessity of guarding against, § 139. . 


IV. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH DERANGEMENT OF THE 
SENSES, AND DISEASE, § 140. 

1st. DEAF AnD Dump, § 140. 

2d. Brinn, § 141, 

3d. Eprmeptics, § 142. 
Peculiar tendency of epilepsy to insanity, § 142. 
Nature of epilepsy, § 143. 
Distinction between the several classes, § 144. 
Different stages of the disease, § 145. 
Actions committed during attack, not valid, § 146. 
Rule as to intermediate stages, § 147. 
Tests laid down by Clarus, § 148. 


V. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP, § 149. 
General effect of sleep on the senses, § 149. 
Ist. SoMNOLENTIA, OR SLEEP-DRUNKENNESS, § 151. 
2d. SomNAMBULISM, § 159. 


VI. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS AFFECTING THE TEMPERAMENT, § 163. 
1st. Depression, § 163. 
2d. HypocnonprtiA, § 166. 
dd. Hysreria, § 169. 
4th. MeLancuoty, § 170. 


VII. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS AFFECTING THE MORAL SYSTEM, § 174. 
Ist. GENERAL MORAL MANIA, § 174. 
Effect of, § 174. 
General symptoms, § 175. 
Illustrations, § 176. 
2d. Monomanta, § 177. 
Doctrine of Mania sine Delirio, § 178. 
Difference of opinion as to its existence, § 179. 
Tests to be applied to it, § 180. 
Tendency in this country to recognize its existence, § 183. 
(1.) Homicidal mania, § 186. 
Cases where Esquirol supposes it to exist, § 186. 
Precautions necessary in its recognition, § 190. 
Tests suggested by Dr. Ray, § 190. 
ee i ‘¢ Dr... Taylor,. 9 190; 
Dr. Mayo’s objections to the entire theory, § 191. 
(2.) Kleptomania (morbid propensity to steal), § 192. 
(3.) Pyromania (morbid incendiary propensity), § 195. 
How far recognized in England, § 197. 
Necessary tests, § 198. 
(4.) Aidoiomania (morbid sexual propensity), § 199. 
(5.) Pseudonomania (morbid lying propensity), § 202. 
(6.) Oikeiomania (morbid state of domestic affections), § 204. 
(7.) Suicidal mania (morbid propensity to self-destruction), § 206. 
Tendency to this in cases of melancholy, &c., § 207. 
Legal consequences in actions against life insurers, § 208. 


MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS PSYCHOLOGICALLY. [BOOK is 


(ZA) 
“J 
~I 

ee} 


(8.) Fanatico-mania, 3 209. 
(a) Supernatural or pseudo-supernatural demoniacal posses- 
sion, § 210. 
Testimony of ancient writers to this, § 210. 
rs of the New Testament, § 211. 
(b) Mental alienation on religious subjects, § 214. 
Tendency of infidelity to insanity, § 214. 
Conservative influence of Christianity, § 215. 
Insane delusion the result of a departure from Christianity, 
§ 216. 
Illustrations of this, § 217. 
Legal bearings of religious insanity, § 219. 
(9.) Politico-mania, § 220. 
How far an epidemic, § 221. 
Causes likely to generate it, § 221. 


VIII. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH INTELLECTUAL PROS- 
TRATION, § 222. 
Ist. Iptocy, § 222. 
Nature of, § 222. 
Physical incidents of, §§ 523-5-6. 
Cretenism, § 228. 
2d. ImBeciuity, § 229. 
With concomitant insanity, § 230. 
Original, § 230. 
Supervening, § 230. 
Specious, § 230. 
With confusion of mind, § 230. 
Without insanity, § 231. 
Distinction between innocent and malignant imbecility, § 232. 
3d. DementiA, § 234. 


IX. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS ACCOMPANIED WITH DELIRIUM, § 235. 
Ist. GENERAL Deinium, § 235 
(a) Depressed delirium, § 236. 
(b) Maniacal delirium, § 237. 
(c) Delirium tremens, § 238. 
(d) Puerperal mania, § 239. 
2d. Partian DeEtirivm, ¢? 240. 


X. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED EMME: DELUSIONS AND HALLU- 
CINATIONS, § 241. 

lst. GENERAL, § DA1, 
Marked by general derangement of the perceptive faculties, § 241. 
Various phases it assumes, § 242. 
Tests of Ellinger, § 243. 
Effect of general delusion, § 244. 

2d. Partiat, § 245. 
Delusions and hallucinations, § 245. 
When there is no other sign of mental unsoundness, § 246. 
When mental unsoundness has made some progress, § 247. 
In cases of drunkenness, &c., § 248. 
In cases of developed insanity, § 249. 
Causes of delusions, § 250. 
Abercrombie’s classification, § 252. 
Hallucination in regard to a change into, or a possession by, wild 

animals, § 253. 


XI. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH LUCID INTERVALS, § 254. 


XII. TREATMENT OF INSANE CRIMINALS, § 259. 
Necessity of separate places of confinement in which insane criminals can be 
placed, § 259. 
(1.) For Rerrisution, § 260. 
In most if not all, cases of crime resulting from insane impulse, there 
is original responsibility, § 260. 
Insanity, in most cases, the result of moral excess, § 261-9. 
Qualified responsibility of lunatics, § 261-9. 


76 


BOOK I.] BODY AND SOUL: THEIR RECIPROCAL INFLUENCE, [$ 80 


(2.) For Prevention, § 270. 
Mischief to society if monomaniacs are suffered to go at large, § 270. 
Necessity of restraint, § 271. 
(3.) For Exampte, § 272. 
Contagiousness of unchecked crime, § 272. 
(4.) For Rerorm, § 273. 
Impossibility of patient recovering when permitted to run at large, 
§ 273. 
Injury to the community from the want of secondary punishments, 
the result being acquittals of dangerous parties, from an unwill- 
ingness to see the severer penalties inflicted, § 274. 
Ordinary penitentiaries inadequate, § 275. 
And so of ordinary lunatic asylums, § 276. 


I. GENERAL THEORIES OF MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS. 


§ 78. To those who have examined that portion of the preceding pages 
which treats of the legal relations of mental unsoundness, it will be obvious 
that no hypothesis can be constructed which will meet with exactness every 
possible future case. No general definition has therefore been attempted, and 
it is sufficient at present to notice the three prominent hypotheses by which 
the cause, rather than the nature, of mental unsoundness has been explained. 
This examination is here made the more thorough, from the fact that it is 
upon the result of this inquiry that the philosophy of the common law doc- 
trine of insanity must depend. 

§ 79. Ist. The psychological theory. This is based on the assumption 
that the primitive source of these diseases is in the soul itself, and that the 
soul is that which originally suffers, and imparts, when there is sympathetic 
insanity, its malady to the body.(d) 

§ 80. 2d. The somatic theory takes for granted that the soul itself, as such, 
is incapable of originating a disease, but that the occasion of every affection of 
the mind is to be found in some abnormity of bodily development, and that 
aberrations of mind are nothing more than disturbances of some functions of 
the soul produced by bodily abnormities. This theory resolves itself into 
various subdivisions. One party assumes, that while every mental disease is 
to be deduced from bodily causes, it is still to be treated as a self-existent dis- 
ease; while others maintain that there can be no such thing as a diseased 
state of the mind, and that what we usually designate as such, is nothing 
more than a symptom of some bodily disorder.(e) The somatic theory, so far 
as it involves phrenology, is examined with singular accuracy and thorough- 
ness by Sir William Hamilton, in the appendix to the first volume of his 
Lectures on Metaphysics.(ee) He first discusses the phrenological doctrine of 


(d) See an exposition of this in Dr. Henry Monro’s “ Remarks on Insanity, its Nature 
and Treatment.” London, 1850. 

(e) A very ingenious though unsound defence of the Somatic Theory will be found 
in Mr. M. B. Sampson’s “Criminal Jurisprudence considered in relation to Cerebral 
Organization.”” London, 1843. Hobbes’ famous theory drifts in the same direction. 
The result of this would be to make all restraint an injustice. So far as concerns 
phrenology, the reader is particularly referred to Sir William Hamilton’s Lectures on 
Metaphysics, pp. 650-658, where the phrenological theory is thoroughly demolished. 

(ee) Edition by Mansel and Veitel, Gould and Lincoln, 1859. : 

T 


§ 80] BODY AND SOUL: [BOOK I. 


the cerebellum, and by a series of experiments, explodes the phrenological hy- 
pothesis. After having weighed, with peculiar care, and under precautions 
which exclude all the known possibilities of mistake, over one thousand brains 
of fifty different species of animals, he shows :— 

(1.) The cerebella of animals generally are not, during a certain period 
subsequent to birth, less in proportion to the brain proper than in adults. 

(2.) In no species of animal has the female a proportionally smaller cere- 
bellum than the male; while in most species, ‘‘and this, according to a cer- 
. tain law, she has a considerably larger.” 

(3.) So far from being the case, as is alleged by phrenologists, that in im- 
puberal animals the cerebellum, in proportion to the brain proper, is greatly 
less than in adults, the contradictory is shown. 

(4.) The phrenological assertion, that “the proportion of the cerebellum to 
_ the brain proper in different species, is in proportion to the energy of the 
phrenological function attributed to it,” is equally groundless. : 

We add one or two distinct points.made by this most eminent and most 
reliable of modern psychologists: ‘‘I shall, however, give you the sample of 
another general fact. The organ of veneration rises in the middle on the 
coronal surface of the head. Women, it is universally admitted, manifest reli- 
gious feeling more strongly and generally than men, and the phrenologists 
accordingly assert that the female cranium is higher in proportion in that 
region than the male. This I found to be the very reverse of truth, by a com- 
parative average of nearly two hundred skulls of either sex. In man, the | 
female encephalus is considerably smaller than that of the male, and in shape 
the crania of the sexes are different. By what dimension is the female skull 
less than the male? The female skull is longer, it is nearly as broad, but it 
is much lower than the male. This is only one of several curious sexual dif- 
ferences of the head. 

“T do not know whether it be worth while mentioning, that, by a comparison 
of all the crania of murderers preserved in the Anatomical Museum of this 
University, with about nearly two hundred ordinary skulls indifferently taken, 
I found that these criminals exhibited a development of the phrenological 
organs of destructiveness and other evil propensities smaller, and a develop- 
ment of the higher moral and intellectual qualities larger, than the average. 
Nay more, the same results were obtained when the murderers’ skulls were 
compared, not merely with common average, but with the individual crania of 
Robert Bruce, George Buchanan, and Dr. David Gregory.” 

Then, as to the frontal sinuses :— 

“JT omit all notice of many other decisive facts subversive of the hypothesis 
in question; but I cannot leave the subject without alluding to one, which dis- 
proves at a blow a multitude of organs, affords a significant example of the 
accuracy of phrenological statement, and shows how easily manifestation can, 
by the phrenologists, be accommodated to any development, real or sup- 
posed. I refer to the frontal sinuses. These are cavities between the tables 
of the frontal bone, in consequence of a divergence from each other. They | 
are found in all puberal crania; their extent and depth are variable, and 
wholly inappreciable from without. Fortunately, or unfortunately, the phre- 

78 


BOOK I. | THEIR RECIPROCAL INFLUENCE. [$ 80 


nologists have placed seventeen of their smallest organs over the region of the 
sinus, that is behind it. How is it possible that eye or finger can detect 
minute degrees of cerebral development beyond these invisible, unknown cavi- 
ties, of various extent? ‘The phrenologists were not acquainted with the 
anatomy of the part. Gall asserted that the sinus was often absent in men ; 
seldom or never found in women. Spurzheim declares that the frontal sinuses 
are found only in old persons, or after chronic insanity.”’ 

In reply to this, Sir W. Hamilton shows, after an inspection of several 
hundred crania, that no skull is without a sinus. 

“Behind the spacious caverns,” he then goes on to show, “‘in utter igno- 
rance of the extent, frequency, and even of the existence of this impediment, 
the phrenologists have placed not one large, but seventeen of their smallest 
organs.”’ 

‘By concentrating all their organs of the smallest size within the limits of 
the sinus, they have, in the first place, put the organs whose range of develop- 
ment is least, behind an obstacle whose range of development is greatest. 

‘In the second place, they have at once thrown one-half of their whole or- 
ganology beyond the range of possible discovery and possible proof. 

“Tn the third place, by thus evincing that their observations on that one- 
half had been only illusive fancies, they have furnished a criterion of the credit 
that may be accorded to their observations on the other half. In this, as in 
other portions of their doctrine, they have shown that manifestation and 
development are quantities, which (be they what they may), can always he 
brought to an equation. 

“Fourthly, as if determined to transcend themselves, and find ‘a lower deep 
beneath the lowest,’ they have placed the least of their least organs at the very 
point where this great obstacle is most potent. The sinus is almost always 
deepest towards the inner angle of the eyebrows, and it is just there that the 
minute organs of size, configuration, weight, resistance, &c., are said to be. 

“Tn the fifth place they have been quite as unfortunate in the location of 
the other minute organs. These they arranged in a series along the upper 
edge of the orbit, where, independently of the sinus, the bone varies more in 
thickness than in any other part of the skull. Here have they packed those 
organs more closely than peas in a pod, which they scarcely exceed in size. If 
these pretended organs actually and severally protruded from the brain (which 
they do not), if there were no sinus intervening (as there is), if they were 
under the thinnest part of the cranium (instead of the thickest), still these 
petty organs could not reveal themselves by showing any elevation, and espe- 
cially any sudden elevation of superincumbent bone. They might possibly 
indent the inner surface, and cause a slight attenuation of the bone—and this 
is all they could do. The glands of Pacchioni, as they are improperly called, 
which rise on the coronal surface of the encephalos, and are often even larger 
than the bodies in question, though they attenuate to the thinnest, never ele- 
vate in the slightest the external bony plate.”’ 

The thoroughness of the material on which Sir W. Hamilton acted, is 
shown by the fact that all the crania in the public Anatomical Museum at 
Edinburgh were inspected by him. He subsequently obtained access to fifty 

79 


§ 81] | BODY AND SOUL: [BOOK I. 


crania, with their supposed developments marked by Spurzheim’s own hand, 
which had passed to the Royal Museum of Natural History at Edinburgh. 
By a tabular view he shows that a large proportion of the supposed ‘‘organs”’ 
were covered or crowded by the frontal sinus. 

§ 81. 38d. The intermediate theory attributes to the body and the soul alike 
originative influence, in the growth of mental diseases.(/) This theory is 


(f) See a very capable sketch of these theories in Schtirmayer, Gerichtliche, Medi- 
cin, § 521, from which this analysis is taken, and see also particularly Dr. Rush’s 
examination of the same points in his treatise on the Mind, pp. 12, 13, 14, and where 
that eminent authority (p. 16) localizes madness in the bloodvessels of the brain. 

Feuchtersleben, in his celebrated work (Principles of Medical Psychology, translated 
by Evans Lloyd, printed by the Sydenham Society, London, 1847), may be considered 
as adopting the intermediate theory. Insanity, he tells us, is not either a bodily or a 
mental disease, being a disturbed reciprocal relation of mind and body. Dr. Jamieson 
(Lectures on the Med. Jur. of Insanity, by Robert Jamieson, M. D.) takes this same 
view. 

The religious aspects of the question are well discussed in the London Christian Ob- 
server, vol. 29, p. 265, and by the Rev. Dr. Jones, in ‘Man, Moral and Physical,” 
Phil. 1860. 

Sir Benjamin Brodie, in a late very interesting essay (Psychological Inquiries, &c. 
London, 1854), gives the following conclusive objections to the phrenological phase of 
the somatic theory: ‘Now there are two simple anatomical facts which the founders 
of this system have overlooked, or with which they are probably unacquainted, and 
which of themselves afford a sufficient contradiction of it. 

‘1st. They refer the mere animal propensities, chiefly to the posterior lobes, and 
the intellectual faculties to the anterior lobes of the cerebrum. But the truth is, that 
the posterior lobes exist only in the human brain, and in that of some of the tribes 
of monkeys, and are absolutely wanting in quadrupeds. Of this there is no more 
doubt than there is of any other of the best established facts in anatomy; so that, 
if phrenology be true, the marked distinction between man on one hand, and a cat, or a 
horse, or a sheep on the other, ought to be, that the former has the animal propensities 
developed to their fullest extent, and that these are deficient in the latter. 

“Odly. Birds have various propensities and faculties in common with us, and in the 
writings of phrenologists many of their illustrations are derived from this class of ver- 
tebral animals. But the structure of the bird’s brain is essentially different, not only 
from that of the human brain, but from that of the brain of all mammalia. In order 
that I may make this plain, you must excuse me if I repeat what I said on the subject 
formerly. In the mammalia the name of the corpus striatum has been given to each of 
two organs of a small size compared with that of the entire brain, distinguished by a 
peculiar disposition of the gray and the fibrous or medullary substance of which they 
are composed, and placed under the entire mass of the hemispheres of the cerebrum. 
In the bird’s brain what appears to be a superficial observer to correspond to these 
hemispheres is found on a more minute examination, to be apparently the corpora 
striata developed to an enormous size; that which really corresponds to the cerebral 
hemispheres being merely a thin layer expanded over their upper surface, and pre- 
senting no appearance of convolutions. It is plain then, that there can be no phreno- 
logical organs in the bird’s brain, corresponding to those which are said to exist in the 
human brain, or in that of other mammalia. Yet birds are as pugnacious and de- 
structive, as much attached to the localities in which they reside, as any individual 
among us.”’ 

In his interesting work on Criminal Jurisprudence, Mr. Sampson adopts the views of 
the author of the “ Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation,” and ascribes every 
criminal action to some abnormal or morbid condition of the cerebral organization. 
This fundamental proposition is, that “every manifestation of the mind depends upon 
the confirmation and health of its material instrument, the brain; and as it is not the 
function of a sound and healthy brain to give rise to any other than healthy mani- 
festations, so no error of judgment can ever arise, but as the result of a defective 
condition of that organ.” He proceeds to say :— 

“‘Mr. Hurlbut, an eminent counsellor, and one of the Supreme Judges in the State of 
New York, in his ‘ Essays on Human Rights and Political Guarantees,’ a work which 
is well worthy of perusal, promulgates the same doctrine, which on the other hand is 
very ably controverted by Dr. Hoods. —‘ Suggestions for the further provision of Crimi- 
nal Lunatics, by Charles Hood, M.D. London, 1854. pp. 126, 127.’” 

80 


BOOK I.] SOMATIC THEORY. [$ 82 


the one best sustained by modern induction, and is that which is most con- 
sistent, as will presently be seen, with the Christian standard. 

§ 82. Independently of the pathological difficulties in the way of the somatic 
theory, psychological research testifies most strongly against it.(g) The men- 
tal and moral functions are the immediate products of an independent sphere 
of organism, and not to be explained by anything lying outside of that sphere. 
The brain and the nerves have only the physical part of perception and motion, 
and to some extent the regulation of the functions, to perform; but the soul 
cannot but be considered as distinct from this activity of the nerves. The 
somatic theory, which confounds the two, will never be able to make a satisfac- 
tory distinction between palsy and imbecility, between convulsions and ravings, 
between sensuous hallucinations and insanity.(h) This theory, therefore, fails 
in affording support to any practical system of therapeutics. The general 
experience of modern times confirms the fact that medicines are of very little 
avail against mental derangements, and that the most essential results are 
attained by a strictly moral treatment, and corresponding regulation of diet 
and habits. (2) 4 

The psychological theory, at its first inception, split upon the opposite 
rock, in denying the influence of the physical processes upon mental diseases, 
in the face of experience. In opposition to the somatists, it was thought 
necessary to exclude all natural causes from the explanation of the origin of 
mental affections, and to ascribe them to an act of voluntary self-enthralment, 
which, in all cases, was to be attributed to some prior moral excess or delin- 
quency incurred with a knowledge of the consequences. But a derangement 
of mind is not identical with sin. For though every vice, every sin, is an 
abnormity of the soul, yet every abnormity of the soul is not sin. A lunatic 
may be, in a human sense, innocent of positive guilt; and, on the other hand, 
the worst of criminals may retain his sanity. It is impossible to adhere to 
this doctrine in practice, without reducing the entire treatment of the disease 
to a system of rewards and punishments; and the vagueness of the idea of 
freedom and constraint, the impossibility of distinguishing between the moral 
thraldom of the criminal and that of the sick man, will throw into confusion 
the entire system of forensic psychology.(j) It is equally wrong to derive all 
diseases of the mind from the passions, although the latter may be important 
causes, and, in the more advanced stages, symptoms of insanity.(%) At the 


(g) Siebeld, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med., Berlin, 1847, § 194; L. Krahmer, Handbuch 
der Gericht. Med., Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 126; Heinroth, Syst. der psychisch- 
gericht. Med. Leipsic, 1825; Kant, Anthropologie, Kénigsb. 1798; Metzger’s Ger. Med. 
Abhandl., Konigsb. 1803. 

(h) Lecons Cliniques sur ]’Aliénation Mentale, par Falret, lecon 1, p. 8, Paris, 1854. 

(4) The most thorough of the German advocates of the somatic theory is Friedreich, 
particularly in his: ‘ Historisch-kritische Darstellung der Theorien iiber das Wesen 
und den Sitz der psychischen Krankheiten,” Leipsic, 1836. 

(j) Etudes Medico-Psychologiques, M. Renaudin, p. 166, art. 30, Sur la responsa- 
bilité morale, Paris, 1854; Legons Cliniques de M. Falret, p. 11, discours d’ouverture, 
Paris, 1854; Manuel Complet de Médecine Légale, par J. Briand, sect. troisiéme, art. iii. 
p- 560, Paris, 1852. 

(k) Heinroth is the leading representative of the psychological theory. See his 
‘Lehrbuch der Seelenkrankheiten,” Leipsic, 1818, and his “System der psychisch- 
gerichtlichen Medicin,” Leipsic, 1825. Dr. Mayo, in his ‘‘ Medical Testimony on Lu- 
nacy,” goes some distance in the same direction; and, as has been seen, very justly 


6 81 


§ 84] PSYCHOLOGICAL THEORY. [BOOK I. 


same time, as will hereafter be more fully shown,(/%) there is in the mass of 
cases of insane convicts such an amount of responsibility as to require the 
infliction of a degree of punishment which, though different from that imposed 
on the sane, will yet be accompanied with a corrective as well as a preventive 
discipline. 

§ 83. The intermediate theory is that to which the soundest psychologists 
now tend. “In the first place,” says Sir William Hamilton, ‘there is no good 
eround to suppose that the mind is situated solely in the brain, or exclusively 
in any one part of the body. On the contrary, the supposition that it is really 
present wherever we are conscious that it acts—in a word, the Peripatetic 
aphorism, the soul is all in the whole and all in every part—is more philo- 
sophical, and consequently more probable, than any other opinion. It has not 
been always noticed, even by those who deem themselves the chosen champions 
of the immortality of the soul, that we materialize mind when we attribute to 
it the relations of matter. Thus, we cannot attribute a local seat to the soul 
without clothing it with the properties of extension and place, and those who 
suppose this seat to be but a point only aggravate the difficulty. Admitting 
the spirituality of mind, all that we know of the relation of soul and body is 
that the former is connected with the latter in a way of which we are wholly 
ignorant; and that it holds relations, different both in degree and kind, with 
different parts of the organism. We have no right, however, to say that it is 
limited to any one part of the organism; for even if we admit that the nervous 
system is the one to which it is proximately united, still the nervous system is . 
itself universally ramified throughout the body; and we have no more right 
to deny that the mind feels at the finger-points, as consciousness assures us, 
than to assert that it thinks exclusively in the brain. The sum of our know- 
ledge of the connection of mind and body is, therefore, this: that the mental 
modifications are dependent on certain corporeal conditions; but of the nature 
of these conditions we know nothing. For example, we know, by experience, 
that the mind perceives only through certain organs of sense, and that through 
these different organs it perceives in a different manner. But whether the 
senses be instruments, whether they be media, or whether they be only partial 
outlets to the mind incarcerated in the body, on all this we can only theorize 
and conjecture.’’ (7) 

§ 84. ‘The intermediate theory has at least not been rejected by standard 
Christian theologians. ‘‘The resurrection,” says Bishop PEARSON, “is not 
only in itself possible, so that no man with any reason can absolutely deny it, 
but it.is also upon many considerations highly probable, so that all men may 
very rationally expect it. If we consider the principles of humanity, the parts 
of which. we all consist, we cannot conceive this present life to be proportion- 
able to our composition. The souls of men, as they are immaterial, so they 
are immortal ; and being once created by the Father of spirits, they receive a 
subsistence for eternity; the body is framed by the same God to be a com- 


argues in favor of a discrimination of punishment between the malicious and the ~ 
unconscious insane criminal. Mayo, &c., 50, 51. 

(kk) Post, §§ 259-276. 

(/) Sir William Hamilton’s Lectures on Metaphysics, p. 356. 


82 


BOOK I, | CONNECTION BETWEEN BODY AND SOUL. [§ 84 


panion for his spirit, and a man born into the world consisteth of these two. 
Now, the life of the most aged person is but short, and many far ignobler 
creatures of a longer duration. Some of the fowls of the air, several of the 
fishes of the sea, many of the beasts of the field, divers of the plants of the 
earth, are of a more durable constitution and outlive the sons of men. And 
can we think that such material and mortal, that such inunderstanding souls, 
should by God and nature be furnished with bodies of so long permansion, 
and that our spirits should be joined unto flesh so subject to corruption, so 
suddenly dissolvable, were it not that they lived but once, and so enjoyed that 
life for a longer season, and then went soul and body to the same destruction, 
never to be restored to the same subsistence? But when the soul of man, 
which is immortal, is forced from its body in a shorter time, nor can by any 
means continue with it half the years which many other creatures live, it is 
because this is not the only life belonging to the sons of men, and so the soul 
may at a shorter warning leave the body which it shall resume again.’’(m) 

To this may be added the authority of Isaac Taylor, who, in his “‘ Physical 
Theory of another Life,’’ after pointing out how completely the question 
whether the human soul is ever actually or entirely separated from matter 
is passed over by St. Paul, as an inquiry altogether irrelevant to religion, 
continues: ‘Let it be then distinctly kept in view that although the essential 
independence of mind and matter, or the abstract possibility of the former 
existing apart from corporeal life, may well be considered as tacitly implied in 
the Christian’s scheme, yet that an actual incorporeal state of the human soul, 
at any period of its course, is not involved in the principles of our faith any 
more than is explicitly asserted. This doctrine concerning what is called the 
immortality of the soul should ever be treated simply as a philosophical specu- 
lation, and as unimportant to our Christian profession.’’(7) 

“We are unable,” says Pascal, “to conceive what is mind; we are unable 
to perceive what is matter; still less are we able to conceive how these are 
united; yet this is our proper nature.”’ 

“Such,” says President Edwards, the first metaphysician of his country, 
and perhaps the first of his age, ‘‘seems to be our nature, and such the laws 
of the union of soul and body, that there never is, in any case whatsoever, 
any lively and vigorous exercise of the will or inclination of the soul without 
some effect upon the body in some alteration of the motion of its fluids, and 
especially of the animal spirits. And, on the other hand, from the same laws 
of the union of the soul and body, the constitution of the body and the motion 
of its fluids may promote the exercise of the affections, but yet it is not the 
body but the mind only that is the proper seat of the affections. The body of 
man is no more capable of being really the subject of love or hatred, joy or 
sorrow, fear or hope, than the body of a tree, or than the same body of man 
is capable of thinking and understanding. As it is the soul only that has 
ideas, so it is the soul only that is pleased or displeased with its ideas. As it 
is the soul only that thinks, so it is the soul only that loves or hates, rejoices 


(m) Pearson on the Creed, ed. 1853, p. 558. 
(n) Carpenter, Mind and Matter, by J. G. Millingen, M. D., M. A., pp. 128, 129, 130. 


83 


§ 85] WHEN INSANITY IS RESPONSIBLE, [BOOK I. 


or is grieved at what it thinks of. Nor are these motions of the animal spirits 
and fluids of the body anything properly belonging to the nature of the affec- 
tions, though they always accompany them in the present state, but are only 
effects or concomitants of the affections that are entirely distinct from the affec- 
tions themselves, and no way essential to them; so that an unbodied spirit 
may be as capable of love and hatred, joy or sorrow, hope or fear, or other 
affections, as one is that is united to a body.’’(0) 

§ 85. Effect of intermediate theory on insane responsibility.—The inter- 
mediate theory, as above stated, relieves the doctrine of criminal responsibility 
of some of its chief difficulties. If the somatic theory be correct, then a 
criminal propensity is a physical malformation, for which the defendant is no 
more responsible than he is for a malformation of the limbs. A squint in 
morals, to carry out a metaphor of Chief Justice Greson, is no more a fault 
than a squint of the eyes. Such a criminal may be prevented from future 
misconduct. But neither punitive nor reformatory discipline can be applied 
to him; the first because it is unjust, the second because it is hopeless. | 

On the other hand, if the psychological theory be correct, insanity, by be- 
coming an organic intellectual lesion, is as much withdrawn from the causal 
power of the will as it is on the somatic basis. It cannot be reached by penal 
discipline, for by the very hypothesis on which it is framed it rises above the 
action of the nervous and corporeal system. It cannot be reformed by bodily 
correction; and to attempt, therefore, by such correction to reach it, would be 
both unjust and nugatory. 

The intermediate theory, however, teaches us that insanity (with the excep- 
tion of idiocy and certain hereditary and organic types) is (1) in a large mea- 
sure the result of nervous and physical causes, often voluntarily induced, partly 
by the negligence and partly by the misconduct of the patient himself; and (2) 
that in such cases, by being made the subject of penal discipline, it may often 
be prevented or restrained. The remaining difficulty is to determine what are 
the cases to which such penal discipline is applicable. And here the analogies 
of the common law give us a safe test. Where mania-d-potu results from 
drink, the party becomes irresponsible. Where, however, he commits a crime 
in a drunken fit, this drunkenness avails him nothing, unless to relieve him 
from the implication of premeditated malice or complex fraud. Thus, when 
the fatal assault is conceived by a party when intoxicated, he is not presumed 
to act with that premeditation or that specific intention to take life which is 
necessary to subject him to capital punishment. So it is in insanity. Mania, 
when a permanent disorder of the intellect, by incapacitating the party from 
reasoning on the particular issue, relieves him from criminal responsibility. 
But a mere monomania, unaccompanied by intellectual lesion, cannot, for 
penal purposes, be considered else than voluntary passion. It may be in- 
voked to lower the grade from murder in the first to murder in the second 
degree, by depriving the intent of that coolness and speciality necessary to 
make up the former offence. But it can never be the basis of an acquittal 
on the ground of irresponsibility. 


(0) Edwards on Religious Affections, p. 15. 
84 


BOOK I.] BY WHOM ALLEGED LUNATICS ARE TO BE EXAMINED. [§ 87 


Il. How MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IS TO BE DETECTED. 


Ist. By whom. § 86. 
2d. At what Time. § 96. 
(1.) Time of act.- § 95. 
(2.) At trial. § 97. 
(3.) At and after sentence. § 98. 
3d. By what Tests. § 100. 
(1.) Physiognomy. § 100. 
(2.) Bodily health and temperament. § 102. 
(3.) Hereditary tendency. § 107. 
(4.) Conversation and deportment. § 110. 
(5.) Nature of act. § 112. 
(a.) Its insensibility. § 112. 
(b.) Its incongruity with antecedents. § 113. 
(c.) Its motivelessness. § 114. 
(d.) Its inconsequentiality. § 115. 


Ist. By whom. 


§ 86. It has already been stated that the experience of medical experts, like 
that of experts in all other branches of science,(r) is part of the common law 
of the land. The illustrations of this principle are very numerous. Thus, if 
a question involving shipbuilding is the subject of judicial investigations, the 
testimony of a shipwright as to the meaning of terms of art, as well as to the 
general laws of the craft, enters into the basis upon which the case is tried. 
And if there has been any difficulty in the reception of the result of medical 
experience, when insanity is at issue, it has arisen from that occasional conflict 
of opinion among medical witnesses which the highest professional authorities 
have so frequently united in deploring.(s) 

§ 87. “Certain recent actions at law in this country,’ says Dr. Hartshorne, 
‘“‘in which heavy damages have been incurred by parties charged with arrest- 
ing and detaining an alleged lunatic against the will and interests of the 
latter, have led to greater circumspection, not only among the friends of 
lunatics, in the procurement of proper medical certificates and other forms 
required for the admission of insane patients into hospitals, but among the 


(r) “C’est aux lumiéres et & la probité des médécins que doit étre exclusivement 
réservé le droit de juger chaque espéce de aliénation mentale, et de donner aux tribu- 
naux les seuls élémens sur lesquels puissent étre raisonnablement fondés des jugemens 
équitables.”—Méd. Léq., M. Orfila, tome i. p. 360. Paris, 1848. 

(s) Lettsomian Lectures on Insanity, by Forbes Winslow, M. D., D.C. L., late Presi- 
dent of the Medical Society of London, &c.; London, John Churchill, New Burlington 
Street. Medical Testimony and Evidence in Cases of Lunacy, being the Croonian Lec- 
tures delivered before the Royal College of Physicians in 1853, with an essay on the 
conditions of mental soundness, by Thomas Mayo, M. D., F.R.8.; London, John W. 
Parker & Son, West Strand, 1854. Marc, Die Geisteskrankheiten, in Beziehung auf 
die Rechtspflege, i.p. 8. And see also particularly Mittermaier’s late very interesting 
essay, ‘Die Stellung und Wirksamkeit der Sachverstiindigen in Strafverfahren,” in 
“Archiv fiir Preussisches Strafrecht,” Berlin, 1853. 


85 


$ 88] EXAMINATION OF ALLEGED LUNATICS. [BOOK I. 


medical advisers in the preliminary examinations of the patients, and the fill- 
ing up of their certificates. The principal hospitals for the insane of the 
’ United States, have printed forms and obligations, which are furnished to the 
friends of patients to be filled up and signed according to the law of the State 
and the rules of the hospital. The form of the medical certificate generally 
requires the patient to have been seen and examined by the physician signing, 
on the day on which the certificate is dated. In all cases the certificate is 
expected to apply only to the actual condition of the patient at the time of 
signing, and to be used without delay in order to be available. -The medical 
certificate must always be accompanied by a formal application for admission 
of the patient, signed by a responsible guardian, near relative, or friend. 
These papers have also annexed to them a series of questions relating to the 
past history and existing condition of the patient, the peculiar symptoms of 
the case, and the probable cause of the attack; which questions are to be 
answered by the friends and relatives, and the attending physician. Some 
hospitals require the signature of two physicians to the medical certificate, 
neither of them, of course, being connected with the hospitals applied to. 
The State Lunatic Hospital of New Jersey requires the medical certificate to 
be formally deposed to by two physicians before a magistrate. Patients 
sometimes obtain their discharge on a writ of habeas corpus, by proving their 
apparent fitness to be at large, but are generally removed by friends or dis- 
charged when sufficiently recovered, at the discretion of the superintendent. 
We are not aware of any legal restriction in this country on the liberation 
of insane patients, except in cases of homicidal or otherwise dangerous luna- 
tics, who have been confined by order of a magistrate, or by a court of law. 
Such patients can only be released by an authority similar to that which 
first committed them. There are patients of this class now in durance at 
the Eastern State Penitentiary of Pennsylvania, and in different State Asy- 
lums.’’(7/) 

§ 88. It is well to keep in mind the suggestions of Hoffbauer in regard to 
the importance of an adaptation, by the inspecting physicians, of his own 
method of examination to the character of the subject. The uneducated and 
the réfined, the bashful, timid, and retiring, and the cunning, insolent, and 
hardened, the eccentric, the victim of fixed ideas, and the lunatic, each requires 
a different style of treatment. The physician must work into the heart of the 
ignorant man by reference to objects palpable to the sense, and must address 
the man of education in the spirit which animates him. He must approach 
the bashful, the timid, and the morose with cordiality and affability, and exer- 
cise practical tact, cireumspection, and adroitness, in conversing with the cun- 
ning, the hardened, and the insolent, impressing them with respect for his 
personal and mental qualifications. On the whole, the tone of the subject 
must regulate the tone of the examiner. But where one style of treatment is 
found of no avail, recourse may be had to the opposite one. Where the patient 
sits immovable as a statue, without answering any question addressed him, 


(y) Taylor’s Med. Jurisprudence, by Hartshorne, Phil. 1853, 556, 562. 
86 


BOOK I.] BY WHOM TO BE CONDUCTED. [$ 91 


which often occurs in cases of deeply-seated melancholy, further questions 
should not be asked, but observation alone resorted to.(z) 

§ 89. That a man is of sound mind, will generally be sufficiently manifest 
to a prosecuting officer of discretion; but whether a man is really, or only 
apparently deranged, is a question which cannot be decided with the certainty 
belonging to science except by a physician; nor is it possible, without a 
thorough knowledge of psychological medicine, to pronounce upon the influ- 
ence exercised by specific forms of disease upon given actions. (a) 

§ 90. It should not be forgotten, however, that it is of much importance in 
the diagnosis of insanity, that the proper legal and medical functionaries 
should act <2 common. Written explanations are here of much less value 
than oral intercourse, where a few words will often suffice to remove a difficulty, 
to correct an error, or to supply an omission. In visiting a deranged culprit 
for this purpose, the prosecuting officer should always invite the physician to 
accompany him. ‘They may then alternately converse with the accused, 
whereby both the morbid and criminal peculiarities of the subject will be 
clearly unfolded to them both. It is well established that a man of unsound 
mind will act very differently, according as he views the persons before whom 
he stands with fear, respect, or confidence. It is sometimes advisable to invite 
the physician’s attendance at an official hearing, where, under the semblance 
of a mere occasional and unofficial companion, he may make a diagnosis the 
more accurate because unsuspected. 

§ 91. It is not to be denied that a lay observer, or an unassisted judge or 
jury, may be able to distinguish a case of fully developed and clearly manifested 
insanity ; but, aside from the necessity of a knowledge of all the particular re- 
lations existing between a given state of disease and a given act, there can be 
no proper foundation for the infliction of punishment in any case, where the 
judgment of which it is the execution is not based on the greatest attainable 
amount of certainty. But this certainty can be no other than that which 
bears the seal of technical science. Nor will a juryman, if properly tender of 
his conscience and of public opinion, base his verdict upon other evidence than 
that of those best able from long training and close attention, to understand 
the features of the case. In some cases the difference between a scientific, or 
technical, opinion, and that of a layman, is not so much in the results attained, 
as in the guarantee afforded by the superior attainments and more minute ex- 
pertness of the man of science. The declaration of such a man is insured 
against the possibility of error to the full extent of the protection of science in 
its present stage of development. Pro foro this degree of certainty is suffi- 
cient, because it is the highest attainable; but the same cannot be said of any 
other.(b) 


(z) J. H. Hoffbauer, Die psychischen Krankheiten in Bezug auf die Rechtspflege, 
Berlin, 31. 

(a) Notwithstanding Regnault’s elaborate disquisition, ‘‘ Du degré de competence 
des Médécins dans les questions judicaires relatives aux alienations mentales,” Xc., 
Paris, 1828, and notwithstanding the occasional contemptuous remarks of Nisi Prius 

judges in the hurry and irritation of trial, this position is recognized, as has already 
’ been seen, by the uniform practice as well as the recognized theory of the law. See 
ante, § 45, n. See also Marc, die Geisteskrankheiten in Beziehung auf die Rechtspflege, 
vol. i. 98. (6) Schtirmayer, § 512. 

87 


§ 94] MEDICAL WITNESSES. [BOOK I. 


§ 92. The American authorities falling under this head may be considered 
as establishing the following points :— 

§ 93. (a.) Professional men, experts in psychological medicine, who have 
personally examined the party, may be asked whether he was insane or not.(c) 
Such, in fact, has been the uniform and undisputed course in practice in all 
cases where medical testimony is taken on this point. The English rule is 
equally definite. (d) 

§ 94. (b.) Even though the witness has not had the opportunity of personal 
inspection, he may be asked for his opinion on an assumed state of facts, or, 
in several of the States, upon the evidence given on trial, if he heard all of it, 
viewing it as a case stated.(e) In Massachusetts and New York, however, this 
position is limited, and there, as well as in England, the settled opinion now 
seems to be that medical witnesses can only be asked their opinion on the whole 
case when the facts are admitted, or not disputed; but that when there is a 
conflict as to testimony, such a question cannot be put; these courts holding, at 
the same time, the right to ask their opinion on a supposed state of facts.(/) 
But, however ascertained, medical opinion enters into the merits of the case. 
It has been already shown that the common law consists of the wisdom of the 
particular age applied to the exigencies of the particular case; and in this 
sense it includes not only the decisions of the courts, but the opinions of ex- 
perts on the particular branches to which their attention has been devoted. (q) 
Thus the evidence of persons acquainted with navigation is admissible upon 
the facts as developed in evidence in cases of collision,(h) or loss from alleged 
unseaworthiness ;(7) of persons conversant with handwriting, as to whether a 


(c) Com. v. Rogers, 7 Metc. 500; M’Allister v. State, 17 Alab. 434; Clark v. State, 
12 Ohio, 483. 

(d) R. v. Searle, 1 Mood. & Rob. 75; R. v. Offord, 5 C. & P. 168. See a learned note 
on this point in 7 Bost. Law Rep. 692. M. Briand (Méd. Lég. 552, Paris, 1852) says: 
“Appelés a faire un rapport sur l’état moral d’un prevenu ou d’un accusé, les médecins 
ne s’immiscent point alors dans les fonctions des juges ou des jurées, mais ils eclairent 
la conscience des uns et des autres.”? See also Manuel de Méd. Leg. de M. Orfila, t. i. 
399, Paris, 1848. In Elwell’s Malpractice and Medical Evidence, chapters 18 and 19, 
this topic is ably treated. 

(e) See Com. v. Rogers, 7 Metc. 500; People v. Lake, 2 Kernan (N. Y.), 358; People 
v. Thurston, 2 Parker, C. R. 49; Negro Jerry v. Townshend, 9 Md. 145; M’Allister v. 
State, 17 Alab. 434; Clark v. State, 12 Ohio, 483; Com. ». Wood, MSS. Phil. 1836 ; 
Com. v. Mosler, MSS. Phil. 1845. 

(/) In New York, a medical witness who had been present during a trial for murder 
was asked by the defendant what, in his opinion, on the facts stated, was the state of 
the defendant’s mind on the night of the killing. The court excluded the evidence. 
But the defendant was allowed to ask what the opinion of the witness was on a sup- 
posed case corresponding to the testimony; and held, further, that the testimony might 
be read to him, and his opinion asked, supposing that state of affairs to exist. Held, 
that here was no ground for exception. People v. McCann, 3 Parker, C. R. (N. Y.) 
272. This seems now to be the opinion of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, Wood- 
bury v. Goodyear, 7 Gray, 467; and of the U. S. Circuit Court in that State, U. S. v. 
McGlue, 1 Curtis, 1. See the restriction of medical witnesses to hypothetical cases 
attacked in the Boston Law Reporter for July, 1859, and defended in Elwell’s Malprac- 
tice and Medical Evidence, p. 310. The English cases to the point in the text are R. 
v. Wright, R. & R. 451; R. v. Frances, 4 Cox, C. C. 57; Opinion of Judges, post, n. (r); 
though see contra, R. v. Searle, 1 Mood. & Rob. 75; R. v. Offord, 5 C. & P. 168. 

(g) See on this point ante, § 45, n. 

(h) Malton v. Nesbit, 1 C. & P. 70; Fenwick v. Bell, 1 C. & K. 312; Thornton »v. 
Royal Exch. Co., Peak, 25. 

(2) Beckwith v. Sydebotham, 1 Camp. 116. # 


88 


BOOK I.] ADMISSIBILITY OF MEDICAL TESTIMONY. [$ 94 


paper was forged ;(j) of seal engravers, as to the genuineness of an impres- 
sion ;(/) of artists, as to whether a picture is an original or a copy ;(l) of 
postmasters, as to the genuineness of a post mark ;(m) of scientific engineers, 
as to the effect of an embankment on a harbor ;(n) of practical surveyors, as 
to whether certain marks were intended as boundaries or terriors ;(0) and of 
naturalists, as to whether the habits of certain fish were such as to enable them 
to overcome certain obstructions in a river.(p) And so nothing is more com- 
mon than to examine a surgeon as to whether death resulted from natural 
causes, or from certain artificial agencies which may be the subject of in- 
quiry.(q) On this principle the opinion of medical men as to whether par- 
ticular symptoms, supposing them to exist, constitute insanity, is part of the 
law of the case. It should be observed, however, as the cases in the note show, 
that the witness is not to be asked whether the evidence shows that the patient 
was insane—for that, indeed, would be taking the jury’s place—but whether, 
if a certain state of facts be true, the inference of insanity would result there- 
from. (7) 


(j) Revett v. Braham, 4 T. R. 497; Hammond’s Case, 2 Greenl. 33; Moody v. Rowell, 
17 Pick. 490; Com. v. Carey, 2 Pick. 47; Lyon v. Lyman, 9 Conn. 55; Hubley v. Van- 
horne, 78. & R. 185; Lodge v. Phipher, 11 8. & R. 333. 


(k) Folkes v. Chadd, 3 Dougl. 157. (1) Ibid. 
(m) Abbey v. Lill, 5 Bing. 299. (n) Folkes v. Chadd, 3 Dougl. 157. 
(0) Davis v. Mason, 4 Pick. 156. (p) Cottrill v. Mason, 3 Fairf. 222. 


(q) See cases quoted in Wharton on Homicide, 241-4; and see also 1 Stark. Ev. 154; 
Phil. and Am. on Ey. 899; 1 Green. on Ev. § 440. 

(r) See 3 Greenlf. on Ev. § 5. In answer to an inquiry of the House of Lords, whe- 
ther ‘‘a medical man, conversant with the disease of insanity, who never saw the 
prisoner previously to the trial, but who was present during the whole trial and the 
examination of all the witnesses, can be asked his opinion as to the state of the pri- 
soner’s mind at the time of the commission of the alleged crime, or his opinion whether 
the prisoner was conscious at the time of doing the act that he was acting contrary to 
law, or whether he was laboring under any and what delusion at the time,” the English 
judges replied: ‘‘We think the medical man, under the circumstances supposed, can-: 
not in strictness be asked his opinion in the terms above stated, because each of those 
questions involves the determination of the truth of the facts deposed to, which it is 
for the jury to decide, and the questions are not mere questions upon a matter of 
science, in which case such evidence is admissible. But when the facts are admitted, 
or not disputed, and the question becomes substantially one of science only, it may 
be convenient to allow the question to be put in that general form, though the same 
cannot be insisted on as a matter of right.” 

In this country, as has been seen, the stricter practice, when medical men are exa- 
mined as experts, is to ask their opinion as to a hypothetical state of facts. Ante, note 
(e). If they happen to have been present during the whole trial, they may be asked 
their opinion as to the particular facts, supposing them to be true; but the deter- 
mination of the truth or falsity of the evidence itself should be reserved exclusively 
for the jury. 

“The opinions of professional men on a question of this description,” says Chief 
Justice Shaw, “‘are competent evidence, and in many cases are entitled to great con- 
sideration and respect. The rule of law, on which this proof of the opinion of witnesses, 
who know nothing of the actual facts of the case, is founded, is not peculiar to medical 
testimony, but is a general rule, applicable to all cases, where the question is one de- 
pending on skill and science in any particular department. In general, it is the 
opinion of the jury which is to govern, and this is to be formed upon the proof of 
facts laid before them. But some questions lie beyond the scope of the observation 
and experience of men in general, but are quite within the observation and experience 
of those whose peculiar pursuits and profession have brought that class of facts fre- 
quently and habitually under their consideration. Shipmasters and seamen have 
peculiar means of acquiring knowledge and experience in whatever relates to seaman- 
ship and nautical skill. When, therefore, a question arises in a court of justice upon 
that subject, and certain facts are proved by other witnesses, a shipmaster may be 


89 


§ 94] EXAMINATIONS OF ALLEGED LUNATICS. [BOOK I, 


(c.) The better opinion has been that witnesses, who are not experts, who 
have for a given time had the opportunity of observing the patient, may be 
asked their opinion as to his sanity.(s) Such witnesses cannot, of course, be 


asked his cpinion as to the character of such facts. The same is true in regard to any 


question of science, because persons conversant with such science have peculiar means, 


from a larger and more exact observation, and long experience in such department of 
science, of drawing correct inferences from certain facts, either observed by themselves 
or testified to by other witnesses. A familiar instance of the application of this prin- 
ciple occurs very often in cases of homicide, when, upon certain facts being testified 
to by other witnesses, medical persons are asked whether in their opinion a particular 
wound described would be an adequate cause, or whether such wound was, in their 
opinion, the actual cause of death, in the particular case. Such question is commonly 
asked without objection; and the judicial proof of the fact of killing often depends 
wholly or mainly upon such testing of opinion. It is upon this ground that the opinion 
of witnesses who have long been conversant with insanity in its various forms, and 
who have had the care and superintendence of insane persons, are received as compe- 
tent evidence, even though they have not had opportunity to examine the particular 
patient, and observe the symptoms and indications of disease at the time of its sup- 
posed existence. It is designed to aid the judgment of the jury in regard to the 
influence and effect of certain facts which lie out of the observation and experience 
of persons in general. And such opinions, when they come from persons of great 
experience, and in whose correctness and sobriety of judgment just confidence can be 
had, are of great weight, and deserve the respectful consideration of a jury. But the 
opinion of a medical man of small experience, or of one who has crude and visionary 
notions, or who has some favorite theory to support, is entitled to very little consider- 
ation. The value of such testimony will depend mainly upon the experience, fidelity, 
and impartiality of the witness who gives it. 

“One caution in regard to this point it is proper to give. Even where the medical or 
other professional witnesses have attended the whole trial, and heard the testimony of 
the other witnesses as to the facts and circumstances of the case, they are not to judge 
of the credit of the witnesses, or of the truth of the facts testified to by others. It is: 
for the jury to decide whether such facts are satisfactorily proved. And the proper 
question to be put to the professional witnesses is this: If the symptoms and indica- 
tions testified to by the other witnesses are proved, and if the jury are satisfied of the 
truth of them, whether in their opinion the party was insane, and what was the nature 
and character of that insanity; what state of mind did they indicate; and what they 
would expect would be the conduct of such a person in any supposed circumstances.” 
See 1 M. & Rob. 75; Com. v. Rodgers, 7 Metc. 5; Elwell’s Malpractice and Medical 
Evidence, p. 310. 

On atrial for murder a medical witness testified that he saw defendant on the evening 
of the day after the killing, conversed with him, and then thought him deranged ; that 
he thought the insanity was delirium tremens; that he knew defendant’s habits of 
drinking, and supposed drinking to be the cause of his insanity; that he had been 
present and heard all the evidence. The witness then stated, under objection, how 
long he thought defendant had been in this state of delirium, but was not allowed to 
state whether, in his opinion, he was in this state on the night of the alleged killing. 
It was held that this was no error. People v. McCaun, 3 Parker, C. R. (N. Y.) 272. 

(s) Clary v. Clary, 2 Iredell, 78; Clark v. State, 13 Ohio, 483; Grant v. Thompson, - 
4 Connec. 203; Harrison v. Rowan, 3 Wash. C. R. 580; Rambler v. Tryon, 75. & R. 
90; Wogan v. Small, 11 8. & R. 141; Morse v. Crawford, 17 Vt. 499; Lester v. Pitts- 
ford, 7 Vt. 158; Gibson v. Gibson, 9 Yerger, 329; Potts v. House, 6 Georg. 324; Colver 
v. Haslam, 7 Barbour, 374, which case, however, was recorded in Dewitt v. Barley, 5 
Selden, 371; Baldwin v. State, 12 Missouri, 223; De Whitt v. Barley, 13 Barbour, 550; 
Kinne v. Kinne, 9 Conn. 102; Norris v. State, 16 Alab. 776; Wheeler v. Wheeler, 3 
Hagg. 574; and see 7 Bost. Law Rep. (N. 8.) 696, where these cases are cited. 

The opinions of witnesses, not medical men, or experts, and not the subscribing wit- 
nesses to a will, cannot be given on the question of the sanity of the testator. [Dewio, 
WILLARD, and Moors, JJ., dissenting.] Dewitt v. Barley, 5 Selden (N. Y.), 371. It 
is said, however, that the opinion of a witness, acquainted with the person whose capa- 
city is in question, and founded on his own observation, is admissible on the question 
of sanity or insanity ; certainly if the facts on which his opinion rests are also stated. 
[Per Denio, J.] Dewitt v. Barley, 5 Selden (N. Y.) 371. 

In Maryland, a witness familiar with the grantor in a deed for a long time, both” 
before and after its execution, may, after testifying to the grantor’s state of mind before 
its execution, be further examined as to acts of insanity subsequent to that period. 
Negro Jerry v. Townshend, 9 Md. 145. 

90 


BOOK 1.] MEDICAL EXAMINATIONS. [$ 96 


examined as to their opinions on a case stated, or on the facts developed in 
the case on trial, but only as to the results of their personal observation, just 
in the same way that a man ploughing on the shore can be examined as to 
the fact of a ship striking a shoal before him, when he could not be admitted 
to prove the cause of the disaster. And, on this principle, it was long held 
admissible to ask subscribing witnesses as to their opinion of the testator’s 
sanity at the time of the execution of the will.(¢) Lately, however, there has 
been a disposition to restrict this rule to subscribing witnesses. (a) 

(d.) Books on insanity, and, in fact, scientific books or papers generally, are 
inadmissible as evidence to the jury.(b) Nor can they be read by counsel 
in their speeches to the jury, unless by consent.(c) It has been said in Iowa, 
however, that a physician can read in his testimony “the views and opinions 
of distinguished writers,’’(d) and in England it would seem that a physician 
may be asked as to the grounds of his judgment, “which may be, in some > 
degree, founded on books as a part of his general knowledge.’’(e) In those 
States where the jury are, by the Constitution, judges of the law as well as of 
the fact, such books may, perhaps, be read in addressing the jury as part of 
the law of the case. 


9d. At what time examinations should be made. 


§ 95. There are three different times in which the conduct of the accused 
may become the subject of a forensico-psychological investigation: 1, at the 
commission of the deed; 2, during the trial; and 3, after sentence pronounced. 
At each of these periods, the judge has a separate point of view from which 
to regard the state of mind of the defendant, in each the purpose of the inquiry 
is different, and in each the interrogations to be directed to the physician must 
be modified accordingly. (w) 

§ 96. In regard to the first point, the questions to be asked the physician 
_ should be, in general, whether a diseased mental state attended the commission 
of the act, wherein the disease consisted, and whether the mental and moral 
functions exercised and implicated in the perpetration, were of such a nature 
that either a, there was no consciousness of criminality and no freedom of 
volition, or b, the possibility of such consciousness and spontaneity was ex- 
cluded, or c, both the one and the other were incapable of ascertainment, and 
must be left in doubt. The practice which has lately grown up, of interrogating 
as to a conclusion of law (e. g. was the defendant capable of distinguishing 
right from wrong, or was hea free agent), instead of as to a state of facts (e. g. 


— 


(t) Chase v. Lincoln, 3 Mass. 237; Poole v. Richardson, ib. 330; Rambler v. Tryon, 
78. & R. 90; Buckminster v. Perry, 4 Mass. 593; Grant v. Thompson, 4 Conn. 203; 
Sheafe v. Rowe, 2 Lees R. 415; Wogan v. Small, 118. & R. 141. 

(a) Com. v. Wilson, 1 Gray, 337; Cocks ». Purdy, 2C. & K. 270; Dewitt v. Barley, 
5 Selden, 371. 

°(b) Com. v. Wilson, 1 Gray, 338 ; Collier v. Simpson, 5 C. & P. 73; Cocks v. Purdy, 
2C. & K. 270; Gehrke v. State, 13 Texas, 568 ; Carter v. State, 2 Carter, 617, 

(c) Boston Law Reporter, May, 1854, p. 9. 

(d) Bowman v. Woods, 1 Iowa R. 441. 

(e) Collier v. Simpson, 5 C. & P. 73. 

(u) See Schiirmayer, § 516, from whence this head is generally drawn. 


91 


§$ 100] WHEN AND HOW TO BE MADE. [BOOK I. 


was he laboring under mental disease, and if so, what), is not only false in 
theory, but pernicious in result. 

-§ 97. The second period of time becomes of particular interest in our Ameri- 
can Jurisprudence, from the fact that when a party alleged to be insane is put 
on his trial, if insanity be pleaded, the jury are specially sworn to determine 
the preliminary issue whether the defendant be insane ai the time of trial. If 
the fact be found in his favor, he is confined under special sanctions. If other- 
wise, the trial proceeds on the main issue. 

§ 98. The third period of time, at which the state of a culprit’s mind is 
open to medical investigation, is after the close of the trial, and before the 
execution of the sentence. A man of unsound mind is incapable of under- 
standing the justice of his sentence, or of recognizing a punishment in the 
~ evil inflicted upon him. In many cases also the evil will aggravate his dis- 
ease. For all these reasons it is necessary to be certain that a convict is so 
far in the possession of all his faculties, that the object of the law in subjecting 
him to punishment will be answered. ‘The interrogations to be submitted to 
the physician are to be framed upon this simple principle ; and it is self-evident 
that only such derangements will here come in question as are clearly mani- 
fest, and as clearly exclude the possibility of the prisoner’s understanding the 
reason of his punishment. 

§ 99. It would be a proper regulation to cause every convict, before under- 
going his punishment, to be examined in body and mind by the physician, for 
the purpose of ascertaining his capacity for the ordeal. Even where the - 
general fitness of the subject is undoubted, there are frequently personal defects 
which require attention in the treatment of the prisoner during confinement. 
In several of the German States this precaution is observed—where a convict 
is found to be insane, he must be subjected to the proper treatment. If a cure 
is effected, the question whether he is now able to sustain the punishment 
without danger of relapse or other injury, is to be decided by the forensic 
physician, upon a careful investigation of all the symptoms and attendant 
circumstances. 


3d. By what Tests. 
(1.) Phystognomy.(v) 


§ 100. The general questions in relation to feigned insanity are noticed 
under a subsequent head. (vv) 

“Close attention,” says Schiirmayer,(w) “should be first directed to the 
entire exterior of the subject, his posture, his motions, his gestures, his eye, 


(v) The features of the face, says Falret, change at each instant or constantly pre- 
serve the same expression ; the lips, the cheeks, the nostrils, the eyebrows, the eyelids, 
frequently show convulsive movement; it is the same with regard to the muscles of 
the eye, and under the influence of these convulsions, the look is troubled, bewildered 
and unsteady. Legons Cliniques sur ]’Alienation Mentale, M. Falret, huitiéme lecon, 
p. 219. Paris, 1854; see also Orfila, Med. Leg. i. p. 379. Paris, 1848. 

(vv) Post, § 127. 

(w) Gerichtliche Medicin, § 529. 

92 


BOOK I.] TESTS OF INSANITY—PAYSIOGNOMY. [$ 101 


his words, his intonation, and above all the first impression produced upon his 
mind by the appearance of the physician. What most distinctly characterizes 
a mental disease, and is never misunderstood by a skilful physician, is the 
physiognomy of such a patient. The eye of a madman is the mirror of his 
soul. He lacks the calm unobstructed gaze peculiar to the sane, untouched 
by passion or excitement.”? ‘‘Look,’’ says Heinroth,(#) “upon the cunning 
leer of a lunatic, the savage glare of a maniac, the lack-lustre eyes of a 
splenetic, or the meaningless stare of an imbecile; such things cannot be 
counterfeited.” (y) 

The form of the skull is often peculiar in every description of mental disease, 
but is particularly noticeable in the case of Cretins and natural fools. 

§ 101. The expressions of the eye(z) and of the nose(a) have been very 
capably exhibited by two eminent physiognomists. The latter feature has 
been examined with peculiar ability by Hoefling.(b) “In the apparently 
joyous countenance of a laughing madman,”’ he tells us, “the upward traction 
of the sides of the nose, nevertheless, indicate unmistakably the presence of 
pain, and this expresses much of the physiognomic peculiarity of such unfor- 
tunates.(¢) In like manner the simple unmeaning smile of imbecility is marked 
by the form and shape of the nose, which, with its downward, circular open- 
ings, and the tension of the skin on the peak, expresses a torpor, while in the 
laugh of a sane man the nostrils contract, and become elongated, without a 
departure of the septum from its horizontal position.’’? The mouth of the 
simpleton twitches with a constant unmeaning smile, accompanied with a low, 
inarticulate and thoughtless mumble, and the imbecile is almost always found, 
sitting or standing, with parted lips.(d) ‘With many,’ says Schiirmayer, 
“the mouth is constantly in motion, as if they were talking to themselves. In 
the paroxysms of mania there is a convulsive distortion or contraction of the 
mouth. Receptivity for certain external impression is generally low, particu- 
larly in the case of impressions accompanied with pain,(e) of cold, heat, and 
certain medicines.” 


(x) System der gerichtlich psychischen Medizin. Leipsic, 1825, p. 343. 

(y) Drawings, very well executed, are to be found in Morrison’s Outlines of Mental 
Diseases. London, 1829, and in Esquirol, Des Maladies Mentales, Paris, 1838. 

(z) Loebels, Grundriss der Semiologie des auges. Jena, 1817, p. 27. 

(a) Hoefling, in Caspar’s Wochenschrift, 1834. (b) Ibid. 

(c) “To represent the prevailing character and physiognomy of a madman, the 
body should be strong and the muscles rigid and distinct, the skin bound, the features 
sharp, the eye sunk; the color of a dark brownish yellow.tinctured with sallowness, 
without one spot of enlivening carnation; the hair sooty black, stiff and bushy, or of 
a pale, sickly yellow with wiry hair.”—Anatomy of Expression. Sir Charles Bell, 
London, 1844. 

‘‘His burning eye whom bloody strokes did stain, 
Stared full wide and threw forth sparks of fire ; 
And more for rank despight than for great pain, 
Shak’d his long locks, colored like copper wire, 
And bit his tawny beard to show his raging ire.’’ 
[Faery Queen, Book ii. canto 4, v. 15.] 


(d) Danz, Allgemeine Medizinische Zeichenlehre. Heinroth’s edition. Leipsic, 1812, 
p. 353. 

(e) Compare Friedreich, Handbuch der Allgemeine’s Pathologie der psychischen 
Krankheiten. Erlangen, 1839, p. 121. 


93 


§ 103] BODILY HEALTH AND TEMPERAMENT. [BOOK I. 


(2.) Bodily Health and Temperament. 


§ 102. Hereditary tendency to insanity will in a moment be considered. 
Under the present head, it is proper to notice the importance of the attention 
of the medical examiner being turned to temperament, disposition, and age; in 
the case of females, to the development of the functions of menstruation, preg- 
nancy, delivery, suckling, to mental characteristics, powers, and habits; to the 
condition in life and profession ; to the questions of rest and exercise, sleep, 
and watching; to excessive evacuations, particularly, if connected with sexual 
eratifications; to sexual abstinence; to bodily injuries, particularly in the 
head, inflammatory affections of the brain or its membranes, diseases of the 
heart, hemorrhoids, obstructions of the abdomen,(f) and to cutaneous 
diseases. 

§ 103. To what extent insanity is accompanied with physical disorganiza- 
tion,-is illustrated by a case mentioned by Wigan in his remarkable work on 
the duality of the mind.(g) ‘‘The gentleman held a situation in which he had 
many younger persons under him. I purposely leave the designation obscure. 
He had risen to the head of the office by long and exemplary services. He 
was a widower, and had a considerable family, all of whom, however, died in 
their youth. He exercised a parental control over his subordinates, and was 
extremely respected by every one who knew him. His salary was ample, his 
excessive benevolence had, however, always kept him poor, but as his style of 
living did not imply the expenditure of more than half his income, he had the 
reputation of wealth. Gradually, towards the age of sixty, this gentleman 
became garrulous and light in his conversation, and the others in the office 
suspected him to have been drinking. He had many rebuffs from the persons 
under his command, but this in no degree changed the indecorous levity of his 
conversation, which had formerly been remarkably dignified, and as reserved 
as was compatible with his excessive benevolence of disposition. Months and 
months passed on, his language became gradually worse, and at last was of 
the most depraved obscenity. This shocked and disgusted his juniors, and he 
was seriously threatened with exposure by them. The propensity was checked 
for a while, but after repeated offences and repeated forgiveness by the young 
men, they made a formal complaint to his superiors. The offender was taken 
to task very seriously, but, as the young men had given rather a lenient repre- 
sentation of his conduct, he was permitted one more trial, with the assurance 
that his next offence would be followed by dismissal. There was soon an 
opportunity of putting the threat in force, for his conduct and conversation 
became more and more gross and disgusting. He was dismissed. Having 
made no provision, he suddenly found himself utterly destitute, but did not 
make known his position. He packed a bundle of necessary clothes, put in his 
pocket whatever money and trinkets he possessed, and wandered about the 
country without aim or object. Every one lost sight of him for two or three 
months, when he was found in a remote part of the kingdom literally dead 


(f) “Unterleibstockungen,” Schtirmayer. 
Ons A new view of Insanity, &c., by A. L. Wigan. London, 1844, p. 81. 
4 


BOOK I.] PATHOLOGICAL TESTS. [$ 108 


on a dunghill, where it is supposed he had laid himself down for warmth ; his 
money was gone, and from the state of the stomach and intestines, it is pro- 
bable that he had died of want of food as the immediate cause, but on examining 
the interior of the skull, there was found extensive softening and disorganiza- 
tion of the left cerebrum, and the other was not free from disease. He could 
not have lived long; though, under proper care, the disease would not have 
been immediately fatal.’’(h) 

A diminution of sensibility, says M. Falret, in his late work,(7) is not of 
common occurrence in mental diseases, its exaltation being much more fre- 
quent. It is proper, however, to state that deranged persons are generally as 
sensible of temperature and impressions as persons ordinarily are. Lesions of 
the sensibility, however, are observable in all kinds of insanity, and especially 
in those cases in which mystical ideas are predominant, in demonomania and 
paralytic insanity. General insensibility has been known to take away from 
some madmen the sense of their own existence. M. de Foville cites the exam- 
ple of a man who thought he had died at the battle of Austerlitz, at which he 
received a severe wound. His insanity consisted in his inability to recognize 
and feel his own body. When any one inquired after his health, it was cus- 
tomary for him to reply, ‘“You ask me how father Lambert is? but father 
Lambert is no more, he was killed by a bullet at Austerlitz. That which you 
see here is not him, but a machine which they have made to resemble him, and 
which is very badly made, so try and make another.” Never, in speaking of 
himself, did he say “‘me” (moi), but ‘that?’ (cela). This man fell several 
times into a complete state of immobility and insensibility, which lasted 
several days. Sinapisms and blisters applied to guard against these accidents, 
never produced the least symptom of pain. He often refused to eat, saying, 
“ca mavait point de ventre.’’ 

Esquirol was unable to discover any sign of pain in passing a pin through 
the skin of the arm of a demonomaniac, who asserted that he no longer felt 
anything, and who imagined that his body had been carried away by the devil. 

In regard to anomalies of general sensibility associated with no illusion, 
there are madmen who appear insensible to the ordinary causes of pain. 
Esquirol speaks of an idiot girl who was in the habit of scratching a lump 
she had upon her cheek, and did not stop until she had perforated it, and, 
after having performed this perforation, she enlarged the wound by con- 
tinually pulling at it with her finger. Deranged persons often cut them- 
selves in different parts of the body without appearing to suffer. But the 
ereatest phenomenon of insensibility is the indifference with which persons 
afflicted with insanity support cold. They have been known to expose them- 
selves in the open air, to sleep upon the ground, flagstones, and the floor, 
when the ice and snow caused persons warmly clad to shiver. And impru- 


(h) Generally of all the causes of mental alienation, the most frequent, without 
doubt, are cerebral affections or some alteration of the encephalic organ, and perhaps 
we should agree with Haslam in saying, that the primitive cause of mental derange- 
ment is always to be found in these alterations.x—J. Briand, Méd. Lég., p. 544. Paris, 
1852. 

(7) Lecons Cliniques de l’Alienation Mentale, par M. Falret. Septiéme lecon, p. 185, 
Paris, 1854. 

99 


§$ 104] SENSIBILITY—HUNGER—PULSE. [BOOK I. 


dences like these appear to have a less dangerous influence upon the insane 
than upon others. This fact, however, has been much exaggerated, and in 
many instances the ordinary effects produced by cold, are observable in the 
deranged. These unfortunates are so exposed to freezing, that in many estab- 
lishments there is an express law to visit, morning and evening, and wrap in 
flannel the feet of those whose condition causes these dangerous consequences 
to be dreaded. (7) 

§ 104. Hunger and thirst are usually quite vivid, digestion varies, while 
the bowels are almost invariably obstructed. The skin is usually dry, rough, 
and inactive. The presence of almost all persons of unsound mind is distin- 
guished by a peculiar specific smell.(%) Others show themselves equally 
indifferent to heat. There are some who walk and sleep entirely naked, in 
the sun upon the hottest days, and who can look fixedly, for a long time upon 
this planet, without being dazzled by it. 

The genital functions are ordinarily preserved by the insane; sometimes, 
indeed, their activity is increased, although the mental disease may not be of 
erotic origin. This super-excitation of the genital organs, independent of 
physical or moral erotomania, is particularly observable in agitated delirium ; 
whilst in despondent delirium they are inactive, at least if it have not love for 
a cause or object. The cases are rare, however, where the sexual organs are 
attacked with insensibility or impotence, except in general paralysis. The 
aptitude of man and woman for the venereal act and for fecundation is not 
lost; only in insanity as in sound mind, the rapid succession of ideas, the 
violence or tenacity of pre-occupations foreign to amorous desires are capable 
of bringing on an inactivity of the genital functions. 

The pulse forms no test. M. Jacobi has instituted experiments in a large 
number of cases of the different forms of mental unsoundness, indicating at 
the same time the relative pulsations of the several arteries, auscultating the 
heart, and counting the number of inspirations and expirations. The attempt 
to deduce a fixed rule, however, was in vain. ‘I had the vexation,”’ he tells 
us, “‘to see that my researches, so conscientiously made, did not fulfil the end 
I had proposed; and I saw that it was impossible to establish the necessary 
connection between the different pathological states of the intellect and feelings, 
and the observations I had collected on the state of the circulation, the respi- 
ration, and the temperature of the skin, in the insane.’’(/) 

The secretions, and particularly the perspiration, are imperfectly performed 
in the majority of insane cases. In these cases there is a dry skin of an un- 
healthy color, and the exhalation of a disagreeable smell. They do not grow 
thin, but even become fat, although eating little, because they perspire badly. 
They urinate a great deal, and the passage of urine is frequent as is common 


(j) “Dans le plus haut degré de la manie les malades oublient leurs besoins, et 
sentent 4 peine, ou pas du tout, la douleur, le froid et le chaud.”—Manuel de Méd. Léa. 
M. Orfila, tome i. p. 377. Dr. Rush makes insensibility to the weather, particularly 
cold, a marked test. 

(&) Compare Hill’s Essay on the Prevention and Cure of Insanity. London. 1814. 
p. 401. Erhard in Wagner’s “ Beitriigen zur Philosophischen Anthropologie,” vol. i. 
Vienna, 1794, p. 111. Milling’s Mentis Alienationum Semiologica Somatica. Bonn. 1828. 
§ 15. Burrow’s Commentaries, p. 297. 

(/) Jacobi, Annales Medico-Psychologiques. 

96 


BOOK I.] PATHOLOGICAL TESTS—RESPIRATION, [$ 106 


in all nervous disorders. Constipation is an almost habitual attendant of the 
disease. 

Without being oppressed, the respiration in the insane is very often un- 
equal, hurried, diminished, interrupted, and sobbing. Their breath is often 
fetid, and this accidental fetidity, an ordinary symptom of all nervous diseases, 
frequently announces the approach of an attack of melancholy, mania, or 
hysteria.(m) 

§ 105. The most interesting symptoms are found in the various abnormi- 
ties of the sensorial system, as manifested in the excitement, depression, or 
delirium of one or the other of the senses. An excitement or depression of 
the sensorial system generally keeps even pace with the mental malady. Be- 
fore the mental disease breaks out, and while its advent is indicated by mental 
and moral excitements, an enhanced excitability in the sensorial system becomes 
perceptible, which, however, where psychical energies are gradually exhausted 
by the recurrence and violence of the paroxysms, frequently turns to an oppo- 
site condition, so that the failing, obtuseness, or loss of one of the senses 
attends the subsequent progress of the evil. According to Spurzheim,(n) the 
ear is the sense, which, of all others, suffers most among the insane, and there 
are more deaf than blind among them. ‘The deliria of the senses, which are 
either illusions, or hallucinations, are found in every form of the disease; they 
sometimes attack one sense only, sometimes several, and sometimes though 
rarely, all the senses at once. (0) 

Esquirol gives it as the result of his experience(p) that when the alienation 
of the mind begins, and sometimes a little earlier, smell and taste have changed, 
but the deceptions of the ear and the eye generally characterize the fancies of 
most madmen. The deliria of smell are less frequent than those of the other 
senses, those of taste are of the most various kind, and those of touch impress 
the patients with the existence of attributes in bodies other than those which 
they possess. These deliria frequently give rise to fixed ideas; particular 
postures, various attitudes and motions, are observed in almost all madmen. 

§ 106. A change of moral disposition is one of the first symptoms, other 
than physical, with which the disease usually makes its appearance. Extreme 
irritability, proneness to anger, suspicion, concealment, obstinacy and_per- 
verseness, are common. In regard to the affections, various abnormal impulses 
and inclinations are observed. Fondness or aversion to particular persons, 
without any special reason; disposition to exercise cruelty, murderous desires, 
a wish to commit arson, or to steal.(r) Memory is generally good in refer- 


(m) Lecons Cliniques de l’Alienation Mentale, par M. Falret. Septiéme Lecon. p. 
185. Paris, 1854. 

(n) Beobachtungen ueber den Wahnsinn. Nach dem Englischen und Franzoesischen 
bearbeitet von Embden, p. 81. See Méd. Lég., M. Orfila, tome i. p. 358. Paris, 1841, 
Or, Méd. Lég., Briand, p. 540. Paris, 1852. 

(o) For a full account of the illusions and hallucinations of the senses we would 
refer the reader to the Lecons Cliniques sur l’Alienation Mentale de M. Falret. 34d, 
4th, 5th, 16th lessons. Paris, 1854. Also to the Etudes Medico-Psychologiques sur 

l’Alienation Mentale, par F. HE. Renaudin. Chap. 8th, p. 388. Paris, 1854. 
- (p) Compare Hagan Die Sinnetaunschungen in Bezugauf Psychologie Heilkunde, 
und Rechtspflege. Leipsic, 1837. 

(r) See § 192. A deranged person, says Orfila, regards with indifference the dearest 

objects of his affections, he thinks no more of:them or holds them in such aversion as 


97 


§ 107] SENSIBILITY —MORAL DISPOSITION. [BOOK I. 


ence to things occurring during the disease, or to persons with whom the 
patient was then connected, but defective or mistaken as to things which oc- 
curred previously.(s) Of the intellectual faculties not all are uniformly in an 
abnormal state; on the contrary, some functions occasionally improve, thus 
producing a complex state of madness, on the one hand, and of wit, reflection, 
and shrewdness, on the other.(¢) Monomania is also included under this head. 
There is often a disposition to soliloquize aloud; and to laugh, without a 
visible reason. 


(3.) Hereditary Tendency.(u) 


§ 107. The teaching of observation on this point is, that not only does the 
existence of insanity in the offspring afford a violent presumption of its ex- 


to repel, injure, and maltreat them. Hatred, jealousy, anger, wickedness, fear, terror, 
a disgust for life, a desire to destroy and kill, replace the most equal, calm, and soft- 
est nature.—Manuel de Méd. Lég. M. Orfila. Tomei. p. 382. Paris, 1848. 

(s) A great many remember things which occur ; and after their recovery, they often 
astonish by remarks which they had made ata time when they seemed most com- 
pletely deprived of their reason.—Méd. Lég. J. Briand, p. 540. Paris, 1852. 

(t) See cases collected by Friedreich, Handbuch der allgemeinen Pathologie, p. 189. 
See post, § 113. 

(u) “ Although at the first glance,” says Renaudin, ‘man appears to possess an in- 
dependent existence, isolated from his birth from those who begot him, although there 
is but little apparent relation between his ripe age and first infancy ; it is not the less 
true that behind the characters peculiar to his individuality, we can discover certain 
typical signs, some of which betray his nationality and others relate to his family. 
These typical signs are to be encountered not only in his physical organization, but are 
also found in his moral idiosyncrasies, and if tradition is of any force as regards man- 
ners and customs, inheritance is certainly of great value as relates to the tastes and 
habits. It is, in fact, manifested in the transmission from generation to generation of 
the most inveterate maladies, before which art is obliged to confess its weakness ; and 
it is with difficulty prophylactic measures ward off the sad result. In mental aliena- 
tion, also, experience furnishes us daily proofs of this transmission, of which it is es- 
sential to study the mode. 

“The question whether this transmission is Girect: or results from a predisposition 
whose development is due to the influence of an occasional cause, or, in other words, 
whether by itself it is an essential condition of causality, is no longer doubtful, and 
we now possess numerous examples not only of hereditary transmission, but also of 
an heredity accumulation of the mordid predispositions. This is particularly the case 
in families where wedlock is limited to a small circle of fortune and social fitness. 
The royal families of many countries have not escaped this law. We see generations 
of insane succeed each other with an unyielding regularity, and there are families 
which in this relation seem pursued by a desolating fatality. 

“ Aside from idiocy and imbecility, which show themselves a short time after birth, 
the predisposition does not ordinarily show itself until the individual has reached a 
certain development—that is to say, when all the conditions of causality are reunited. 
This native predisposition does not suppose that those that preceded were insane, it 
depends, above all, upon the conditions in which they are placed and which react 
upon the phases of their existence. This predisposition is also progressive from one 
generation to another; and it is in this manner that great social commotions and cer- 
tain epidemics contribute to the production of insanity, in leaving after them deep 
distress or in producing a disordered exaltation. 

‘“‘ All causes capable of altering the public health have a marked influence upon the 
immediate production of insanity or upon the hereditary transmission of its predis- 
positions. The unhealthiness of dwellings, and insufficiency or bad quality of food 
are so many circumstances influencing its production, and to which municipal govern- | 
ments should pay serious attention. It is on account of these and other analogous 
causes that cretinism and idiocy are endemic in certain localities, and that this influ- 
ence is exercised not only on natives, but also upon those establishing thembelves 
there. 

“The mode of life of the parents, and the diseases they have had are no less ae 


98 


BOOK I.] TESTS OF INSANITY. [$ 107 


istence in the parent, but that its existence in the parent affords the same pre- 
sumption as to its existence in the offspring. 

In regard to idiocy, the facts are very striking. ‘Suffice it to say,” we are 
told by Mr. 8. G. Howe, chairman of the Massachusetts State Idiocy Com- 
mission, in a very luminous report, submitted in 1848, “that out of 420 cases 
of congenital idiocy examined, some information was obtained respecting the 
condition of the progenitors of 359. Now in all these 359 cases, save only 
four, it was found that one or the other or both of the progenitors of the un- 
fortunate sufferers had, in some way, widely departed from the normal condition 
of health, and violated the natural laws.” 

The hereditary transmission of moral insanity is equally well authenticated. 
“We have no doubt,” says a very eminent physician, “that various immoral 
and vicious practices ought to be ascribed to insanity. When periodic insanity 
has shown itself in a large family, it is probable that some members of the 
family will evince a propensity to thieving or swindling.(v) And when more 
children than one of the same parents, bursting through all the restraints im- 
posed by carefully-instilled principles and established habits, engage in swin- 
dling transactions, it will often appear, upon inquiry, that insanity has generally 
broken out in that family.’’(w) And the same high authority tells us that in 
families where insanity prevails with the progenitors, he has known two, three, 
or four children of the same parents become deranged. One instance in par- 
ticular he dwells upon, in which, among a family of twenty persons, the 
children of a brother and of two sisters, fen were afflicted with insanity. 

A late very interesting table, originally published in the London Quarterly 
Review,(«) and indorsed by Dr. Winslow,(y) shows at once the importance 
of this inquiry :— 


cious in producing a predisposition to mental unsoundness. If insanity has existed 
in those that preceded, the chances of a direct transmission are much more probable. 
This predisposition is sometimes so marked as to be in some measure the only cause. 
Among the circumstances most likely to produce an hereditary predisposition, we 
should mention drunken habits in the parents. Many, indeed, are the cases of idi- 
ocy and imbecility which owe their situation to this cause. Many generations thus 
suffer the punishment inflicted for the faults of one alone. 

“The hereditary predisposition presents numerous varieties in its evolution. Many 
members of the same family are free from mental unsoundness ; and one only becomes 
insane. In another the inheritance shows itself from mother to daughter as a conse- 
quence of parturition. This predisposition sometimes consists only in the peculiarity 
of character, which drags a man towards a precipice which conducts irresistibly to 
insanity.”—Ktudes Medico-Psychologiques, par L. F. E. Renaudin. Chap. I. p. 33. 
Paris, 1854. 

(v) See post, § 192. 

(w) Essays on Partial Derangement in Supposed Connection with Religion. By the 
late John Cheyne, M. D. Dublin, 1843. 

(x) No. 163. 

(y) Lectures, &c. 150. See Rush on the Mind, 46, where this point is examined. 

99 


[BOOK I. 


TESTS OF INSANITY. 


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[BOOK I. 


TESTS OF INSANITY. 


§ 107] 


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BOOK I.] HEREDITARY TENDENCY. [$ 107 


Dr. Steinau, in his Essay on Hereditary Disease, mentions a very interest- 
ing incident bearing on this point.(7) ‘‘ When I was a boy, there lived in 
my native town an old man, named P , who was such an inveterate thief, 
that he went in the whole place by that name; people speaking of him used 
no other appellation but that of The Thief, and everybody then knew who 
was meant. Children and common people were accustomed to call him by 
that name, even in his presence, as if they knew not his other name; and he 
bore it to a certain degree with much good-natured forbearance. It was even 
customary for the tradesmen and dealers, who frequented the annual fair in 
the place, to enter into formal treaty with him; that is, they gave him a tri- 
fling sum of money, for which he engaged not only, not to touch their pro- 
perty himself, but even to guard it against other thieves. A son of this P 
named Charles, afterwards lived in B——- during my residence there. He was 
respectably married, and carried on a profitable trade which supported him 
handsomely. Still, he could not help committing many robberies quite without 
necessity, and merely from an irresistible inclination. He was several times 
arrested and punished; the consequence was, that he lost his credit and re- 
putation, by which he was at last actually ruined. He died while still a young 
man, in the house of correction at Sp , where he had been confined for his 
last robbery. A son of this Charles, and grandson of the above mentioned and 
notorious P , In my native town, lived in the house where I resided.’ In 
his earliest youth, before he was able to distinguish between good and evil, the 
disposition to stealing, and the ingenuity of an expert thief, began already to 
develop themselves in him. When about three years old, he stole all kinds 
of eatables within his reach, although he always had plenty to eat, and only 
needed to ask for whatever he wanted. He therefore was unable to eat all 
that he had taken ; nevertheless he took it, and distributed it among his play- 
fellows. When playing with them, some of their playthings frequently disap- 
peared in a moment, and he contrived to conceal them for days, and often for 
weeks, with a slyness and sagacity remarkable for his age. When about five 
years old, he began to steal copper coins; and at the age of six years, he began 
to know something of the value of money, and he looked out for silver pieces ; 
and in his eighth year, he only contented himself with larger coins, and proved 
to be, on public promenades, an expert pickpocket. He was early apprenticed 
to learn a trade, but his master being continually robbed by him, soon dis- 
missed him. This was the case with several other tradesmen, till at last, in 
his fourteenth year, he was committed to the house of correction.” (y) 

A late writer gives us the following additional illustration: ‘‘ A gentleman 
recently returned from New South Wales told me,” says the author, “ that he 
was present one day at a factory or barrack, where the convicts are kept until 
engaged by a master, when a gentleman came in, and seeing a youth whom he 
thought would suit him, he said to him, ‘ Well, my lad, what are you?’ ‘A 
London thief,’ was the boy’s reply, touching his hat. ‘What can you do ?’ 
‘Thieve, sir.’ ‘No doubt of that,’ said the interrogator; ‘but how were you 


(x) See Pathological and Philosophical Essay on Hereditary Disease, p. 19, No. 21. 
(y) See post, §§ 190-194. 


103 


§ 108] TESTS OF INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


brought up ?’ ‘To thieve, sir,’ was the boy’s answer. ‘Nonsense! What was 
your father?’ ‘A thief, sir.’ The gentleman, now, probably humoring the 
conversation, continued to inquire concerning his mother and family, when it 
appeared that he had five brothers and five sisters, all of whom in the same 
manner were thieves.”’(z) 

§ 108. “ Nothing,’ says Mr. Hill, in his recent work on crime, ‘has been 
more clearly proved than that crime is, to a considerable extent, hereditary— 
crime appearing, in this respect, greatly to resemble pauperism, which, accord- 
ing to the evidence of the Poor-law Commissioners, often proceeds from father 
to son in a long line of succession.” (a) He adduces numerous cases in confir- 
mation of the fact. One of the most striking applies to the families of three 
brothers, containing together fifteen members. Of these, no fewer than four- 
teen were utterers of base coin, while the fifteenth, who appeared to be an ex- 
ception to his kindred, was, at length, detected in setting fire to his own house 
which he had insured for four times its value. Supposing each of those em- 
ployed in uttering base coin to have passed only one piece a day and to have 
had a career of five years’ duration (which there is reason to believe is about 
the average), no fewer than twenty thousand offences might have been pre- 
vented by removing the three brothers permanently from society, before they 
became fathers of families.”” The disposition to commit crime is often unques- 
tionably an incurable form of insanity ; hence, we read of persons who are all their 
lives criminals, and only terminate one period of imprisonment to recommence 
another. The case of a woman is cited by Mr. Hill, who continued in a- 
career of crime for twenty-five years; and that also of another woman, fifty 
years of age, who had already been in prison sixty-seven times. Furthermore, 
he refers to another example, of a woman who had been in the police cells, in 
Edinburgh, at least one thousand times, chiefly for acts of violence. (b) 

In a legal as well as a psychological view, the relevancy of evidence of 
hereditary taint has been very ably shown by a late eminent judge,(c) whose 
capacity as a mental observer was not less than his ability asa judge. On 
the trial of the issue, the object of which was to determine the validity of the 
will of Captain Arrowsmith, the evidence was that the deceased was a retired 
mariner who had attained a competence; the plaintiff was his sister, his heir 
by descent, as the last of her father’s issue; and the defendant his housekeeper, 
was his devisee. The fact in contest was his sanity. There was no evidence 
of practice or imbecility ; but the plaintiff’s witnesses testified as to acts of 
sudden and unprovoked passion, violence, wildness, extravagance, and excen- 
tricity ; and, in order to corroborate the inference from them, her counsel 
offered the deposition of Susan Arrowsmith, the widow of one of the testa- 
tor’s brothers, that the testator’s father was insane towards the close of his 
life; that one of the testator’s two uncles, on the father’s side, was insane, 
and the other imbecile; that his two aunts, on the same side, and their child- 
ren, were insane; that a son of one of them is in a madhouse; and that her 
own husband was mentally disqualified before his death. The admission of 


(z) Old Bailey Experience, 34. 
(a) Crime; its amount, causes, and remedies. By Frederick Hill, Barrister-in-law, 
late Inspector of Prisons, 1853, p. 55. (b) Ibid. (c) Gibson, C. J. 
104 


BOOK I.| - HEREDITARY TENDENCY. [$ 108 


the deposition was opposed, on the ground that the legitimate inquiry was 
into the state of the testator’s mind, not that of another; and that it did not 
follow, that because the testator’s father and his collateral relations were in- 
sane, that he must have been so too. The point was elaborately argued on 
principle and authority, but the Chief Justice said: “I admit the deposition 
without hesitation, notwithstanding the dicta of Mr. Shelford,(d) and Mr. 
Chitty,(¢) that it is an established rule of law not to admit proof of insanity 
in other members of the family in civil or criminal cases. Established! When, 
where, and by whom? Certainly not by the House of Lords, in McAdam v. 
Walker,(/) the only case cited for it, for the question there was avowedly 
dodged. That high court would not shock common sense by affirming the 
order of the Scotch Court of Session; nor would it gratuitously reserve it, 
when the decision could be safely put on another ground. The authority of a 
judgment appealed from, and left in dubio, cannot be very great. Sir Samuel 
Romilly’s argument against the evidence was rested on the fecundity and in- 
terminableness of collateral issues; and Mr. Chitty seems to have had a 
glimpse of the same idea, when he said the course is to confine the evidence 
to the mental state of the party. But every new fact, though it open a new 
field of inquiry, is not collateral. It may bear directly on the fact in contest; 
and where it does so, it is not in the power of the court to shut it out. A 
collateral issue is such as would be raised by allowing a party to put a ques- 
tion to a witness, on cross-examination, in regard to a fact palpably uncon- 
nected with the cause, in order to afford an opportunity to discredit him by 
contradicting him; but does not proof of hereditary madness bear directly on 
the condition of the mind, which is the subject of investigation? What if 
the point had been ruled by the chancellor and law judges in the House of 
Lords ? Profoundly learned in the maxims of law, they were profoundly igno- 
rant of the lights of physiology; yet free from the presumptuousness of 
which ignorance is the foster-father, they refused to rush on the decision of a 
question to which they felt themselves incompetent. Mr. Chitty fancifully 
puts the solution of questions of insanity on the doctrine of legal presump- 
tions. ‘As the imputation,’ he says, ‘is contrary to the natural presumption 
of adeqaute intellect, the deficit should be established by direct and positive 
evidence, and not merely to be conjectural or probable proof.’ If that be law, 
a question of insanity is the only one in which positive evidence is required, 
and circumstantial evidence to corroborate, is rejected. Why is evidence of 
an old grudge admitted against a prisoner, as a remote proof of malice, if the 
remote proof of hereditary insanity may not be given by him, to rebut it; and 
why should the presumption of sanity be allowed to overbear the presumption 
of innocence, the strongest of them all? I admit that hereditary insanity 
will not itself make out a case for or against a member of the family; but to 
say that it may not corroborate what Mr. Chitty calls direct and positive 
proof, without defining it, staggers all belief. In a measuring cast it ought 
to prevail. He says harsh conduct, bursts of passion, or displays of unnatural 
feeling will not, of themselves, establish insanity. Beit so. But because the 


(d) Treat. on Lunacy, 59. (e) Med. Jurisp. 355. (f) 1 Dows. Par. Ca. 148. 
105 


§ 108] TESTS OF INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


springs of such actions are concealed, are they never to be laid bare, and shown 
to be seated in the blood. When it is admitted by Mr. Chitty and Mr. Shel- 
ford themselves, that insanity is a descendable quality, they give up the argu- 
ment. There can be nothing unreasonable in referring wild, furious, and un- 
natural actions, not otherwise accounted for, to the aberrations of a mind, the 
reflux of that of a crazy father. Mr. Taylor, a distinguished lecturer on 
Medical Jurisprudence in Guy’s Hospital, London, says that ‘in making a 
diagnosis of a case of insanity, the first question put is commonly in reference 
to the present or past existence of the disorder in other members of the family. 
There can be no doubt, from the current testimony of many writers on in- 
sanity, that a disposition to the disease is frequently transmitted from parent 
to child through many generations. M. Esquirol has remarked, that this 
hereditary taint is most common of all cases to which insanity can be refer- 
red.’(g) M. Esquirol was, in 1838, and perhaps is still, the principal physi- 
cian to the hospital for the insane at Charenton, in France, and a member of 
the Royal Academy of Medicine at Paris. His tables of insanity are held in 
high repute, by not only the physicians of France, but of Europe. Well 
might Mr. Taylor say that these things ought to be borne in mind by medical 
jurists. The knowledge attained by men, of a subject which they have grap- 
pled all their lives, ought surely to prevail against knowledge gleaned from 
the hornbooks of a profession to which the gleaners did not belong. Strange 
that a source of information open to every one else, should be closed to those 
who are to pass on the fact. Every man has observed that there are families 
through which insanity has been handed down for generations; and why 
should the probability of hereditary madness be excluded, when probabilities 
in other cases are weighed, especially when it is known that a proclivity to 
theft, intemperance, lying, cheating, and almost all other moral vices, are as 
transmissible as gout, consumption, deafness, blindness, and almost all other 
constitutional diseases. It is supposed by the million, that insanity is a dis- 
ease of the mind, not of the body. Ridiculous! If it were, it could never 
be cured; for the mind cannot take physic, or be separately treated; yet the 
statistics of the insane exhibit a great number of cures, and the time is fast 
coming, when insanity will be considered the most manageable disease that 
flesh is heir to. An objection to an inquisition which does not disclose the 
specific nature of the ancestor’s infirmity, might stand in a different light ; 
but testimony which brings the fact of madness home to him, ought to be re- 
ceived like evidence of family likeness, which, though less reliable, was allowed 
to be corroborative proof of fraternity in the Douglas Peerage case, in 1767, 
and again in the Townsend Peerage case, in 1843. Lord Mansfield said, in 
the former, that he had always considered likeness as an argument of a child 
being the son of a parent; that a man may survey ten thousand people before 
he sees two faces exactly alike, and that in an- army of a hundred thousand 
men, every man may be known from another ; that if there should be a likeness 
in feature, there may be a difference in the voice, gesture, or other characters : 
whereas family likenesses run generally through all of these ; for that in every 
thing there is a resemblance, as of feature, voice, attitude, and action. Might 


(g) Taylor on Med. Juris. 502. 
106 


BOOK I.] CONVERSATION AND DEPORTMENT. [$ 110 


he have not added the diathesis of the brain? He doubtless might if the 
point had been mooted. In prosecutions for bastardy, the practice in the 
Quarter Sessions was, in my day, not exactly to give the child in evidence, but 
+o put it before the jury, sometimes by the prosecutor, and sometimes by the 
putative father. But ancestral irregularity in the action of the brain is more 
frequently transmitted than any resemblance in form or feature; and it is diffi- 
cult to imagine’ an objection to ‘evidence for it for purposes of corrobora- 
tion.’ ’’(h) 

§ 109. Taylor thus sums up the recent English cases on this point: ‘In 
the case of Reg. v. Ross Touchet, 1844, tried and acquitted on the ground of 
insanity, for shooting a man, Maule, J., held that evidence that the erand- 
father had been insane may be adduced, after it had been proved by medical 
testimony that such disease is often hereditary in a family. It was also 
admitted in Oxford’s case, the prisoner having been here tried for shooting at the 
Queen.(7) This kind of evidence has, however, been frequently rejected, and 
it is not admitted in the law of Scotland.(7) Therecan be no doubt, from the 
concurrent testimony of all writers on insanity, that a predisposition to the 
disease is frequently transmitted from parent to child through many genera- 
tions. The malady may not always show itself in such cases, because 
the offspring may pass through life without being exposed to any exciting 
cause ; but in general it readily supervenes from very slight causes.’’(/) 


(4.) Conversation and Deportment.(kk) 


§ 110. The general questions relating to feigned insanity are discussed under 
another head (post, § 127). One or two cases will be sufficient to show the 
importance of accurate observation in this respect. 

A short time ago, a parish officer, from the neighborhood of Middleton, 
took a lunatic to the asylum, pursuant to an order signed by two magistrates. 
As the man was respectably connected, a gig was hired for the purpose, and 
he was persuaded that it was merely an excursion of pleasure on which he was 
going. In the course of the journey, however, something occurred to arouse 
the suspicions of the lunatic with respect to his real destination; but he said 
nothing on the subject, made no resistance, and seemed to enjoy his jaunt. 
When they arrived at Lancaster, it was too late in the evening to proceed to 


(h) Smith v. Kramer, 1 Am. Law Reg. 353. (7) Law Times, Oct. 26, 1844. 

(j) Gibson’s case, Edinburgh, Dec. 1844. 

(k) Taylor’s Med. Jur., p. 555. 

‘In a great majority of cases,” says Dr. Wood, “insanity is produced by exciting 
causes acting upon a predisposition to the disease. Inheritance is the most frequent 
source of this predisposition—perhaps more frequent than all others put together. 
Even a particular form of insanity is often inherited ; and it has been noticed that the 
attack is apt to come on at the same period of life inthe parent and his offspring. The 
tendency to suicide not unfrequently descends from parent to child. It is thought 
that children born before the occurrence of insanity in the parent are less liable to be 
affected than those born subsequently.” —Practice of Medicine, by Prof. G. B. Wood, 
M. D., vol. ii. p. 672. Phila. 1849. 

According to the observations of Esquirol, more than a third (and perhaps the half) 
of the persons who became insane, count insane persons among their near relations, 
and thus at their birth bring on an hereditary predisposition to the disease.—WMed. 
Lég., Briand, p. 543. Paris, 1852. 

(kk) On this point see ante, §§ 86-92. 


107 


§ 110] TESTS OF INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


the asylum, and they took up their quarters for the night at aninn. Very 
early in the morning the lunatic got up and searched the pockets of the officer, 
where he found the magistrate’s order for his own detention, which, of course, 
let him completely into the secret. With that cunning which madmen not 
unfrequently display, he made the best of his way to the asylum, saw one of 
the keepers, and told him that he had got a sad mad fellow down at Lancas- 
ter, whom he should bring up in the course of the day, adding’: ‘‘ He’s a very 
queer fellow, and he has got very odd ways. For instance, I should not 
wonder if he was to say I was the madman, and that he was bringing me; 
but you must take good care of him, and not believe a word that he says.”? The 
keeper of course, promised compliance, and the lunatic walked back to the™ 
inn, where he found the officer still fast asleep. He awoke him, and they sat 
down to breakfast together. ‘‘ You’re a lazy fellow to be sleeping all day; I have 
had a long walk this morning,’”’ says the lunatic. ‘ Indeed,’”’ says the officer, 
“‘T should like to have a walk myself after breakfast ; perhaps you will go with | 
me?” . The lunatic assented, and after breakfast they sat out, the officer lead- 
ing the way toward the lunatic asylum, intending to deliver his charge; but 
it never occurred to him to examine whether his order was safe. When they 
got within sight of the asylum the lunatic exclaimed—‘‘ What a fine house 
that is!’? ‘‘ Yes,” said the officer, ‘“‘I should like to see the inside of it.’ 
“‘So should I,’”’ observed the lunatic. ‘‘ Well, I dare say they will let us 
through—TI will ask,” was the response. They went to the door; the officer 
rang the bell, and the keeper whom the lunatic had previously seen made his 
appearance, with two or three assistants. The officer then began to fumble 
in his pockets for the order, when the lunatic produced it, and gave it to the 
keeper, saying: “ This is the man of whom I spoke to you about. You will 
take care of him; shave his head, and put a strait waistcoat on him.’’ The 
men immediately laid hands on the poor officer, who vociferated loudly that 
the other was the madman, and he the officer ; but, as this only confirmed the 
story previously told by the lunatic, it did not at all tend to procure his libera- 
tion. He was taken away, and became so indignantly furious that the strait 
waistcoat was speedily put upon him, and his head was shaved, secundum 
artem. Meanwhile, the lunatic walked deliberately back to the inn, paid the 
reckoning and set out on his journey homeward. ‘The good people in the 
country were, of course, surprised on seeing the wrong man return; they were 
afraid that the lunatic, in a fit of phrensy, had murdered the officer, and they 
asked him with much trepidation, what he had done with Mr. Stevenson. 
“Done with him?” said the madman, “‘ why, I left him at the Lancaster 
Asylum, as mad as a fury !”’ which indeed, was not very far from the truth ; for 
the wits of the officer were well nigh upset by his unexpected detention and 
subsequent treatment. 

Further inquiry was forthwith made by his neighbors, and it was ascer- 
tained that the man was actually in the asylum. A magistrate’s order was 
produced for his liberation ; and he returned home with a handkerchief tied 
round his head in lieu of the covering which nature had bestowed upon it.(J.) 


(1) Manchester (England) Guardian. 
108 


BOOK I.] CONVERSATION AND DEPORTMENT. [$ 110 


“Delusions are sometimes cunningly concealed for a length of time,” says 
Dr. Winslow, “and, notwithstanding we are certain that they exist, no amount 
of ingenuity will induce the patient to disclose them, particularly if made 
aware of the object of our visit. I had been, recently, to see a lady whose 
insanity was manifested in a remarkable degree in her every action; but after 
paying her several visits I found it impossible to induce her to exhibit any one 
delusive impression or insane idea; but no sooner had [I left the room, than 
her conversation and conduct became outrageously insane. Many insane per- 
sons are able to talk with apparent rationality, but cannot write without 
exhibiting their insanity. I have examined, recently, one very remarkable 
case of this kind, in a clever, well-read, and intellectual woman, whom I had 
occasionally to visit.(«) I never could detect the slightest aberration of mind 
in her conversation, and yet almost invariably upon my leaving, she placed in 
my hands a letter (which had been written previous to my calling), full of the 
most absurd extravagances and fancies; accusing strangers, myself, and mem- 
bers of her family of being engaged in deeply concocted conspiracy against 
her property and life. Several of these peculiar and interesting cases are 
recorded, and the medical man has been advised, with the view of obtaining 
an insight into the true condition of the mind, to open a correspondence with 
the supposed lunatic, upon the principle that few persons positively insane can, 
for any length of time, write without exhibiting their delusions, whatever 
amount of self-control they are able to exercise over their thoughts and morbid 
ideas, during protracted conversations. It is essential for us to ascertain the 
degree of knowledge possessed of the ordinary and everyday occurrences of 
life. Upon one occasion I was conversing with a person whose state of mind 
was the subject of my investigation, and finding him rational and apparently 
sane upon all points, I questioned him as to who was the reigning sovereign, 
without knowing he had any delusion on the point. The person immediately 
started from his chair, exclaiming, in an excited tone of voice, ‘‘I am the 
sovereign !’’(v) 

‘“‘T was requested,’”’ says the same authority, ‘‘to see a gentleman who was 
said to be suicidally insane. Upon inquiry, I ascertained from good authority 
that under the influence of the most distressing hallucinations he had attempted 
to hang himself. The patient firmly, earnestly, and apparently with great 
truthfulness, resolutely and repeatedly denied the fact. He declared it was an 
invention—a pure creation of the imagination, originating with the family ; 
that he was happy, subject to no depression, had a strong wish to live, and 
ereat fear of death. J examined him, in conjunction with another physician, 
and neither of us could seize hold of the salient point, or satisfy himself that 
the man was actually insane. But, we asked ourselves, what motive could 
his family have for thus misrepresenting the facts of the case? We felt quite 
assured, from the character of the evidence presented, that an attempt at 
suicide had been made; but the patient, with an ingenuity which would have 


(u) “Dans la folie raisonnante sans grand agitation, le malade peut paraitre devant 
celui qui l’interroge avec calme, repondre tres juste & toutes les questions et expliquer 
d’une maniére plausible les actions extravagantes qui lui sont .mputees.”— Or/ila, 
tome i. p. 396. Paris, 1848. 

(v) Winslow on Medico-Leg. Ev. 108. ‘hh 


§ 110] TESTS OF INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


reflected credit upon a nist prius lawyer, parried with great skill all the 
questions, and gave such prompt and happy replies to our anxious interroga- 
tories, that we were compelled to admit ourselves, for a time, perfectly defeated. 
By a course of conversation I drew the gentleman’s thoughts into a different 
channel; and whilst my attention was directed apparently elsewhere, I kept a 
close watch upon all his movements. I perceived, as I imagined, some kind 
of instrument projecting from his pocket. He perceived that my eyes were 
directed to this, and he immediately expressed a wish to leave the apartment. 
J at once said, ‘I cannot permit you to do so until I know what you have 
concealed in your trowsers pocket.’ Heat once manifested signs of embar- 
rassment and excitement, and rising rapidly from his seat, endeavored to rush 
out of the door. He was immediately prevented from doing so, and his 
pockets emptied, and a razor discovered. In his pocket-book a letter was 
found, addressed to the coroner, intimating to him that he was pursued by an 
evil spirit, and this impression had driven him to commit an act of self-de- 
struction. Fortunately for our own reputation and the patient’s life, this 
providential discovery was made.(w) It may be necessary to see and examine 
the patient on more than one occasion before the physician is satisfied as to 
the actual state of his mind. In cases of doubtful character, I would suggest 
that this course should invariably be adopted, taking the necessary precaution 
to recommend close vigilance during the interregnum. I suggest this course, 
in consequence of my being acquainted with the case of a lady, whose removal 
from home was for a few days temporarily postponed, in compliance with the 
cautious and judicious advice of the medical man, who admitted that he could 
not detect, according to his apprehension, sufficient evidence of insanity to 
justify him in signing the certificate. During the interim she succeeded in 
destroying herself. In a few instances we are justified in partially acting upon 
the representations of the family and friends of the alleged lunatic. If a delu- 
sion be detected, it must be referred to; and if the patient has committed any 
overt acts of violence, or manifested a suicidal disposition, it is our duty to 
refer to these facts, guarding ourselves by stating that we derived such infor- 
mation from parties immediately around the patient. It is important in all 
cases to specify the character of the existing delusion. The expression of a 
belief in the fact of delusive ideas, and of the presence of abstract insanity 
without a specification of facts, renders a medical certificate invalid. I have 
often seen certificates worded to this effect : ‘I have formed my opinions from 
the fact of the party being insane’—‘ being under delusions’—‘ being excited’ 
—‘being violent.’ These generalizations should be carefully avoided; the 


(w) ‘It is only in having,” says Orfila, “an acquaintance with the whole life of an 
individual, in weighing and comparing every fact, that, in some cases, we can pro- 
nounce with certainty upon his actual moral state. It is in interrogating the past 
that we acquire a knowledge of the present.” The same author also states, that when 
an opinion is asked from physicians upon the actual state of an accused person, they 
ought, in the examination of his previous conduct, to understand what act is imputed 
to him, if that should be necessary to influence their opinion. In a report, they should 
not confine themselves to a simple opinion upon the state of the person who is the 
subject of it, but, of necessity, should go into details upon the facts observed, in order 
that the same piece may be submitted to the examination of new experts. The em- 
ployment of all the means indicated does not always lead to a positive result, and 
sometimes we are to remain in doubt.—Méd. Lég., Orfila, tome i. p. 400. Paris, 1848. 


110 


BOOK I.] BY WHOM TO BE CONDUCTED. [$ 111 


more concise the account of the patient’s condition, the closer will it be in 
unison with the expressed wish of the Commissioners in Lunacy. The record 
of one clear and unmistakable delusion is quite sufficient for all legal purposes. 
But cases do occur where no delusion can be detected, and yet confinement 
may be absolutely necessary. Under such circumstances it is the duty of the 
medical man to enter more into detail as to the facts of the case. Perhaps I 
may be excused for suggesting, that in every instance of this kind, the parties 
should keep copies of their certificates.’’(a) 

§ 111. A man mentioned by Pinel, who had been for some time confined 
in the Bicétre, was, on the visitation of a commissary, ordered to be discharged 
as perfectly sane, after a long conversation in which he had conducted himself 
with the greatest propriety. The officer prepared the procés verbal for his 
discharge, and gave it to him to put his name to it, when he subscribed him- 
self Jesus Christ, and then indulged in all the reveries connected with that delu- 
sion. Lord Erskine gives a very remarkable history of a man who indicted 
Dr. Munro for confining him without a cause in a madhouse. He underwent 
the most rigid examination, by the counsel of the defendant, without discover- 
ing any appearance of insanity, until a gentleman came into court who desired 
a question to be put to him respecting a princess with whom he had corres- 
ponded in cherry-juice. He immediately talked about the princess in the most 
insane manner, and the cause was at an end. But this having taken place in 
Westminster, he commenced another action in the city of London, and on this 
occasion no effort could induce him to expose his insanity; so that the cause 
was dismissed only by bringing against him the evidence taken at Westminster. 
On another occasion, Lord Erskine examined a gentleman who had indicted 
his brother for confining him as a maniac, and the examination had gone on 
for great part of a day without discovering any traces of insanity. Dr. Sims 
then came into court, and informed the counsel that the gentleman considered 
himself as the Saviour of the world. A single observation, addressed to him 
in this character, showed his insanity, and put an end to the cause. Many 
similar cases, says Abercrombie, are on record. Several years ago, a gentle- 
man in Edinburgh, who was brought before a jury to be cognosced, defeated 
every attempt of the opposite counsel to discover any traces of insanity, until 
a gentleman came in court, who ought to have been present at the beginning 
of the case, but had been accidentally detained. He immediately addressed 
the patient by asking him what were his latest accounts from the planet Sat- 
urn, and speedily elicited ample proofs of insanity. (J) 

M. Orfila states, that deranged persons who are conscious of their condition, 
and who yet preserve some control over themselves, will answer correctly all 
questions that are addressed them, and will not betray their condition if 
they have an interest in concealing it.(m) 

Mr. David Paul Brown gives us the following illustration of this same 
craftiness: M. having written a letter from the asylum, made up of patches 
of Latin, Greek, French, and German, and manifesting most clearly a dis- 


(x) Winslow on Medico-Legal Ev. 153; see ante, § v. 3. 
(il) Abercrombie on the Intellectual Powers, pp. 253, 254; see also §§ 86-92. 
(m) Méd. Lég. M. Orfila, tome i. p. 396. Paris, 1848. 


111 


§ 111] TESTS OF INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


ordered mind, upon escaping from his confinement, desired counsel to institute 
an action for false imprisonment, against the managers. ‘I shall do no such 
thing,” said the lawyer (handing him the letter) ; ‘‘look at that, and tell me 
whether a sane man ever wrote such a letter.” Upon which, bursting into a 
laugh, the madman said, ‘‘That indeed does look as if I were insane; but I 
wrote it purposely in that way, because I knew if it had been reasonable, and 
the managers had opened it, as they always do, they never would have allowed 
it to reach its address.’’(7) | 

Lord Chancellor Loughborough once ordered a man to be brought before 
him, against whom his heirs wished to take out a commission of lunacy. 
He examined him and put various questions to him, to which he made the 
most pertinent answers. ‘This man mad!” thought he, ‘verily he is one 
of the ablest men I ever met with.’”? Toward the end of the examination, 
however, a little scrap of paper was put into his hands on which was written 
“Hzekiel.”? This was enough for such a shrewd and able man as his Lord- 
ship.. He took his cue. ‘What fine poetry,” said the Chancellor, “is in 
Tsaiah !’’ ‘‘ Very fine,” replied the man, ‘especially when we read in the origi- 
nal Hebrew.”? ‘And how well Jeremiah wrote.” ‘‘ Surely,” said the man. 
“What a genius, too, was Ezekiel!’ ‘Do you like him ?” said the man; 
“T’ll tell you a secret, I am Ezekiel !” 

“‘ Another patient of mine,’’ says Dr. Bucknill, “a barrister, so completely 
concealed and denied his delusions in conversation, that he succeeded in per- 
suading his relatives, and especially his mother, a woman of rare intelligence 
and discrimination, into the belief of his perfect recovery from an attack of 
mania, and of his capacity to resume his professional labors. During the 
whole of this time he was writing letters to relatives living at a distance, full 
of delusion relating to his supposed marriage with a servant, to the distribu- 
tion of a large fortune which he did not possess, and a yacht voyage to every 
part of the globe. | 

“The conduct of the patient should be observed by night as well as by day. 
I have for several years had under my care a respectable tradesman, whose 
conduct and conversation during the day exhibit scarcely a trace of mental 
disease. He is industrious, sensible, and kind-hearted; and it is strange that 
his nights of suffering have left no painful impression on his pleasing features. 
At night he sees spectres of demons and spirits, at which he raves aloud and 
prays with energetic fervor. 

“That it is important to test the memory and the capacity by examinations, 
repeated at various times, is shown by the case recorded by Sir H. Halford in 
his Essays. A gentleman sent for a solicitor, gave instructions for his will, 
and told the solicitor that he would make him his heir; soon after this he be- 
came deranged. After a month’s violence he was composed and comfortable, and 
manifested great anxiety to make his will. This request was evaded as long as 
possible, but at last consented to. The solicitor received the same instructions, 
drew it, and it was signed by the physicians (Sir Henry Halford and Sir George 
Tuthill). After leaving the room and conversing on the delicacy of their 


(x) 2 Brown’s Forum, p. 478. 
112 


BOOK I.| BY WHOM TO BE CONDUCTED. [$ 111 


situation, the physicians returned to his room and questioned him how he had 
left his property. He mentioned the legacies correctly, but when asked to 
whom the real estate was to go, he said, ‘To the heir at law, to be sure.’ 
This case, although instructive, is not very intelligible ; probably the solicitor 
was better acquainted with the peculiar weakness of the patient’s mind than 
either of the eminent and titled physicians.”’ 

Mr. A. amassed a large fortune in Philadelphia, in a few years, as a carriage 
builder. He had an extraordinary degree of skill, among other things, in 
poising and adjusting the springs and weights of a carriage, and in uniting, 
in remarkable perfection, beauty and lightness with strength. As his busi- 
ness increased, he would be occupied during large portions of the night, as 
he lay sleepless in his bed, by calculations as to how these adjustments could 
be best secured. In the spring of 1855, he engaged in real estate specu- 
lations, in which he speedily showed that his mind was becoming unbalanced. 
He negotiated, or pretended to negotiate, for a large and immensely valuable 
lot of ground, intimating that he expected it to be occupied by Queen Victoria 
in a visit that she was projecting. Then he turned his attention to live stock, 
taking measures to purchase a vast number of cows, on the ground, he said, 
of an expected rise in the price of milk. His family petitioned for a commission 
of lunacy, which was granted, and the present writer was appointed commis- 
sioner. While the case was on hearing, it was agreed on both sides that to 
give every opportunity for recovery, as well as to secure greater certainty in 
the result, Mr. A. should be permitted to travel for a few months, under the 
charge of two parties in whom he personally had confidence. The experiment 
was made, and two remarkable facts were established. The first was, that he 
was possessed by certain insane delusions, which destroyed his capacity for 
managing his estate. The second was that he was conscious that he was un- 
der watch, and that these delusions, if shown to exist, would lead to the pend- 
ing trial being decided adversely to his sanity. Nothing could exceed the 
adroitness and tact with which, on the one hand, he pursued these delusions, 
and on the other hand, sought to conceal or mask them from his attendants. 
It seems that besides wanting to purchase all the live stock he met, he had a 
fancy that these creatures were rational. He accordingly addressed notes to 
a “oray mare,” or “a black horse, which I met in such a place,”’ and in seek- 
ing to get these notes to their intended destination, he used the adroitness and 
finesse of a subtle diplomatist. Then, when the fact was discovered, he would 
laugh it off, with the utmost coolness, as a practical joke attempted by him on 
his guardians. When the case was brought up for a final hearing, he not 
merely went successfully through the test of a protracted and thorough exami- 
nation, but cross-examined the witnesses himself, and made a long, able, and 
artful speech, in which he endeavored to. explain away all the facts that ad- 
mitted of a doubtful construction. As to those which were unequivocally irra- 
tional, he took a ground something like the following : “ You know, gentlemen 
of the jury, being business men yourselves, how acutely one who has been 
immersed all his life in a business in which he delights, and of which he may 
be justly proud, must feel when suddenly dragged from that business, forced to 
compulsory idleness, and dogged by men who he knows are seeking to entrap 

8 113 


§$ 115] PRESUMPTION OF INSANITY FROM NATURE OF FACT. [BOOK 1. 


him into something which will prove him a lunatic. You can easily see how 
under such circumstances, a man might resort to imaginary business, such as 
the world resorts to in its fashionable sports and games, to fill the void of 
real. You can understand, also, how he might attempt practical jokes to see 
how far the gullibility of his keepers may go, and since they wish to stare, 
lay traps to give them something to stare at.” 

Notwithstanding this defence, which for coolness, coherence, and appropri- 
ateness, the sanest advocate could with difficulty have excelled, Mr. A. was 
found by the jury to be a lunatic, and was remanded by the court to the Penn- 
sylvania Hospital for the Insane. There his insanity became unrestrained and 
unmistakable; and a few weeks after, during the momentary absence of an 
attendant, he killed himself by cutting his throat. 


(5.) Nature of the Act. 


(a.) Lis Insensibility. 


§ 112. ‘In foro medico,” as is well remarked by Schiirmayer,(n) ‘a de- 
rangement of the mental faculties is generally to be presumed where the 
consciousness, imagination, or sensual apperception or impulse, when subjected 
to common and usual provocations, internal or external, respond in a manner 
different from what they would in a normal state. But whether a certain 
action, undergoing a criminal investigation, was the effect of a diseased mental . 
activity of the subject, and committed when he was not master of himself, is a 
_ question to be answered primarily from the indicia presented by the action 
itself, and then from the results of an examination of the accused, in reference 
to his physical, moral, and mental condition before, at, and after the deed in 
question. Illustrations of acts whose insenszbility can be received to show 
their irresponsibility or incompetency of the actor, may be found in the old 
law cases of a legacy to the King of Siam, and of an executory devise to all 
the children in a particular parish who should, in a specific year, be born with 
moles on their faces. The presumption of irresponsibility would, of course, 
attach with great force under similar circumstances, to criminal acts equally 
insensible, as in the case of the idiot who was found putting an infant brother 
into the pot to boil for dinner.” 


(b.) Lis Incongruity with Antecedents. 


§ 1138. When a man of uniformly mild character boldly and openly commits 
a deed of blood; when a woman of previous purity gives way to lascivious- 
ness ; when a long course of irreproachable honesty and exactness is suddenly 
broken in by profligacy; or domestic peace, by unprovoked ebullitions of 
violence, or by expressions of distrust to those formerly most loved or most 
trusted,(o) it is proper to consider how far unsoundness of mind may not be 
considered as the cause. Illustrations of this species of change will hereafter 


(n) Gerichtliche Medicin, § 522. 
(0) See also, Médecine Légale, par M. Orfila, tome i. p. 389. Paris, 1848. 


114 


BOOK I.] PRESUMPTION OF INSANITY FROM NATURE OF Fact. [§ 114 


be noticed in other connections. It should be observed that omission to fly 
is a very important ingredient to make up this species of presumption.(p) It 
should be observed, also, that a man of unsound mind generally chooses the 
most injudicious time and place for the perpetration of the act, although the 
cunning and address with which an offence was committed, do not exclude the 
supposition of derangement,(q) and repels with indignation every intimation 
of his insanity; in many cases asserting that he committed the crime with 
perfect consciousness, and when entirely in his senses, and disregarding all that 
is said to extenuate it.(7) 

M. Falret thus speaks of the change of character, which is a prominent 
symptom of commencing insanity: Sometimes, instead of a simple exaggera- 
tion, it is a veritable transformation that the character undergoes. Avarice 
gives place to prodigality, piety to irreligion, modesty to obscenity, temperance 
to drunkenness, the love of truth to deceit, the most tender and tried affections 
to indifference and even hate.(rr) 

A frequent result is the neglect of the duties due to family and society, dis- 
order of conduct and derangement of affairs, and those ebullitions of irritation 
and violence which momentarily, and sometimes for ever destroy the harmony 
existing between relations and friends.(s) The changes of conduct observable 
in the incubation of mental diseases are infinite; the deranged show a neglect 
or an unaccustomed zeal for their customary occupations, and for the cares 
and attentions of family, and for social customs and duties. Patients who 
were before sedentary in their habits, indulge in long absences from their dwell- 
ings. Some show an indifference and neglect for the persons and things they 
loved the most, and seek after objects which they did not like. Others over- 
whelm you with demonstrations of obligingness and devotedness. Generally 
those thus affected are absent and forgetful; they do not remember what they 
have done or what they were about to do an instant before, and then seem 
much surprised when these frequent absences of mind are pointed out to them. 
Their conduct abounds in contrasts. Those who were orderly become dissi- 
pated ; those who were careful in business, now enter upon the most dangerous 
speculations, and they addict themselves to play, drinking and sexual excesses, 
and in fact to all the vices which were before unknown to them. (ss) 


@ 


(c.) Its Motivelessness.(t) 


§ 114. “It is assumed or implied,” says Dr. Taylor with great justice, ‘that 
sane men never commit a crime without an apparent motive, or one of delusive 


(p) 2 Mittermaier Deutsch St. § 12. Wills on Circumstantial Ev. 70. Best on 
Presump. 322. Wharton’s Cr. Law, § 826. 

(q) See Méd. Lég. J. Briand, p. 553. Paris, 1852; and see ante, §§ 60, 61. 

(r) Compare Friedreich, Handbuch der gerichtsaertztlichen Praxis. Vol. i. p. 370. 

(7r) See ante, § 106. (s) See post, § 204. 

(ss) Legons Cliniques sur l’Alienation Mentale, M. Falret. 8th Legon, p. 215. Paris, 
1854. Post, § 204. See ante, § 106. 

(t) Médicine Légale, J. Briand, p. 548-49. Paris, 1852. Pinel, Alienation Mentale, 
p- 157. Etudes Medico-Psychologiques sur l’Alienation Mentale, par L. F. E. Renaudin. 
Paris, 1854, chap. 18th, p. 779. See also Legons Cliniques de Médicine Légale, M. 
Falret, Legon 2d, p. 55-67. Paris, 1854. Also Médicine Légale, par Orfila, tome i. 
p. 304. Paris, 1848. ae 


§ 114] PRESUMPTION OF INSANITY FROM NATURE OF FACT. [BOOK I. 


nature only in the perpetration of a criminal act. If these positions were true, 
it would be very easy to distinguish a sane from an insane criminal, but the 
rule wholly fails in practice. In the first place, non-discovery is here taken 
- asa proof of the non-existence of a motive; while it is undoubted that motives 
may exist for many atrocious criminal acts without our being able to discover 
them—a fact proved by the numerous recorded confessions of criminals before 
execution, in cases of which, until these confessions were made, no motive for 
the perpetration of the crime had appeared to the acutest minds. In the case 
of Courvoisier, who was convicted of the murder of Lord William Russell, in 
June, 1840, it was the reliance upon this alleged criterion before the secret 
proofs of guilt accidentally came out, and led many to believe he could not 
have committed the crime; and the absence ‘of motive’ was urged by his 
counsel as the strongest proof of the man’s innocence. It was ingeniously 
contended, ‘that the most trifling action of human life had its spring from 
some motive or other.’ This is undoubtedly true, but it is not always in the 
power of man untainted with crime to detect and unravel the motives which 
influence criminals to the perpetration of murder. No reasonable motive was 
ever discovered for the atrocious murders and mutilations perpetrated by 
Greenack and Good; yet these persons were very properly made responsible 
for their crimes. On the trial of Francis for shooting at the Queen, the main 
ground of the defence was, that the prisoner had no motive for the act and 
therefore he was irresponsible; but he was convicted. It is difficult to com- 
prehend under what circumstances any motive for such an act as this could 
exist; and therefore the admission of such a defence would have been like 
laying down the rule, that the evidence of the perpetration of so henious a 
crime should, in all cases, be taken as a proof of the existence of an irrespon- 
sible state of mind. Crimes have been sometimes committed without any 
apparent motive, by sane individuals who were at the time perfectly aware of 
the criminality of their conduct. No mark of insanity or delusion could be 
discovered about them, and they had nothing to say in their defence. They 
have, however, been very properly held responsible. On the other hand, luna- 
tics confined in a lunatic asylum have been known to be influenced by motives 
in the perpetration of crimes. ‘Thus they have often murdered their keepers 
in revenge for ill treatment which they have experienced at their hands.(w) 
Thus Farmer was acquitted as insane, while the clear motive for homicide was 
revenge and ill-feeling.. In another case the act of murder was perpetrated 
from jealousy.(v) On the whole, the conclusion with respect to this assumed 
criterion is, that an absence of motive may, when there are other strong evi- 
dences of insanity, favor the view of irresponsibility for crime; but the non- 
discovery of a motive for a criminal act cannot of itself be taken as any proof 
of the existence of homicidal monomania in the perpetrator. It is right to 
state, however, that the law invariably acts on the humane principle, that the 
absence of a sufficient motive forms a strong presumption of innocence—the 
presence of one is no proof of guilt.’’(w) 


(u) See the case of the Queen v. Farmer. York Spring Assizes, 1837. 
(v) Reg. v. Goule. Durham Summer Assizes, 1845. 
(w) Taylor’s Med. Jurisprudence, pp. 578, 579. 

116, 


BOOK I.] EMOTIONS.—REMORSE. [$ 116 


(d.) Lés Inconsequentiality. 


§ 115. Of this an illustration may be found in the case of a madman men- 
tioned by Hitzig, who occupied himself with incessant and anxious labor in 
rowing an imaginary boat. He never, alas! reached the shore towards which 
he so toiled, until death released him from his labors; and the last pulse of 
life was given to a tremulous, and, then, scarcely perceptible movement of the 
spectral oars. 


IJ. From WHAT MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. 
Ist. E’motions.(x) 


Briand says, that from the height of passion to madness is but one step, 
but it is precisely this step which impresses upon the act committed a distinct 
character. It is important then to know exactly the precise characteristics of 
the passions and of insanity. But here science fails, for it must be admitted 
that we are unable to point out the place where passion ends or where mad- 
ness commences.(y) M. Orfila draws the following distinction between a man 
acting under the impulse of the passions and one urged on by insanity. The 
mind is always greatly troubled when it is agitated by anger, tormented by an 
unfortunate love, bewildered by jealousy, overcome by despair, humbled by 
terror, or corrupted by an unconquerable desire for vengeance, etc. Then, as 
it is commonly said, a man is no longer master of himself, his reason is af- 
fected, his ideas are in disorder, he is like a madman. But, in all these cases, 
a man does not lose his knowledge of the real relation of things ; he may ex- 
aggerate his misfortune, but this misfortune is real, and if it carries him to 
commit a criminal act, this act is perfectly well motived. Insanity is more or 
less independent of the cause that produced it; it exists of itself; the passions 
cease with their cause, jealousy disappears with the object that provoked it, 
anger lasts but a few moments in the absence of the one who by a grevious 
injury gave it birth, ete. Violent passions cloud the judgment, but they do 
not produce those illusions which are observable in insanity. They excite for 
a moment sentiments of cruelty, but they do not produce that deep moral 
perversion which influences the madman to sacrifice, without motive, the being 
he most cherishes. (z) 


(1.) Remorse. 


§ 116. ‘When remorse,” says Cogan, ‘‘is blended with the fear of punish- 
ment, and rises to despair, it constitutes the supreme wretchedness of the 
mind.”’(a) And of all stages of passion, remorse is the one most liable, when 


(x) See particularly Aristotle’s delineation of the Passions in the Second Book of 
his “ Rhetoric ;” and see also L. Krahmer, Handbuch der gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. 
Schwetschke, 1851, § 126. Observe, also, an essay by Leigh Hunt, in his Miscella- 
nies, p. 51. 

(y) Méd. Lég. p. 551. Paris, 1852. (z) Méd. Lég. tome i. p. 407. Paris, 1848. 

(a) Cogan on the Passions, vol. i. chap. 2, sec. 3. 


ay 


§ 116] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOKI. 


the conscience is acute, to be mistaken for insanity itself. Of this we have a 
very melancholy case in our own local experience. A young gentleman of 
peculiarly nice sense of honor and keen sensibility, killed an intimate and be- 
loved friend in a duel, hastily forced on by his own undue susceptibility. For 
twenty years he has never ceased to stride to and fro the chamber in which he 
has been confined, firing an imaginary pistol at intervals, and then throwing 
himself back with the acutest expression of misery. In this instance remorse 
has run into madness. In others it has made but a slight progress in that 
direction ; in others entire sanity and responsibility remain. And yet in all it 
presents symptoms which it is well for the forensic physician to examine in 
relation to their moral as well as their psychical origin. 

Harpsfield, in his Ecclesiastical History, gives us the following graphic re- 
port of the dying words of Cardinal Beaufort, which is a powerful illustra- 
tion of the effect of this passion: ‘‘ And must I then die! Will not all my 
riches save me! J could purchase the kingdom, if that would save my life. 
What! is there no bribing of death? When my nephew, the Duke of Bed- 
ford died, I thought my happiness and my authority greatly increased : but 
the Duke of Gloucester’s death raised me in fancy to a level with kings, and 
I thought of nothing but accumulating still greater wealth, to purchase at 
last the triple crown. Alas! how are all my hopes disappointed! Where- 
fore, O my friends, let me earnestly beseech you to pray for me, and recom- 
mend my departing soul to God!” A few minutes before his death his mind 
appeared to be undergoing the tortures of the damned. He held up his two 
hands, and cried—‘“‘ Away! Away! why thus do you look at me?” This 
same scene in the Cardinal’s life is thus still more vividly depicted by Shak- 
speare :-— 


SCENE—The Cardinal's bed-chamber. 


Enter King Henry, Salisbury, and Warwick. 


King Hen. How fares my lord? speak, Beaufort, to thy sovereign. 


Cardinal. If thou be’st death, ’ll give thee England’s treasure, 
Enough to purchase such another island, 
So thou wilt let me live, and feel no pain. 


King Hen. Ah, what a sign it is of evil life, 
When death’s approach is seen so terrible ! 


Warwick. Beaufort, it is thy sovereign speaks to thee. 


Cardinal. Bring me unto my trial when you will; 
Died he(4) not in his bed? where should he die? 
Can I.make men live, whe’r they will or no?— 
Oh! torture me no more, I will confess.— 
Alive again? then show me where he is; 
Ill give a thousand pounds to look upon him. 
He hath no eyes, the dust hath blinded them. 
Comb down his hair; look! look! it stands upright, 
Like lime-twigs set to catch my winged soul !— 
Give me some drink; and bid the apothecary 
Bring the strong poison I bought of him. 

King Hen. O thou eternal Mover of the heavens, 
Look with a gentle eye upon this wretch! 
Oh, beat away the busy meddling fiend, 
That lays strong siege unto this wretch’s soul, 
And from his bosom purge this black despair ! 


Warwick. See, how the pangs of death do make him grin. 


(b) Meaning the Duke of Gloucester. 
118 


BOOK I.] REMORSE. [$ 117 


Salisbury. Disturb him not, let him pass peaceably. 


King Hen. Peace to his soul, if God’s good pleasure be! 
Lord Cardinal, if thou think’st on heaven’s bliss, 
Hold up thy hand, make signal of thy hope.— 
He dies and makes no sign; O God, forgive him! 


Warwick. So bad a death, argues a monstrous life. 


King Hen. Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all. 
Close up his eyes, and draw the curtain close ; 
And let us all to meditation. (c) 


M. Guillon relates the following remarkable case: ‘‘ The Chevalier de S 
had been engaged in seventeen ‘affairs of honor,’ in each of which his adver- 
sary fell. But the images of his murdered rivals began to haunt him night 
and day: and at length he fancied he heard nothing but the wailings and 
upbraidings of seventeen families—one demanding a father, another a son, 
another a brother, another a husband, &c. Harassed by these imaginary 
followers, he incarcerated himself in the monastery of La Trappe; but the 
French revolution threw open this asylum, and turned the Chevalier once more 
into the world. He was now no longer able to bear the remorse of his own 
conscience, or, as he imagined, the sight of seventeen murdered men, and there- 
fore put himself to death. It is evident that insanity was the consequence of 
the remorse, and the cause of the suicide.’’(d) 

Mr. De Quincey, in one of the volumes of his literary reminiscences, thus 
speaks of a duel between Coionel Montgomery and Captain Macnamara :— 

‘The Colonel, as is well known, a very elegant and generous young man, 
fell; and Captain Macnamara had thenceforward a worm at his heart, whose 
enawings never died. He was a post-captain; and my brother afterwards 
sailed with him in quality of midshipman. From him I have often heard 
affecting instances of the degree in which the pangs of remorse had availed to 
make one of the bravest men in the service a mere panic-haunted, and, in a 
moral sense, almost paralytic wreck. He that, whilst his hand was unstained 
with blood, would have faced an army of fiends in discharge of his duty, now 
fancied danger in every common rocking of a boat; he made himself, at times, 
the subject of laughter at the messes of the junior and more thoughtless officers; 
and his hand, whenever he had occasion to handle the spy-glass, shook (to use 
the common image), or rather shivered, like an aspen tree!” 

§ 117. Schiirmayer’s(e) views on this point are of peculiar interest, as indi- 
cating the conservative jealousy with which the continental authorities guard 
against that involuntary dissimulation on the patient’s part which makes real, 
and yet at the same time responsible emotions so difficult to distinguish from 
irresponsible disease. ‘‘Remorse,’’ he says, ‘often affects the mind so power- 
fully, as to assume the appearance of insanity. The smothered self-reproach 
of the criminal sometimes expresses itself in the shape of deep dejection, and 
sometimes in that of petulance and irritability. Almost every defendant who 
is guilty, will be seen to lapse at least periodically into a deep reverie, with 
the eyes staring into vacancy. The most consummate villains alone are exempt 


(c) King Hen. VI. part ii. Act 3. 

(d) Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, pp. 53, 54. See particularly Wharton on 
Theism, § 22. 

(e) See Gericht. Med. § 519. 


119 


§ 117] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOK I. 


from such feelings. Criminals generally endeavor to suppress the voice of 
conscience, because they fear to be betrayed by it. But this very reaction is 
perfectly legible in their faces, gestures, and general bodily condition. Under 
these circumstances the qualms of conscience frequently assume the appearance 
of disease. The accused, particularly if in confinement, does not sleep at night 
for weeks, and consequently looks pale and haggard, loses his appetite, and 
speaks with hesitation, and sometimes with trembling. When this condition 
reaches a point of great intensity, the guilty is visited by visions and hallu- 
cinations; avenging angels appear to him, or evil spirits, phantoms, or the 
shades of the dead and injured. Add to this a little superstition, and the 
victim is firmly convinced of the reality of these apparitions, and regards them 
as punishments sent from heaven. In the course of the trial itself, these 
symptoms are less perceptible; and generally the culprit hesitates to tell an 
official person what he suffers in seclusion, but the struggle within frequently . 
breaks out in spite of his efforts, or at least interferes with the coherence of . 
his speech. In such cases a man, perfectly hale in mind and body, will fre- 
quently talk at random, or at least express himself in so confused and stupid 
a manner as to induce doubts of his sanity. It is remarkabie, that those who 
confess their guilt are subject to these attacks equally with those who deny it. 
It might be supposed that the criminals who have made a public confession, 
would experience a regenerating sense of relief in consequence of having 
removed a load from their minds; but the confession often precedes the first 
sensations of remorse, by directing the attention to the moral and religious 
aspects of the deed. 

“This proves that even a confessed criminal should be treated with great 
circumspection. Instead of overwhelming him with reproaches, the victory 
gained by his integrity over his fears, should be held up to himself as a restorer 
of self-respect. 

“The more depraved order of culprits do not allow their consciences to 
drive them to despair, but only to petulance; but even this frame of mind 
sometimes goes so far as to lead the subject to do the most incomprehensible 
things, such as asserting things against reason, refusing to answer, or causing 
constant trouble and vexation in the prison. Such persons are often greatly 
misunderstood, sometimes by ascribing their offensive conduct solely to malice 
and spite, and sometimes by regarding them as demented, when, driven by their 
chagrin, they lose all reflection, and say or do things to their own injury. The 
consciousness of crime, coupled with the despair of expiation consequent upon 
having denied it, produce an internal schism which may result in the most 
singular and distracting phenomena. 

“A tolerably sure criterion of an awakened conscience is often to be found 
in the desire of the culprits for some consolatory assurance. Hven those who 
deny their guilt are generally anxious to know how they would be able to bear 
the condition of a criminal, sentenced according to law. In many cases there 
is an exaggerated idea of the impending punishment, still further increased 
by the imaginings which haunt the prisoner’s solitude. When such erroneous © 
notions come to the knowledge of the examining physician, it is perfectly 
right in him to correct them, and the information thus imparted will generally 

120 


BOOK I. | ANGER. [$ 119 


produce a change of feeling which must at once dispel every idea of mental 
derangement.’’(/) 


(2.) Anger. 


§ 118. “ Anger,” says Archbishop Tillotson,(g) an authority not distin- 
guished for undue poignancy of description, “is a short fit.-of madness, and 
he that is passionate and furious deprives himself of his reason, spoils his 
understanding, and helps to make himself a fool.”” And Dr. Cogan, while 
more exact, isnot much less emphatic: ‘‘ Anger is the strong passion or emo- 
tion, impressed or excited. by a sense of injury received or in contemplation ; 
that is, by the idea of something of a pernicious nature and tendency, being 
done or intended, in violation of some supposed obligation to a contrary con- 
duct.’’(h) 

§ 119. ‘A morbid paroxysm of anger,’’ Dr. Rush tells us, “appears in a 
preternatural determination of the blood to the brain, a turgescence of the 
bloodvessels of the face, a redness of the eyes, an increased secretion of saliva, 
which is discharged by foaming at the mouth, great volubility or a total sup- 
pression of speech, agitations of the fists, stamping of the feet, uncommon 
bodily strength, convulsions, hysteria, bleeding at the nose, apoplexy, and 
death. Sometimes this disease appears with paleness, tremors, sickness at 
the stomach, quick respiration, puking, syncope, and asphyxia. It is in this 
ease generally combined with fear, and hence arises the abstraction of blood 
from the brain, and its determination to other parts of the body.’’(z) 

“‘ Anger,’’ says Dr. Millingen, “‘ will vary in its symptoms according to our 
temperament. Thus we may observe what is called red anger and pale anger. 
The first is of a violent and explosive nature; it generally affects the sangui- 
neous; the circulation of the blood is accelerated—the breathing is difficult 
and panting—the features flushed—the swollen veins are visibly enlarged un- 
der the integuments—the eyes flash fire, and become injected with blood—the 
lips contracted expose the teeth—the voice becomes hoarse—the hearing diffi- 
cult—foam will occasionally issue from the mouth; in short, the features 
assume the character of mania, arising evidently from a congestion of blood 
on the brain; and under the violence of the paroxysm the angry man will: 
know no restraint, and is indeed, for the time being, a maniac, indiscriminate 
in his fury and perfectly uncontrollable. Such was the case of Charles VI. 
of France, who, being violently incensed against the Duke of Bretagne, and 
burning with a spirit of malice and revenge, could neither eat, drink, nor 
sleep, for many days and nights, and at length became furiously mad; as he 
was riding on horseback, drawing his sword and striking promiscuously every 
one who approached him. During this paroxysm of anger the violence of an 
infuriated man is such that he will break and destroy everything about him. 
On this sabject Dugald Stewart has entertained a singular notion, and fancied 
that in these outrageous acts, the angry man thinks that the inanimate objects 
that he attacks are alive. The following are his words: ‘The disposition 


(f) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 519. (9) Works, vol. i. ser. 4. 
(h) Cogan on the Passions, vol. i. p. 113. (2) Rush on the Mind, p. 332. 


121 


§ 120] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOK I. 


which we sometimes feel, when under the influence of instinctive resentment, 
to wreak our vengeance upon inanimate objects, has suggested to Dr. Reid a 
very curious query—whether, upon such an occasion, we may have a momen- 
tary belief that the object is alive? For my own part I confess my inclina- 
tion to answer this question in the affirmative.’ Now, with all due respect to 
the opinion of these psychologists, daily experience proves the fallacy of this 
doctrine ; for, although such furious persons may break and demolish pots and 
pans, bottles and glasses, chairs and tables, they rarely expend their fury on 
bystanders, who would not remain as quiet as crockery or furniture, but have 
recourse to retaliation, with capital and interest. ‘True, such men may beat 
their wives and their children, but they are more cautious with strangers ; and 
their outrageous conduct I consider as an indication of a cowardly desire to seek 
revenge, rather than a resentful spirit to avenge wrongs or insults; and these 
outbreaks are nothing more than a manifestation of power that mankind is 
ever proud of possessing and displaying. And I truly must again differ in 
opinion with the philanthropic Dugald Stewart, when he maintains that a 
man wishes to punish an offender with his own hands, owing to ‘a secret wish 
of convincing our enemy, by the magnanimity of our conduct, how much he 
had mistaken the object of his hatred.’ I must confess that I should feel 
much hesitation in exposing myself to this chance of a benevolent display of 
magnanimity on the part of an infuriated person.’’(7) 

§ 120. And a still higher metaphysical authority, Dr Reid, likens it to “a 
storm at sea, or a tempest in the air.”(%) “It does not, therefore, signify. 


(j) Mind and Matter, by J. G. Millingen, M. D., M. A., pp. 326-7-8. 


(x) ‘*Seepe, mihi cum amare meditanti incommoda vite, 
Spesque leves, trepidosque, metus vanosque labores, 
Gaudia que instabili semper fucata sereno, 

Non secus ac navis lato jactata profundo, 
Quam venti violensque xstus canusque magister 
In diversa trahunt,’’ &¢.—Buchananus. 


Montaigue (says Sir William Hamilton), alludes to these verses in the tenth chapter 
of his third book, but Without naming his master. He has thus puzzled his commen- 
tators. 

‘¢ Nubibus Atris 
Condita Nullum 
Fundere possunt 
Sidera lumen 
Si mare volvens 
Turbidus Auster 
Misceat eestum, 
Vitrea dudum, 
Parque serenis 
Unda diebus, 
Mox resoluto 
Sordida coeno 
Visibus obstat. 
Tu quoque, si vis 
Lumine claro 
Cernere verum, 
Tramite recto 
Carpere callem : 
Gaudia pelle, 
Pelle timorem, 
Spemque fugato, 
Nee dolor adsit, 
Nubila mens est, 
Vinctaque frenis 
Hee ubi regnant.’’—Boetheus. 


122 


BOOK I.] ANGER—REMORSE. [$ 121 


anything in the mind that is constant and permanent, but something that is 
occasional and has a limited duration, like a storm or tempest. Passion com- 
monly produces sensible effects, even upon the body. It changes the voice, the 
feature, and the gesture. The external signs of passion have in some cases a 
great resemblance to those of madness; in others to those of melancholy. It 
gives often a degree of muscular force and agility to the body, far beyond what 
it possesses in calm moments. ‘The effects of passion on the mind are not less 
remarkable. It turns the thoughts involuntarily to the objects related to it, so 
that a man can hardly think of anything else. It gives often a strange bias 
to the judgment, making a man quick-sighted in everything that tends to in- 
flame his passion and to justify it, but blind to everything that tends to mod- 
erate or allay it. Like a magic lantern, it raises up spectres and apparitions 
that have no reality, and throws false colors upon every object. It can turn 
deformity into beauty, vice into virtue, and virtue into vice. The sentiments 
of a man under its influence will appear absurd and ridiculous, not only to 
other men but even to himself, when the storm is spent and succeeded by a calm. 
Passion often gives a violent impulse to the will, and makes a man do what 
he knows he shall repent as long as he lives. That such are the effects of 
passion I think all men will agree. They have been described in lively colors 
by poets, orators and moralists in all ages.(/) But men have given more at- 
tention to the effects of passion than to its nature; and while they have co- 
piously and elegantly described the former they have not precisely described 
the latter.’ 

§ 121. Schiirmayer very justly remarks that in practice, anger and revenge 
afford much less difficulty, because much more readily distinguishable from in- 
sanity than is remorse. With the more depraved, experience tells us that 
that malignant hatred which led to crime, is often increased after the crime is 
committed, and is further aggravated by displeasure at the unfavorable testi- 
mony of witnesses. The fury of such miscreants is often directed against the 
judge, the keepers, and all who contribute to the execution of their sentence. 
In the case of Carrigan, who was recently convicted in North Carolina for 
murder, so high did his temper run, that the defendant, immediately after the 
verdict of conviction was rendered, drew forth a pistol, with which he aimed a 
shot at the prosecuting attorney, and then shot himself. 

In the fierce outburst of passion, it is quite possible to mistake a man under 
such circumstances for a madman, particularly where philanthropy predisposes 
the mind to doubt, and science and skill are not at hand to correct the first 
erroneous impressions. But these doubts will vanish if the examiner abstains 
from doing anything which may still further stimulate the passions, and pre- 


(/) Milton thus describes what Dr. Millingen calls pale anger :— 


‘Thus, while he spake, each passion dimm’d his face, 
Thrice charg’d with pale tre, envy, and despair, 
Which marr’d his borrow’d visage, and hetray’d 
Him counterfeit.’’ 


Thomson has also depicted the same state :— 


‘« Senseless and deformed, 
Convulsive anger storms at large, or pale 
And szt/ent settles into fell revenge.”’ 


$ 123] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOK I. 


serves an imperturbable composure. If after this, a severe reprimand is found, 
either at once, or after one or two repetitions, to make a wholesome impres- 
sion, and quell the excitement, there is certainly no derangement of the facul- 
ties; for a man with mania, or under the ravings of disease, will never be 
restored to self-control by the voice of reason. Where the man is very wild 
and debased, reproaches will not always answer the purpose, and it becomes 
necessary to menace him with coercion. 'The manner in which such announce- 
ments are received will also suffice to remove all doubts of his sanity. 


(3.) Shame. 


§ 122. The feeling of shame may also exert a very considerable influence 
‘on the demeanor of an accused man, not entirely lost to this sensation by a 
long course of vice. Shame rises and sinks with the feeling of honor: ‘shame 
is the disagreeable perception of the unfavorable opinions entertained of us by - 
others.”? Men of ordinary stamp, who value external honor far above the 
dignity of self-respect, can imagine no more dreadful fate than degradation in 
the eyes of the public. By injudicious treatment such individuals may be re- 
duced to a state closely resembling insanity, particularly in the form of melan- 
choly, which will disappear the moment a more judicious course is resorted to. 

It is not necessary for us, in order to make out the similarity of symptoms 
between insanity and excessive shame, to find many parallels to the story told 
by Dr. Benton, and cited without protest by Dr. Rush, of a schoolmaster who 
was accidentally discovered upon a close-stool by one of his scholars, and who 
in consequence became deranged. (m) 
~ § 123. Dr. Rush also tells us of an American Indian, who became deranged 
and destroyed himself, in consequence of seeing his face in a looking-glass 
soon after his recovery from a violent attack of smallpox. The loss of one 
eye by an affray in a country tavern, which materially affected the beauty of 
the face, produced derangement in a young man who was afterwards a patient 
in the Pennsylvania Hospital. There are other facts which show the depth 
of this attachment to beauty, in the human mind, and the poignancy of the 
distress occasioned by its loss or decay. The once beautiful Lady Wortley 
Montague tells a friend, in one of her letters, that she had never seen herself 
in a looking-glass for eleven years, solely from her inability to bear the morti- 
fying contrast between her appearance in the two extremes of her life. A 
clergyman in Maryland became insane in consequence of having permitted 
some typographical errors to escape, in a sermon which he had published on 
the death of General Washington. (7) 

A young gentleman of considerable promise, of high natural and acquired 
attainments, had been solicited to make a speech at a public meeting, which 
was to take place in the town in which he resided. - As he had never attempted 
to address extemporaneously a public body, he expressed himself extremely 
nervous as to the result, and asked permission to withdraw his name from the 
published list of speakers. This wish was not, however, complied with, as it 


(m) Rush on the Mind, p. 38. _ (n) Ibid: p. 40. 
124 


BOOK I.] SHAME—GRIEF. [$ 124 


was thought that when the critical moment arrived he would not be found 
wanting even in the art of public speaking. He had prepared himself with 
considerable care for the attempt. His name was announced from the chair: 
when he rose for the purpose of delivering his sentiments. The exordium was 
spoken without any hesitation; and his friends felt assured that he would 
acquit himself with great credit. He had not, however, advanced much in his 
prefatory observations when he hesitated, and found himself incapable of pro- 
ceeding. He then sat down, evidently excessively mortified. In this state he 
retired to a room where the members of the committee had previously met, and 
cut his throat with his penknife. He wounded the carotid artery, and died in 
a few minutes.(0) 


(4.) Grief. 


§ 124. Shakspeare very touchingly as well as naturally describes the symp- 
toms of that species of morbid grief which becomes monomaniac by self-con- 
finement and self-involution :— 


‘Grief fills up the room of my absent child ; 
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me; 
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words ; 
Remembers me of all his gracious parts ; 
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form ; 
Then I have reason to be fond of grief.’ 

‘“‘Physicians,”’ says Dr. Rush, ‘‘in their unsuccessful efforts to save life, are 
often obliged to witness this passion. It is of consequence for them, therefore, 
to be well acquainted with its symptoms and cure.. Its symptoms are acute 
and chronic. The former are, insensibility, syncope, asphyxia, and apoplexy; 
the latter are fever, wakefulness, sighing, with and without tears, dyspepsia, 
hypochondriasis, loss of memory, gray hairs, marks of premature old age in 
the countenance, catalepsy, and madness. It sometimes brings on sudden 
death, without any signs of previous disease, either acute or chronic. Dissec- 
tions of persons who have died of grief, show congestion in, and inflammation 
of the heart, with a rupture of its auricles and ventricles.(00) But there are 
instances in which the sympathy of the heart with the whole system is so com- 
pletely dissevered with grief, that the subject of it discovers not one mark of 
it in his countenance or behavior. On the contrary, he sometimes exhibits 
signs of unbecoming levity in his intercourse with the world. This state of 
mind soon passes away, and is generally followed by all the obvious and natural 
signs of the most poignant and durable grief. ‘There is another symptom of 
grief which is not often noticed, and that is profound sleep. I have often 
witnessed it, even in mothers, immediately after the death of a child. Crimi- 
nals, we are told by Mr. Akerman, the keeper of the Newgate, in London, 
often sleep soundly the night before their execution. The son of General Cus- 
tine slept nine hours the night before he was led to the guillotine, in Paris. 
These facts, and many similar ones that might be mentioned, will serve to 
vindicate the disciples of our Saviour for a want of sympathy with him in his 


| (0) Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, p. 64. 
(oo) Late researches, however, indicate such cases to be very exceptional. 


125 


§ 125] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOK I. 


suffering. They slept during his agony in the garden, because their “flesh was 
weak,’’ and in consequence of “‘sorrow having filled their hearts.’’(p) 

Tears, or the capacity to weep, form no test in this respect. ‘How often,” 
very beautifully says Dr. Cheyne,(pp) “have we, in passing through this vale 
of tears, heard the following lament: ‘Oh, that I could only ery! I feel as if 
it would so relieve me! There seems nothing natural in my grief. I, who 
wept so bitterly for my father, have not a single tear to shed for my child.’ 
This tearless state sometimes remains to the very end of life; and we may hear 
individuals, who were originally possessed of the liveliest affections, declare : 
‘River since my husband, son, or daughter died, my affections have been frozen, 
and my eyes dried up.’ It is very generally observed, when the first bitterness 
of grief is overpast—when the more violent, selfish, or ecstatic stage of the 
passion has had time to subside—that tears will again begin to flow.’ 

One distinction, however, may be relied on with almost certainty. Grief 
may be, in most cases, relieved by the counter-irritation of some affection other ~ 
than that wounded ; but ¢nsanity never. Bishop Jebb, in his one hundred and 
thirty-ninth letter to Mr. Knox, very touchingly illustrates this: ‘“ Mr. Wilber- 
force one day proposed to take me out to pass next Tuesday with our valuable 
friend, Mrs. H. Thornton, at Clapham. I most gladly embraced the offer. 
She was much affected, and spoke freely to me about her feelings. At first she 
had been reduced to a state of inert grief, which would have made her willingly 
lie down in the same bed with him that was just gone, and die with him. A 
sense of affection and duty to her children soon roused her from this torpor, and 
she then felt, and continued many days to feel, as if she were in heaven. This 
high-wrought feeling, however, could not long remain, and nature since has 
had its griefs and tears.” ‘On this passage,” says Dr. Cheyne, ‘“‘we would 
offer the following short observation. By the ‘inert’ state of her grief, we 
understand that, though it was profound, so that she willingly would have 
died with her husband, yet that it was without its natural expression; there 
was no wailing. Then another affection was roused, and that assurance of 
Divine protection, which is the inheritance of the servants of God, filled her 
mind with gratitude and joy. Lastly, as the ecstasy subsided, and when her 
anguish was exhausted, nature had its ‘griefs and tears.’ It is always desirable 
that tears should come to the relief of the deeply afflicted ; and it is easier to 
allow the first gush of grief to be over, before we attempt, by religious con- 
sideration, to moderate its poignancy.”? | 


(5.) Home-sickness (Nostalgia).(q) 


§ 125. This often assumes a shape hardly distinguishable from Hysteria. 
Thus Goldsmith writes, :— 


(p) Rush on the Mind, pp. 346, 347. 

(pp) Cheyne on Derangement in Connection with Religion, p. 107. 

(q) Orfila gives the following symptoms by which Nostalgia may be recognized : 
Profound sadness to which succeeds a gloomy melancholy, silence and a great desire 
to be alone, a great indifference for everything which does not recall the objects re- 
gretted. Spasmodic contraction of the stomach, prostration of mind and body, ma- 
rasmus, &¢.— Méd. Lég., vol. i. p. 331. Paris, 1848. 

126 


BOOK I.| HOME-SICKNESS.—SIMULATED INSANITY. [$ 127 


‘¢ The intrepid Swiss that guards a foreign shore, 
Condemn’d to climb his mountain-cliffs no more, 
If chance he hear the song, so sweetly wild, 
Which, on these cliffs, his infant hours beguil’d, 
Melts at the long-lost scenes, that round him rise, 
And sinks a martyr to repentant sighs.” 


“Tt is remarkable,’”’ says Dr. Rush, “that this disease is most common 
among the natives of countries that are the least desirable for beauty, fertility, 
climate, or the luxuries of life. They resemble, in this respect, in their influ- 
ence upon the human heart, the artificial objects of taste which are at first dis- 
agreeable, but which from habit take a stronger hold upon the appetite than 
such as are natural and agreeable.”’(7) 

§ 126. Nostalgia, as Siebold(s) tells us, develops itself principally in that 
period of childhood approaching puberty. When the malady is of long con- 
tinuance, it runs into voluntary starvation, sleeplessness, delirium, derangement 
of the senses, together with the usual melancholy consequences of unsatisfied 
desire. Sometimes symptoms of Pyromania are discoverable. Thus we are 


told of a girl of ten years who exposed two children, committed to her care, 
to the flames, under the stress of home-sickness. (2) 


2d. Simulated Insanity.(u) 


§ 127. In every case, the examining physician will be led at once to in- 
quire, whether the apparent abnormal state of mind is real or feigned. One 
thing, however, must not be overlooked, and this is that impostors of this kind 
are but very rarely able to keep up the character of the disease assumed, with 
consistency, and without involving themselves in contradictions. ‘‘ How hard 
it is on the stage,” remarks Dr. Bucknill, (ww) “and for a few minutes only, for a 
man to represent the manners of a sailor, a peasant, an old man, or any other 
characteristic manners, so that the deception shall be acknowledged complete ! 
But the histrionic powers of a feigning maniac or melancholic must be kept 
for days and weeks on the stretch in the representation of manners and modes 


(r) Rush on the Mind, pp. 38, 39. 

(s) Gericht. Med. § 213. 

(t) See Jahrb. des Osterreich Staates,15 Bd. 1834. § 597. See also the article 
under the head of Heimweh, by Jesse, in the Encyclop. Wérterp. der Med. Wissensch. 
Band 25. Berl. 1841. § 292. 

(uv) In relation to simulated insanity, M. Orfila says, that as there exists in the 
world a very false idea of madmen, the one who simulates insanity, after this idea, 
will perform, at every instant, contradictory and false acts; thus, he will pretend not 
to remember his past actions, he will not recognize those whom he knows very well, 
he will not make a single correct reply to questions that are addressed to him. His 
features will not have the expression of such a violent condition ; he cannot for so long 
a time prevent himself from sleeping ; he will play the fool particularly whilst he thinks 
himself observed; finally, his pretended malady will not have developed itself until 
he feared the pursuit of justice; it will not have been preceded by that originality of 
character, by those marked symptoms of moral disorder which are observable in the 
majority of cases of insanity.—Méd. Lég., tome i. p. 400. Paris, 1848. See also 
Méd. Lég. J. Briand, p. 396. Paris, 1852. See on this point, Principles of Medical 
Psychology, being the outlines of a course of Lectures by Baron Ernest von Feuchter- 
sleben, M. D. Vienna, 1845. Translated from the German by the late H. Evans 
Lloyd, Esq. Revised and edited by B. G. Babington, M. D., F. R. 8., &c. London, 
printed for the Sydenham Society, 1847, p. 376. See, also, an article by Dr. Bucknill, 
13 Am. Journ. of Ins. 354. 

(wu) Bucknill on the Diagnosis of Insanity. 


127 


§ 123] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOK I. 


of thought far more difficult to imitate than those which are usually the sub- 
ject of theatrical art. Dr. Rush is reported to have discriminated feigned 
from real insanity by the relative rapidity of the pulse; Dr. Knight and other 
writers have claimed the same power for the sense of smell. At the present 
day the deposits in the urine would, we suppose, be appealed to. Much reli- 
ance, however, is not to be placed upon any one, or even upon several, of the 
physical signs of nervous disturbance. They have a scientific but scarcely a 
diagnostic value. They may serve to direct the inquiries of the physician, or 
even to confirm his opinion founded upon other data ; but standing by them- 
selves, they are of little importance in the diagnosis of insanity.” 

It is important to adopt here the precautions prescribed by Schiirmayer,(v) 
‘to watch the subject most closely when he supposes himself least observed, as 
_ at such times he generally drops his mask, which is irksome to him. In all 
such investigations the physician must never show the most trifling sign of 
doubt or hesitation ; he must, on the contrary, appear to know everything, in - 
order to discover everything, and must present a firm and imposing front in 
all his intercourse with the accused. Where the disease in question is of such 
a nature, as, if genuine, to interfere with or suspend sleep, it becomes neces- 
_ sary to watch the patient unobserved at night. To subject him purposely to 
mental irritation or excitement is improper, reprehensible, and liable to cause 
harm. Threats of painful medicines or operations are admissible where the 
processes threatened are really indicated by therapeutics, but the execution of 
such threats must depend upon the principles laid down in another part of © 
this work, in reference to the tests applicable to feigned bodily diseases. 


§ 128. Schiirmayer gives us the following reasons for suspecting dissimula- ~ 


tion or deception. | 

1. When the party has committed some act, the punishment of which he 
would escape by inducing a belief in his aberration of mind, in this case the 
comparison of the offence committed, with the form of mental disease assumed, 
will often suffice to confirm the suspicion. (w) 

9. When the individual has frequently expressed an aversion to a particular 
occupation or profession he is expected to assume, as, for instance, that of a 
soldier. 

3. When the general character of the party is open to imputations of ma- 
lice and deceit. (x) | » 

4. When it is impossible to discover any previous indications, physical or 
mental, of the pretended derangement of the mental faculties. (y) 

A late German trial brings before us a state of facts well worthy of being 
considered by those concerned in religious and moral education. The parents 
of two young girls, one eleven and the other fifteen, claimed public relief on 
the ground that the latter were subject to epileptic fits. The patients were 
for months subject to medical scrutiny, and were received into an hospital, 


(v) Gericht. Med. § 392. 


i Compare Heinroth, System der psychisch gerichtlichen Medizin. Leipsic, 1825, 
p- 453. 


(x) Heinroth, Medizinische Zeichenlehre. Ausgabe von Danz. Leipsic, 1812. p. 380. 
(y) Friedreich, handbuch der gerichtlichen Psychologie, p. 155. 


128 


BOOK I.] SIMULATED INSANITY. [$ 129 


where, during intermission, as well as of paroxysm, they were under constant 
observation. The elder, in particular, was affected by the disease in its worst 
shape ; being prostrated by convulsive attacks of extraordinary violence, which 
afterwards left her in a state of entire exhaustion. Suspicion, however, was 
aroused as to the entire sincerity of the patients, and one of the hospital offi- 
cers, against the vehement protestations of the medical attendants, threatened 
the eldest of the two with severe discipline in case she should have another 
fit. The attempt was successful. No fit was repeated ; and the children con- 
fessed that partly to excite sympathy, partly to obtain money, the disease had 
been simulated. 

Now, in connection with this, observe the following remarks of Dr. Carter, 
in his work on the Influence of Education on Diseases of the Nervous Sys- 
tem :— 

‘‘When once a young woman has discovered her power to produce a hys- 
teric paroxysm at will; and has exercised it for her own gratification, without 
regard to the anxiety or annoyance it may entail on her friends, a very re- 
markable effect is speedily produced upon her whole mental and moral nature. 
The pleasure of receiving unwonted sympathy, once tasted, excites a desire for 
it that knows no bounds; and when the fits have become familiar occurrences, 
and cease to excite attention, their effect is often heightened by the designed 
imitation of some other disease.’’ Then, in the words of Dr. Carter, “ plea- 
sure is morbidly associated with many ideas which ordinarily excite pain. 
‘The girl, though originally amiable and disinterested, derives a strange satis- 
faction from the sight of the anxiety, and even the distress of her friends ; and 
thus proverbially enjoys the idea of deceiving them.”’ 

So says another writer: ‘A person in the shattered state of mind that fol- 
lows some sudden afiliction, finds the sympathy of friends excited by very de- 
monstrative grief. This in itself to many minds is a natural outlet, and then 
with that strange selfish cunning which never tempts the heart so fiercely as 
in such moments of desolation, the paroxysms of grief are so timed as best to 
attract the attention and secure the sympathy of those around. When coarse 
ordinary grief ceases to do this, new forms of broken-heartedness are partly 
felt, partly feigned. Food is often refused. Sleep is rejected. Very often 
these conditions, from being partly affected, become wholly real. And yet, 
strangely enough, the sufferer, when he thinks himself unobserved, will desist 
from them. He will put on his mourner’s air when he knows he is looked at ; 
but when he thinks himself unobserved, will permit himself to be diverted. 
The only cure in such a case is for those about not to pamper the hysteria, if 
such it be, by petting and soothing it, otherwise it may become irradicable.’’ 

§ 129. The species of mental unsoundness most frequently imitated by the 
vulgar is deliriwm—which, at the same time, is that which it is the most diffi- 
cult to sustain. Sheridan, with his usual tact, hit upon this when he made 

the mock-author in the Critic throw his heroine into precisely this stage :— 


Enter Tilburina and Confidant, mad, according to custom. 


Sneer. But, what the deuce, is the confidant to be mad, too? 

Puff. To be sure she is; the confidant is always to do what her mistress does; weep when 
she weeps, smile when she smiles, go mad when she goes mad. Now, madam confidant—but 
keep your madness in the background, if you please. 


9 129 


§ 129] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOK I 


Tilb, . . . The wind whistles—the moon rises—see, 
They have kill’d my squirrel in his cage! 
Is this a grasshopper?—Ha! no; itis my 
Whiskerandos; you shall not keep him— 
I know you have him in your pocket. 
An oyster may be cross’d in love !—who says 
A whale ’s a bird ?—Ha! did you call, my love?— 
He ’s here! he’s there! He ’s everywhere! 
Ah me! he’s nowhere! [Batt. 


Puff. There, do you ever desire to see any body madder than that ? 

Sneer. Never while I live! 

Puff. You observed how she mangled the metre ? 

Dang. Yes—egad, it was the first thing made me suspect she was out of her senses ! 

Sneer. And pray, what becomes of her? 

Puff. She is gone to throw herself in the sea, to be sure ; and that brings us at once to the 
scene of action, and so to my catastrophe—my sea-fight, I mean. 

Tt is much more easy to counterfeit imbecility in its lower stages, as 7naction 
rather than action is then required. 

“The feigning madman in all ages has been apt to fall into the error of 
believing that conduct utterly outrageous and absurd is the peculiar character- 
istic of insanity. The absurd conduct of the real madman does not indicate 
a total subversion of the intelligence; it is not utterly at variance with the 
reasoning processes ; but it is consistent either with certain delusive ideas, or 
with a certain perverted state of the emotions. In the great majority of 
cases, feigned insanity is detected by the part being overacted in outrageous- 
ness and absurdity of conduct, and by the neglect of those changes in the 
emotions and propensities which form the more important part of real in- 
sanity. Sometimes mania is simulated—the man howls, raves, distorts his 
features and his postures, grovels on the ground, or rushes about his room 
and commits numberless acts of violence and destructiveness. If he has had 
the opportunity of observing a few cases of real insanity, and if he is a good 
mimic, he may succeed in inducing a person who only watches him for a few 
minutes to believe that he is in the presence of a case of acute mania; but if 
the case is watched for a few hours or days, the deception becomes apparent. 
No muscular endurance and no tenacity of purpose will enable a sane man 
to keep up the resemblance of acute mania; nature soon becomes exhausted, 
and the would-be patient rests, and at length sleeps. The constant agitation, 
accompanied by symptoms of febrile disturbance, by rapid pulse, foul tongue, 
dry and harsh or pallid, clammy skin, and the long-continued sleeplessness of 
acute mania, cannot be successfully imitated. The state of the skin alone will 
frequently be enough to unmask the pretender. If this is found to be healthy 
in feeling, and sweating from the exertion of voluntary excitement and effort, 
it will afford good ground for suspicion. If after this the patient is found to 
sleep soundly and composedly, there will be little doubt that the suspicion is 
correct. 

‘“‘Chronic mania may be imitated ; and if this should be done by an accurate 
observer of its phenomena, who also happens to be an excellent mimic, it can- 
not be denied that the imitation may deceive the most skilful alienist. It is 
remarkable, that two of the most perfect pictures of insanity presented to us 
in the plays of Shakspeare are instances of feigned madness—namely, the 
madness of Hamlet, assumed to escape the machinations of his uncle, and that 
of Edgar, in Lear, assumed to escape the persecutions of his brother. These 
inimitable representations of the phenomena of insanity are so perfect that in 

130 


BOOK I.] SIMULATED INSANITY. [$ 181 


their perusal we are insensibly led to forget that they are feigned. In both 
instances, however, the deception was practised by educated gentlemen; and 
on the authority of the great dramatic psychologist it may, perhaps, be ac- 
cepted, that the phenomena of insanity may be feigned by a skilful actor like 
Hamlet so perfectly, that no flaw can be detected in the representation. For- 
tunately for the credit of psychologists, insanity is rarely feigned except by 
ignorant and vulgar persons, who are quite unable to construct and to act out 
a consistent system of disordered mind. It must be remembered that all the 
features of every case of insanity form a consistent whole, which it requires 
as much intelligence to conceive and to imitate, as it does to conceive and to 
imitate any dramatic character. The idea which the vulgar have of madness 
is of quite a different kind. They represent it as a monster, half man, half 
beast ; the emotions they represent unchanged and human, the intellectual 
functions they represent entirely perverted, grovelling, and bestial. They 
think that madness entirely alters the character of a man’s perceptions and 
utterly destroys his judgment, so that he not only ploughs the shore and sows 
salt for seed, but that he cannot recognize his own son or avoid the destruc- 
tion of his life. In more homely cases it will be found that men feigning in- 
Sanity pretend that they cannot read or write, or count ten correctly, or tell 
the day of the week, or how many children they have; they answer every 
question wrongly, which a real lunatic, who could be made to understand the 
question and to answer it at will, would certainly answer right.’ (yy) 

§ 130. The physiognomy of mature madness, does not admit of imitation— 
though the case is otherwise with imbecility. ‘The demeanor of the individual 
under threats, or even under the application of painful remedies, is a criterion 
of inferior value, because skilful impostors withstand the test, and because 
many who are really affected, particularly before the disease has assumed a 
settled character, manifest fear and dread of such remedies, and retain, in a 
considerable degree, sensibility to pain. The torpor of the stomach and bowels 
under the use of emetics and purgatives is equally unreliable, because the same 
condition is found unconnected with unsoundness of mind; of greater value 
is sleeplessness, which a deceiver will not long sustain after the fashion of 
lunatics.(z) | 

§ 131. The shortest road to certainty(a) is by comparing the case in hand 
with those recorded or experienced, and by a strict application of the induc- 
tive tests. Experience teaches that the various abnormal conditions of the 
mind have certain symptoms in common, by means of which they admit of 
being arranged in greater and smaller subdivisions, and finally of being re- 
duced to certain clearly defined forms and combinations of forms. Although 
every case, to a certain extent, furnishes its own rule, yet this logical process 
will be of great avail in detecting dissimulation, on the one hand, or ground- 
less imputation of insanity, on the other. The more the phenomena of a case 
of alleged insanity subject to examination differ from recorded observations, 
or the more a person of dubious insanity presents an array of symptoms at 


(yy) Bucknill on the Diagnosis of Insanity. 

(z) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. 2 533. See also ante, §§ 100,101. 

(a) Ellinger Ueber die anthropologischen Momente der Zurechnungsfachigkeit, p. 97. 
131 


§ 182] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOK I 


variance with the form of the disease to which they ought to belong, the more 
reason is there to guard against deception.(>) At the same time, it must be 
admitted that the science of psychical medicine has not attained such a degree 
of perfection, as to exclude entirely the possibility of cases arising which would 
not admit of being classed with any of those already observed and noted. At 
times they incline to mere moral perversity, and are often treated as such for 
years; or the disease itself is not yet clearly developed; or, finally, it has 
apparently ceased, or arrived at a stage in which the patient is able to control 
and direct his condition, as a drunkard his intoxication.(c) 

§ 132. For various reasons, simulation is not always to be inferred from 
the absence of a trace of insanity at the time of the investigation. (d) 

1. Patients, whose minds are unsound on one subject only, have the power 
of burying their madness in their own hearts, to such an extent as to betray 
no sign of derangement in the course of the examination ; because it is not 
necessary that the disturbance of one mental function should impair the action 


(b) Mare, Die Geisteskrankheiten, &c., vol. i. p. 104. 

(c) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 533. 

“Whether the following case was or was not one of simulation cannot yet be known; 
the recapture of the convict may, perhaps, hereafter determine the question. John 
Jakes was convicted at the Devon Easter sessions, 1855, of pocket-picking. Previous 
convictions having been proved, he was sentenced to four years’ penal servitude. On 
hearing the sentence, he fell down in the dock as if in a fit of apoplexy. When 
removed to the gaol, he was found to be hemiplegic and apparently mindless. He, 
however, did some things which did not belong to dementia following apoplexy; for 
instance, he was designedly filthy, and even ate his own excrements. His insanity 
was certified by the surgeon of the gaol, and by a second medical man, and he was 
removed to the asylum. Notwithstanding the medical certificates of his insanity, the 
convicting magistrates, who knew his character as a burglar and a criminal of great 
ability, thought that he was feigning. Warned by their caution, I examined the man 
carefully. He had all the symptoms of hemiplegia: the toe dragged in walking, the 
uncertain grasp of the hand, a slight drawing of the features, the tongue thrust to the 
paralyzed side—all these symptoms were present in a manner so true to nature, that, 
if they were feigned, the representation was a consummate piece of acting founded 
upon accurate observation. In the asylum the patient was not dirty; he was tranquil 
and apparently demented ; he had to be fed, to be dressed, and to be undressed, to be 
led from place to place; he could not be made to speak ; he slept well. On the night 
of the 17th of August, 1856, he effected his escape from the asylum, in a manner which 
convinced the magistrates that their opinion of his simulation was just, and that he 
had succeeded in deceiving some four or five medical men. He converted the handle 
of a tin cup into a false key, wherewith he unlocked a window guard; through the 
window he escaped by night into the garden; from thence he clambered over a door, 
eight feet high, and afterwards over a wall of the same height. He got clear away, 
probably joined his old associates, and has never been heard of since. 

“Tt is hard to say which is the least improbable, a representation of hemiplegia and 
dementia, so perfect as to deceive several men, forewarned against deception; or the 
escape of a really paralytic patient by the means described. It must be remembered 
that the patient was an accomplished housebreaker, and that things impossible to other 
lunatics might have been accomplished by him. 

“The fifth report of the inspectors in Ireland states that several cases of feigned 
insanity, to defeat the ends of justice, have come under the official cognizance of the 
inspectors during the year. One young woman, who had murdered her husband, dis- 
played the most extraordinary determination; although secretly watched day and 
night for weeks, she never deviated from the line of deception; she was, however, 
tried, convicted, and executed. The cases of other murderers who feigned insanity— 
namely, William Quinlan and John Grady—are also recorded. Unfortunately, the 
carefully prepared report is an official document, and not a scientific record; and, 
therefore, the manner in which the inspectors detected these impositions, and secured 
the administration of justice, is not made known to us.”—Bucknill on the Diagnosis 
of Insanity. 

(d) Compare Friedreich, p. 165. 

132 


BOOK I.] FEIGNED INSANITY. [$ 184 


of the others. There are many cases, which have been in part noticed, and 
some of which will appear in the course of the following pages, in which the 
sufferer is insane on one subject alone, while all the other operations of his 
mind proceed in their normal manner, so that any one unacquainted with the 
fixed idea which controls him, would pronounce him perfectly rational. (e) 

2. It is established by experience, that lunatics, even when their disease is 
not that of monomania, enjoy intervals in which their understanding has not 
only its normal vigor, but even displays uncommon powers. (/) 

3. A genuine mental disease may be suspended or removed by the very 
circumstance which gives rise to the investigation, by analogy to the cases of 
madmen restored to health by great mental and moral shocks, as well as of 
persons attempting suicide from melancholy or despair, who are cured of their 
folly by the impressions received while making the attempt. (q) 

§ 133. Another consideration which must never be lost sight of in investi- 
gations of the kind is this, that a pretended mental disease may turn into a 
real one.(h) A» man who makes every effort to appear deranged, may be so 
much affected by his efforts, that what he pretends may assume a reality in his 
mind, and he become in fact insane.(z) In conclusion, there is also a class of 
cases in which genuine paroxysms of madness alternate with pretended ones, 
which calls for especial caution in pronouncing upon them.(7) 

§ 134. There are persons of unsound mind, who, in the incipient stages of 
the disease, retain sufficient consciousness to endeavor, for various reasons, to 
conceal their malady. A continued attentive observation of such individuals 
will, however, suffice, in general, to furnish the data for a correct view of the 
case. But even in cases of confirmed insanity, an occult condition, so-called, 
may occur, in which the madman tries and manages to conceal his ailment, or 
rather his impulses, fancies, and feelings. This is particularly frequent in lucid 
intervals and in partial insanity.(&) Under such circumstances, in addition 
to the maxims adduced under the head of dubious cases, the following sugges- 
tions will be found useful. To interrogate the patient directly to the point is 
of very little avail, for if he is anxious to conceal his madness, any questions 
will inspire him with a suspicion of the questioner which must frustrate all 
such efforts. More circuitous means are preferable. 

1. By bringing the patient into a succession of different relations of life, and 
regarding closely the effect produced upon him, some indications of his fixed 


(e) Compare Wagner, Beitrage sur Philosophischen Anthropologie. Vienna, 1794. 
Vol. i. p. 114. Perfect, Annalen einer Anstalt fiir Wahusinnige. Hanover, 1804. 
p- 341. Esquirol, Note sur la monomanie homicide. Paris, 1837, p. 3. 

(f) Muratori, Ueber die Hinbildungs Kraft. Leipsic, 1785. Vol. ii. p. 8. Reil’s 
Rapsodien, p. 76. 

(g) Etudes Medico-Psychologiques sur l’Alienation Mentale, par L. F, E. Renaudin. 
Chap. ix. p. 522. Paris, 1854. 

(h) For an interesting essay on Monomania induced by Imitation, see 1 Am. Journ. 
of Insan. 116. See ante, § 128. (2) Ibid. p. 172. 

(j) Compare Neumann, Die Krankheiten des Vorstellungsvermoegens. Leipsic, 
1852, p. 397. And Pye, Aufsaetze, &c., aus der gerichtlichen Arzneiwissenschaft. 
Third series, p. 219. And see particularly Schiirmayer, § 535, whence the above 
observations are drawn. . 

(k) Friedreich, Diagnostik, p. 38 ; and his Handbuch der gerichtlichen Psychologie, 
p. 175. 


133 


“§ 139] FROM WHAT INSANITY IS TO BE DISTINGUISHED. [BOOK I. 


ideas may be made to escape him. If the subject of his lunacy is thus brought 
into question, by contradicting his views in connection with it, the perversion 
of ‘his intellect will be doubly apparent. (4k) 

§ 135. 2. Amelung’s advice is to furnish the party with pen, ink, and paper, 
and induce him, under some pretext or other, to write; he will not be able to 
refrain from setting down something which will throw more or less light on 
the nature of his derangement. 

§ 136. 8. Heindorf proposes that the physician should narrate the patient’s 
own history, or so much of it as he had learned or could surmise, to the patient, 
as the history of the physician; this is to enlist the confidence of the patient 
and make him suppose a parallel between his own case and that of the examiner, 
so that the dulce habere soctum malorum may elicit circumstances which he 
would otherwise have concealed. 

§ 137. 4. A similar proposal is to associate the individual with another, of 
equal rank, degree of education, social position, &c., with himself, as a con- 
fidant, as persons of this description generally display more frankness towards 
people of their own order, than towards those whom they regard as above 
them. This idea, however, it will be easily seen, is very difficult of practical 
application. 

The tests which may be applied at a medico-legal examination have been 
noticed under a previous head.(a) 

§ 138. Though patients of this kind may conceal, they can never deny their 
fixed ideas. Many persons, says Heinroth, who, in a healthy state, had no 
scruples in telling a large series of falsehoods, whenever their interest required 
it, or a confession of the truth would subject them to a disagreeable exposure, 
forget all this the moment they have a fixed idea to maintain. Then they 
overlook every advantage, and stand at no absurdity and no disgrace. To 
hold fast the fancy which enchains them, is their only aim. If the physician 
can discover this fancy, he has but to ply the party with questions in reference 
to it, to make him betray himself, and in many cases, disclose more than the 
inquirer had ever thought of investigating. (/) 

§ 189. In this view it is peculiarly important not to lose sight of latent 
insanity, or insania occulta,(m) illustrations of which have been given under a 
previous head(mm). This term is used to designate an unsoundness of mind — 
which becomes perceptible externally, and consequently to others, only by the 
commission of a crime, the motive of which is derived exclusively from the 
mental disorder. The forms it assumes may vary, as even furor transitorius 
may issue from insania occulta. Whatever difference of opinion exists as to 
the possibility and the explanation of occult insanity, the facts of experience 
compel us to consider such a condition as possible. But to detect and sub- 
stantiate it in any given case will be attended with more or less difficulty, ac- 
cording to the circumstances, and must be undertaken with reference to the same 
criteria as were pointed out in regard to the furor transitorius.(n) | 


(kk) See ante, §§ 89-92. (a) Ante, § 100. 

(/) See particularly Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 536; and also L. Krahmer, face 
buch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 122. 

(m) Friedreich, 580. (mm) § 110. (n) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 553. 


134 


BOOK I.] DISEASES OF THE SENSES. [$ 140 


In its special relations to medico-legal examination, tnsania occulta has 
been already discussed. (77) 


IV. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS AS CONNECTED WITH DERANGEMENT OF THE 
SENSES, AND DISEASE. 


Ist. Deaf and Dumb.(0) 


§ 140. The deaf and dumb, where their infirmity is congenital, or contracted 
in early infancy, are always in an abnormal mental and moral condition, owing 
to the absence of hearing and speech, the two main faculties for the culture of 
the mental and moral man.(p) For the same reason, only this description of 
the deaf and dumb comes under consideration, and in every case the point of 
inquiry will be the degree of development of the mental and moral powers; 
that is to say, of the power of understanding the consequences and the wrong- 
fulness of the act committed. What will always exert great influence, is the 
question whether the deaf and dumb person has received any, and what in- 
struction ; where no instruction has been efficient, there is always great reason 
to conclude that the psychological conditions are wanting upon which moral 
responsibility depends.(q) The most difficult part of the task is always the 
examination of the individual, which, to lead to a reliable result, requires the 
assistance of an adept—that is to say, a teacher of the deafand dumb. In 
pronouncing upon such cases, it must not be forgotten that the deaf and dumb 
have a peculiarly irascible disposition, and that many of them, especially those 
whose features are marked by froward, morose, gloomy and sinister expression, 
and more or less resemble those of the Cretins, are born with a tendency to 
deceit, malice, cunning, duplicity, and cruelty.(7) 

In regard to the form and manner in which the intellectual condition of the 
deaf and dumb should be examined and probed, Hoffbauer and, after him, © 
Friedreich have given a series of directions, substantially as follows: Where 
the deaf and dumb person is able to understand spoken words by following the 
motions of the lips, the inquirer must speak distinctly and with marked articu- 
lation, so as to enable the patient to see what he says. Where oral examina- 
tions are impracticable or unsatisfactory, the scrutiny, if possible, must be 
made in writing, when it becomes especially important to propound simple 
questions, intelligible to every one. But they must not be such merely as the 
patient is likely to expect beforehand, for these might be answered promptly 
and correctly ; not, however, because he has properly examined into and un- 
derstood their meaning, and properly concentrated in his own thoughts the 
answer he returns, but because he considers the question as written down, with- 
out thinking further about it, as a request to commit to paper that which per- 


(nn) Ante, § 87. 

(o) See an interesting treatise on this point, 8 Am. Journ. of Ins. 17. L. Krahmer, 
Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 122. 

(p) Friedreich Handbuch der Geritchtlichen Psychologie, p. 659. 

(q) See J. Briand, Méd. Lég., article sur la surdi-mutité, p. 569, Paris, 1852. See 
also M. Orfila, Méd. Lég. sur la surdi-mutité, tome. i. p. 460. Paris, 1848. Also, 
Traité des maladies de l’oreille et de audition, par Itard, vol. xi. 

(r) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 562. . 

135 


§ 140] DEAF AND DUMB. [BOOK I. 


haps would be his answer if he thought at all about it. So long as these 
answers are correct or, if not correct, at least congruous, there is room to be- 
- lieve that the questions were understood by the patient, and that he is able, to 
a certain extent, to make himself intelligible to others by means of writing. 
But the contrary does not appear if his answers are incongruous. But if 
several answers are incongruous, and particularly if it is found that a certain 
number of answers are constantly repeated, no doubt remains that the indi- 
vidual, however capable of tracing written characters, is not able, in the pro- 
per sense of the word, either to read or write. Where it is necessary to 
converse with the deaf and dumb person by means of signs, and for this pur- 
pose to call in the assistance of an expert, the capacity of the latter must be 
so far taken into account as to obtain the assurance that he will speak and 
interpret according to the intention of the judicial purpose had in view; for 
which reason, it will be important to instruct the interpreter fully on this sub- 
ject. It may also be necessary, and is declared indispensable by some,(s) to 
employ two interpreters at the hearing. It may be said, in passing, that such 
examinations are almost always unsatisfactory in their results. Itard is of 
opinion that the intellectual capacity of a deaf and dumb person should be 
tested by a written colloquy, and that if incapable of taking part in such 
communications, he is to be looked upon as lacking the necessary instruction, 
and idiotic. The same high authority further remarks, that if a deaf and dumb 
man denies having received any instruction, in the hope of escaping punish- 
ment on the score of ignorance, the proper course is to accuse him of a graver 
crime, and one of another character from that imputed to him,(¢) and that, on 
the whole, a deaf and dumb man who understands the questions asked of him 
in writing, is much the same as a man entirely compos mentis. Marc says 
that when the responsibility of a deaf and dumb person who has been taught 
to converse, is in question, a hearing should be had, without any judicial pre- 
paration, under the form of a conversation on general subjects entirely foreign 
to the offence committed, from which, by an association of ideas, a transition 
should be effected to general questions of morals and social order. 

‘There is but little difference,’’ says Orfila, ‘between the uninstructed deaf 
and dumb and the idiot, and such is the affinity existing between these two 
conditions of the intelligence, that more than the fortieth part of the deaf and 
dumb are afflicted with idiocy. It may be that this mental incapacity is the 
result of inaudition, or it may depend upon the same cause that paralyzed the 
auditive sense. It should be observed, however, that the idiot is incapable of 
learning, whilst the deaf and dumb, on the contrary, can receive an almost 
complete education. Even if the uninstructed deaf and dumb do not know all 
the consequences of certain criminal actions, still they are not slow in learning 
that these actions are censurable, and even that they are the subject of punish- 
ment.’’(w) Legally, however, though a party seeking to charge an unedn- 
cated deaf mute, has the burden on him of proving some degree of intelligence 


(s) Kleinschrod. 

(¢) If he knows how to write, he will have immediate recourse to this method, in 
order to justify himself, and will thus show the whole range of his intelligence. 

(u) Méd. Lég. tome i. p. 460. Paris, 1848. 


156 


BOOK I.] DISEASES OF THE SENSES. [$ 140 


on part of the defendant, yet when this is shown, the defendant can no longer 
plead his disability as a bar. 

The legal position of deaf and dumb persons is as follows :— 

(a) They can personally exercise control over property. In 1754, a 
woman born deaf and dumb, upon arriving at the age of twenty-one years, 
applied to the Court of Chancery for the possession of her real estate, and for 
the enjoyment of her personal estate (it is presumed that she had been pre- 
viously under the control of a guardian). Upon her appearing before the 
Chancellor, Lord Hardwicke, he put questions to her in writing, and receiving 
suitable written answers, her application was granted. (a) 

(b) They can take by descent, a point which we believe has never been 
disputed. 

(c) When otherwise of disposing capacity, they can make a valid will.(0) 

(d) Even though uneducated, if capable of intelligently bargaining (though 
it seems the burden of proving this is on the party seeking to charge them), 
they may make.a valid contract, or convey real and personal estate. 

The cases on this point are thus summed up by Dr. H. P. Peet, in a very 
interesting essay published by him in the thirteenth volume of the American 
Journal of Insanity :— 

In Brower v. Fisher,(¢) a deed was declared valid that had been made by an 
uneducated deaf-mute, it being shown, on inquiry by a commission of lunacy, 
that the grantor, though born deaf and dumb, “‘had sufficient intelligence for 
the management of himself and property, and was capable of communicating 
by signs and motions with persons with whom he was intimate, so as to be well 
understood, and of understanding them; that the jurors were of opinion that 
the defendant was not a lunatic, unless the fact of his having been born deaf 
and dumb, in judgment of law, made him a lunatic.”” The deaf-mute had sold 
his interest in his father’s estate to the plaintiffs for $375, which was proved 
to be a fair compensation under the circumstances, being assisted in making 
the sale by his mother and an intimate friend. Subsequently bringing suit on 
the bond then given, the purchaser was advised that the deed from a deaf- 
mute was not valid, and appealed to the Court of Chancery for his own pro- 
tection. Chancellor Kent decided that the deed was valid under the circum- 
stances; yet that ‘the bill does not appear to have been filed vexatiously, but 
rather to obtain, for greater caution, the opinion of the court on a point which 
had been left quite doubtful in many of the books, and which had never received 
any discussion here.’’ The Chancellor observes: “Upon the finding of the 
jury under the commission, in nature of a writ de lunatico inquirendo, I re- 
fused to appoint a committee, and adjudged that the defendant was not to be 
deemed an idiot from the mere circumstance of being born deaf and dumb. 
This is a clear, settled rule, and numerous instances have occurred in which 
such afflicted persons have demonstrably shown that they were intelligent and 
capable of intellectual and moral cultivation.” This is quite a safe assertion, 
even in this country, in 1820, the date of this case. After citing conflicting 


(a) Dickinson v, Blisset, 1 Dickens, 168. 
(b) See 2 Bradford’s Reports, 42, 265. 
(c) 4 Johnson’s N. Y. Chancery Reports, 441. 
137 


§ 140] DEAF AND DUMB. [BOOK I. 


eases and authorities, for which we refer our readers to the volume of reports, 
the learned and able Chancellor goes on to say: ‘Perhaps, after all, the pre- 
sumption, in the first instance, is, that every such person is incompetent. It 
is reasonable presumption, in order to insure protection and prevent fraud, and 
is founded on the notorious fact that the want of hearing and speech exceed- 
ingly cramps the powers and limits the range of the mind. ‘The failure of the 
organs necessary for general intercourse and communion with mankind op- 
presses the understanding; affigat humo divine particulam aure. A special 
examination, to repel the inference of mental imbecility, seems always to have 
been required ; and this presumption was all that was intended by the civil law, 
according to the construction of the ecclesiastical courts; for a person born 
deaf and dumb was allowed to make a will, if it appeared upon sufficient 
proof, that he had the requisite understanding and desire. I am satisfied that 
the plaintiff is justly to be exempted from the charge of a groundless and 
vexatious inquiry; and the course is not to punish the prosecutor of a charge 
of lunacy with costs, if the prosecution has been conducted in good faith, and 
upon probable grounds. I shall, therefore, dismiss the bill without costs.” 

The effect of this decision seems to be that a deaf-mute from birth is, in all 
cases, to be presumed incompetent to make a will or a contract, till his com- 
petency is proved; and that, if he sells property, and the buyer afterwards 
chooses to question his competency, he must defend himself at his own costs. 
We submit that it would be more in accordance with reason and justice to 
presume his competency, as in the case of men who hear and speak, when he 
has among his neighbors a reputation for intelligence and ability to manage 
his own affairs, and more especially when he has been taught to read and 
write. It is to be presumed that no man would make a contract with him, 
unless he had such a reputation for intelligence and competency; and if the 
purchaser of property from a deaf-mute neglected to ascertain this point before- 
hand, we, with all due respect to the high authority we have cited, respectfully 
submit that the laches is his own, and that he ought to bear the costs of an 
inquiry which he ought to have previously made himself. 

It is observable that Chancellor Kent, in the opinion before us, makes no 
distinction between deaf-mutes who have, and those who have not been edu- 
cated. Probably, at that early day, he was hardly aware of the nature of this 
distinction. Indeed, it is a fact that there are some uneducated deaf-mutes 
more intelligent in matters concerning their own affairs than are some of those 
who have spent years in an institution ; for all the care of the teacher cannot 
remedy the original want of capacity. Such cases are, however, rare. The 
fact of having been educated is one strong presumption of capacity of a deaf- 
mute to manage his own affairs; and if not educated, still his reputation for 
intelligence among his neighbors ought, as we have already observed, to be 
presumptive proof as to his capacity or incapacity. 

The capacity of making a contract involves the capacity of making a will; 
and we see, in the citation just given from Chancellor Kent, he refers to the 
testamentary capacity conceded to deaf-mutes by ‘‘the ecclesiastical courts,” 
where they were proved to have “the requisite understanding and desire,” in 
illustration of the capacity of a deaf-mute to execute a valid deed. From this 

138 


BOOK I.] DISEASES OF THE SENSES. [$ 140 


decision, therefore, and from the opinion expressed by Surrogate Bradford, 
before referred to, we are warranted in declaring the law to be that an intelli- 
gent deaf-mute, even if unable to write, and only able to make his wishes known 
by signs, can make a valid will, or valid deed, or bind himself to any other 
obligation or contract. And we have high legal authority for adding that, 
whatever may be the degree of his intelligence, he is bound for, and an action 
can be maintained against him for, necessaries suitable to his condition, unless 
it appear that the person who supplied them knew of his want of ordinary 
intelligence, and imposed upon him.(d) 

In the same volume of Johnson’s Chancery Reports (iv. p. 168) we find a 
case in which a woman, “unmarried, of the age of sixty years, deaf and dumb 
from infancy, and of such imbecility of mind as to be incapable of defending 
the suit,”’ in which she was legally a party with her brother and others, was 
admitted to appear and defend by guardian. No special inquiry was here 
made; the facts on which the application for the appointment of a guardian 
were founded being merely verified by affidavit. Here it will be seen the 
appointment of a guardian was grounded on “imbecility of mind,” and not 
merely on the defendant’s being deaf and dumb. She was doubtless unedu- 
cated, for at that date (1819) there were no deaf-mutes in the State of New 
York, sixty years of age, who had had the opportunity of receiving an educa- 
tion. Had she been educated, however, there can be no question that extreme 
‘“‘imbecility of mind,” though it would be less likely to supervene, would, if 
present, be a cause for appointing a guardian.(e) We find a French case in 
point recorded by Piroux, who informs us that he was called in as an expert, 
to give advice on the question whether Frances Bowry, one of his former 
pupils (at Nancy, in Eastern France), was in a condition to manage her own 
estate, or whether it would be for her benefit to name for her a conseil judi- 
ciare (a sort of half-guardian). ‘ Knowing,” he says, “that this young 
woman has no longer father or mother, that she is obliged to live with illite- 
rate persons, among whom her instruction cannot be continued, and, finally, 
that a sickness of nearly a year, which she had when in our establishment, has 
hindered her progress, we considered that it would be useful for her to name 
for her a consetl judiciare; and the tribunal has by a judgment confirmed 
our opinion.”’ 

(e) If compos menits they can contract matrimony.(/ ) 


(d) Baxter v. The Earl of Portsmouth, 7 D. and Ry. 614; 5 Barn. and Cress. 170; 
2 Car. and Pay. 178. 

(e) Since writing this paper we have examined the laws of Georgia, in which it is 
enacted that, “ Deaf and dumb persons shall be so far considered idiots in law as to 
authorize the inferior court to appoint guardians, etc.”—“ Provided it shall be made 
satisfactorily to appear to said court that such deaf and dumb person or persons are 
incapable of managing his or her estate, or him or her or themselves.” This is the 
only American legislative provision on this point that has come to our notice. Pos- 
sibly similar provisions may exist in the laws of other States; but we believe not in 
those of the North, Eastern, or Middle States. By the principles and practice of the 
common law, courts might, without special enactment, appoint guardians for any 
person satisfactorily shown to be incapable of managing his estate, whether deaf and 
dumb or not. See 2 Johnson’s N. Y. Chancery Rep. 235. It seems, then, the indig- 
nation expressed by a Georgia deaf-mute at the law just cited (Am. Annals, viii. 124) 
was rather unnecessary. 

(f) Swinburne on Spousals, cited 13 Am. Journ. Insan. 127. 


139 


§ 140] DEAF AND DUMB. [BOOK I. 


(f) They can be examined as witnesses in courts of justice; and for this 
purpose it is proper that their testimony should be interpreted through the 
~medium which they best understand. (q) | 

(g) They are legally responsible for crimes in the same way as other per- 
sons, though in determining the question of sanity, their disability, when not 
removed by education, should throw on the prosecution the burden of proving 
them to have some degree of intelligence. (h) 

“The favor of courts and jurists may also be justly invoked for a deaf person 
in cases where he has acted under erroneous impressions natural to one in his 
circumstances. Deaf-mutes, and deaf persons who are not quite dumb, are 
often suspicious and irritable, from their inability to hear and take part in 
what is going on around them. They sometimes take as intentional annoy- 
ance and insult gestures or practical jests, unskilfully made, which were merely 
intended as friendly pleasantry. Piroux records the case of Jean-Baptist Vil- 
lemin, a deaf-mute of twenty-nine years, very imperfectly educated, and of feeble 
capacity. Placed by the wealth of his family above the necessity of manual 
labor, and incapable of intellectual labor, he fell into dissolute habits, wander- 
ing idle about the fields and frequenting public-houses. One night, in a tavern, 
he met a man named Marchand, who attempted to amuse himself and the 
company by making signs to the deaf-mute which the latter did not understand. 
Villemin indicated by a gesture that he desired to be let alone; but Marchand 
continued to annoy him, seizing his head, making a bite at his nose, and brand- 
ishing round his head a cane, which he then held in the attitude of firing a 
gun, saying to the company that he wished to invite Villemin to go a hunting. 
Villemin naturally lost his patience ; unable to understand what was meant by 
Marchand, or to express his own sentiments, except by actions, he seized the 
aggressor, flung him on the floor, and gave him a kick on the head. Mar- 
chand was only slightly hurt. The company declared, and he admitted, that 
he was himself to blame; and he said he harbored no ill-will to Villemin for 
what had passed. Returning home, a distance of several leagues on foot, he 
fell sick and died of a disease of the chest, which his family chose to ascribe to 
the blows which he had received from Villemin—which, however, was disproved 
by the medical witnesses. The deaf-mute was, in the first instance, sentenced 
to two months’ imprisonment; but, on an appeal to the Cour Royale of 
Nancy, in consideration of the unfortunate condition of Villemin, and of the 
brutal and inconsiderate conduct of Marchand, the term was reduced to six 
days. (2) 

“Other cases may easily be supposed in which a deaf person may be led to 
violent conduct by his inability to hear, and to understand what is meant by 
others. An impatient man, for instance, requests a deaf-mute to get out of 
his way, and, not knowing that the latter could not hear his request, attempts 
to shove him aside, thus provoking a manual retort. A deaf-mute may also 
erroneously conceive himself wronged in making change, or in price, weight, 


(g) Wh. Cr. Law, § 754; 13 Am. Journ. Ins. 155. 

(h) The cases under this head are stated by Dr. Peet, in the article already refer- 
red to. 

(7) Piroux’s Journal, i. 46, 59. 


140 


BOOK I.] DISEASES OF THE SENSES. [$ 140 


or measure, and break out into violence. In such cases, we are confident, there 
are very few who would undertake a prosecution for violence by a deaf-mute, 
after becoming aware of his peculiar circumstances. 

‘“‘The disposition of courts and juries to mitigate the punishment of an un- 
educated deaf-mute criminal has been shown in France and Germany in several 
cases of murder, some of them of an aggravated character; for it is notorious 
that deaf-mutes who have grown to maturity without instruction are too often 
passionate and vindictive. Bebian relates the case of Pierre Sauron, an un- 
educated deaf-mute of the department of Cantal, who had formed an illicit 
connection with the daughter of a neighbor. The father, scandalized by such 
a connection with a dumb man, undertook to put a stop to it by sending his 
daughter out of the country. For this Sauron manifested the most implacable 
resentment, and finally waylaid and murdered him. The sentence was hard 
labor for life: for the like crime one not deaf and dumb would have been sent 
to the guillotine. When the sentence was explained to the deaf-mute, he 
declared he would rather be put to death. 

‘¢ Another case we find thus related in the Ninth Report of the Deaf and 
Dumb Institution of Hamburgh, Germany. 

“ At Cologne, on the 14th and 15th of August, 1829, the royal Court of 
Assizes was occupied by an accusation against a deaf and dumb journeyman 
shoemaker, Johann Schmit, of Kreuznach, who, enraged at being upbraided 
for the defects of his work, had stabbed his master with a knife. The princi- 
pal question discussed was whether the early instruction and moral and in- 
tellectual state of the deaf-mute made for or against his accountability. The 
jury found that the unfortunate murderer was not accountable; and he was 
therefore acquitted of the charge, and dismissed free into the street. This 
(adds the editor of the Hamburgh Report), it is to be hoped, was not without 
that solicitude that might secure a better education to the unfortunate man, 
then twenty-three years old, and sufficient precautions lest he should become 
possessed with the idea that he could do such acts with impunity.” 

“ A much more aggravated case than either of the foregoing, was that of 
Michael Boyer, an uneducated and vagabond deaf-mute, of about twenty-seven 
or twenty-eight years, who was brought before the Court of Assizes of Cantal 
(France), under the triple charge of rape, murder, and robbery, committed on 
a girl of 11 years, whom he met in a lonely place, on Christmas-day, 1843, on 
her way to the residence of an aunt in a distant village, with whom she was 
to spend the winter in order to attend school. Boyer was proved to have 
pursued other females with evident intentions of violence, and had been, some 
years before, condemned to three years’ imprisonment for theft. The evidence, 
though circumstantial, was conclusive. It is not to our purpose to detail it. 
We observe, however, that the prisoner, being interrogated through M. Riviere, 
director of the school for the deaf and dumb at Rodey, denied, energetically, 
the principal facts imputed to him, and succeeded in making it understood that 
he maintained that the blood observed on his garments came from a wound in 
the head, occasioned by a fall while in liquor. What plea was by his counsel 
set up in defence we are not informed. The jury found him guilty of the 
triple charge, but admitted extenuating circumstances—a verdict the effect of 

141 


§ 140] DEAF AND DUMB. [BOOK I. 


which was to save the prisoner’s life. He was condemned to hard labor for 
life, and to the exposition publique (pillory, or stocks).(7) It should be ob- 
‘served that the only extenuating circumstances that appear in the narrative 
of this fearful crime were the total deprivation of instruction, and neglected, 
vagabond state of the criminal. 

‘A similar verdict and sentence were given in the case of the deaf-mute Em- 
“ manueli, of Corsica, who had waylaid and murdered the two sisters Ristori, 
provoked to frenzy by the obstinate refusal of one of them to listen to his 
prolonged suit. He had, some years before, killed her brother in a quarrel on 
the same account; and it being considered that he had acted with great pro- 
vocation, was only condemned to five years’ imprisonment—a lenity which the 
commission of the second, and far more aggravated murder showed to have 
been misplaced. (4) 

‘«« The details of another French case of murder by an uneducated mute, Louis 
Chavanon, may be read in Beck’s Medical Jurisprudence. This deaf-mute was 
of such a covetous and grasping disposition that he harbored the most violent 
enmity against any one who purchased property of his father. The deceased, 
Treille, having become possessed, by purchase, of the half of the house in 
which Chavanon lived, the latter, after repeated menaces in gestures, meeting 
him on the common stairs, an affray ensued which ended in the death of the 
unfortunate Treille. The sentence was ten years’ imprisonment and a fine of 
one thousand francs to the widow and children of Treille. 

‘‘ Another deplorable instance of the ungovernable passions of too many un- 
educated mutes is furnished by the case of Pierre Lafond, who, having been 
repeatedly detected in thefts of the property of his uncle and aunt, by whom 
he had been adopted and brought up, his aunt was at length provoked to the 
degree of following and reproaching him in the presence of a young neighbor, 
of whom Lafond was enamored. Watching an opportunity to execute the 
vengeance that rankled in his heart, he availed himself of the absence of his 
uncle to attack his aunt at night, in her bed, with several of the shoe-knives 
used by him in his trade. Her daughters, coming to her assistance, were also 
grievously wounded, but, providentially, none of the victims were mortally 
touched. ‘Taken, a day or two afterwards, wandering in the fields, Lafond 
alleged, by the aid of an interpreter conversant with his signs, that he com- 
mitted the act under the influence of a sudden fright and hallucination. How- 
ever, neither this adroit defence nor his unfortunate position could make the 
jury forget the aggravating circumstances of the case. He was found guilty, 
and condemned to ten years at hard labor. (/) 

‘In the several French cases that have been cited (and we might have cited 
other similar cases from Bebian’s, Piroux’s, and Morel’s Journals), no difficulty 
appears to have been experienced in relation to the formalities of a trial; the 
questions that were raised related to the degree of moral accountability of the 
deaf and dumb. But the few English and Scotch cases we have are mostly of 
a different character. In these cases the defence set up for deaf-mutes accused 


(j) Morel’s Annales, ii. 166-170. (k) Piroux’s Journal, iv. 144. 
(1) Ibid. i. 56. 


142 


BOOK I.] DISEASES OF THE SENSES. [$ 140 


of crime has generally turned on legal forms and technicalities. As this 
paper has already extended to an unexpected length, and as the cases to 
which we refer can be consulted at large in standard works, we shall restrict 
ourselves to brief outlines. 

“In July, 1817,(m) Jean Campbell, an uneducated deaf and dumb woman, 
the mother of three children by three different fathers, was charged before the 
Court of Justiciary, in Edinburgh, with murdering her child by throwing it 
over the old bridge at Glasgow. Mr. Robert Kinniburgh, an eminent teacher 
of the deaf and dumb, was called in as an expert. He understood, from her 
signs, that she maintained that, having the child at her back, held up by her 
cloak, which she held across her breast with her hands, and being partially 
intoxicated, she had loosened her hold to see to the safety of some money in 
her bosom, thus allowing the child to fall over the parapet of the bridge, 
against which she was resting. She indignantly denied having intended to 
throw it in the river. 

“Mr. Kinniburgh being asked whether he thought she could understand 
the question, whether she was guilty or not guilty of the crime of which she 
was accused, answered, that in the way in which he put the question, asking 
her by signs whether she threw the child over the bridge or not, he thought 
she could plead not guilty by signs, and this is the only way in which he 
could so put the question to her; but that he had no idea, abstractly speak- 
ing, that she knew what a trial was, but that she knew she was brought into 
court about her child. 

“John Wood, Esq., auditor of excise (who is deaf and partially dumb), 
gave in a written statement upon oath, mentioning that he had visited the 
prisoner in prison, and was of opinion that she was altogether incapable of 
pleading guilty or not guilty; that she stated the circumstances by signs, in 
the same manner she had done to the court, when questioned before the court 
by Mr. Kinniburgh, and seemed to be sensible that punishment would follow 
the commission of a crime. 

“The court were unanimously of opinion that this novel and important 
question, of which no precedent appeared in the law of this country [Scot- 
land], deserves great consideration, and every information that the counsel on 
each side could could procure and furnish.”’ 

“‘ At a subsequent period the judges delivered their opinion as follows :— 

“Tord Hermand was of opinion that the panel (prisoner) was not a fit 
object of trial. She was deaf and dumb from her infancy; had had no in- 
struction whatever ; was unable to give information to her counsel, to com- 
municate the names of her exculpatory witnesses, if she had any, and was 
unable to plead to the indictment in any way whatever, except by certain 
signs which he considered no pleading whatever.’’ 

“The four other judges, however, overruled this opinion, referring especially 
to a case (already mentioned in a former part of this paper) that had occurred 
in England, in 17738, in which one Jones, who had stolen five guineas, appear- 


(m) Beck gives this date 1807, which is a manifest error, as Mr. Kinniburgh, of the 
Edinburgh Institution for the Deaf and Dumb, which was first opened in 1810, was 
called in the case, and referred to it in his report for 1815. 

143 


§ 141] DEAF AND DUMB. [BOOK I. 


ing to be deaf and dumb, and being found by the jury impanelled on that 
point to be mute ‘from the visitation of God,’ was arraigned by the means 
of a woman accustomed to converse with him by signs, found guilty, and 
transported. And it was also observed that it might be for the prisoner’s 
own good to have a trial; for if the jury found that her declaration, that she 
did not intend to throw her child in the river, was true, she would be acquitted 
and set free; whereas, if not found capable of being tried for a crime, she 
must be confined for life. The woman Campbell was accordingly placed at 
the bar, and when the question was put, Guilty or not? ‘her counsel, Mr. 
McNeil, rose, and stated that he could not allow his client to plead to the 
indictment, until it was explained to her that she was at liberty to plead guilty 
or not. Upon it being found that this could not be done, the case was dropped, 
and she was dismissed from the bar simpliciter. Thus, though it is esta- 
blished that a deaf-mute is dolt capax, no means have yet been discovered of 
bringing him to trial.’ 

_ “Certainly the system of laws of Scotland must be defective, under which 
important leading cases are decided, not on broad, general principles, but on 
mere formalities and technicalities. 

‘‘ Beck cites two similar English cases, in each of which a deaf and dumb 
woman was arraigned for the murder of her illegitimate child; and both being 
found, on matters of form, not capable of taking a trial, were ordered to be 
confined in prison during the king’s pleasure. ‘The difficulty, in the first of 
these cases (that of Esther Dyson, at York Assizes, 1831) was, that her in- 
terpreter could not make her understand what was meant, when asked if she 
desired to challenge any of the jurors. We should suppose her counsel could 
have done that far better than she, even if more intelligent than she was, could 
have done it for herself. She was pronounced not of sound mind—that is, 
with regard to the ability to conduct her own defence with discretion. Pro- 
bably compassion had as much to do with this decision as reason.”?(mm) 

The manner in which deaf and dumb persons are to be arraigned has been 
noticed in another work.(n) | 


2d. Blind. 


§ 141. Blindness(v) can only come in question here when it is congenital 
or has originated in early infancy, for then only can it exercise decisive influ- 
ence on the mental and moral development. In general, however, blindness 
is no reason to suspend the personal responsibility of an agent; the defects of 
the mental and moral nature consequent upon it are not diseases; and the 
bearing which they have upon the degree of culpability ascribable to an act 
committed in violation of law, must be referred to the discretion of the court, 
as guided by the circumstances of each case.(w) 


(mm) Essay by Dr. Peet, already cited. 

(n) Wh. C. L. § 532. 

(v) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. 563; and see L. Krahmer, Handbuch de Gericht. 
Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 122. 

(w) Compare Friedreich, 676, where the learning on this subject is collected. 


144 


BOOK I.] EPILEPTICS. [$ 145 


3d. Lpileptics.(x) 


§ 142. Epileptics, from their nervous susceptibility, and their tendency to 
mental alienation, should be regarded with peculiar tenderness by those to 
whom is committed the administration of public justice. Nor should the idea 
of a recent recovery ever exclude one who has been so afflicted, from that pro- 
tection which would secure at least a patient investigation of the question of 
moral responsibility. Recent investigations, conducted by men of eminent 
sagacity and great opportunities of observation, have led to the conclusion 
that epilepsy produces not only general mental prostration, but anomalies in 
the entire moral and intellectual system. And although the malady some- 
times coexists with great intelligence, yet the patient retains, not only during 
the attack, but for an indefinite period afterwards, but an imperfect use of his 
faculties. (y) 

§ 143. Epilepsy consists in periodical attacks of insensibility, accompanied 
with involuntary, convulsive, and more or less violent motions of the limbs. 
That persons committing a violation of law while in this condition, are entitled 
to the full benefit of all the considerations which affect the responsibility of 
the agent, needs no argument after what has been already said on the subject 
of unsoundness of mind. The case, however, admits of more difficulty when 
the question is whether, in the interval between the attacks, a state of mind 
does or does not exist calculated to destroy or diminish responsibility. (z) 

§ 144. It will be peculiarly necessary, here, to make a division between the 
several classes of epileptic diseases. The infirmity is well known to appear 
in very different degrees of intensity, under different circumstances, and as it 
arises from different physical causes, it may be considered as exerting different 
retroactive influences on the mind and the body. It may effect the intellectual 
faculties in a very subordinate degree, as the cases of men like Cesar, Napo- 
leon and Mohammed sufficiently prove. The doctrine therefore results, that 
in general epilepsy, the usual presumption of responsibility applies to acts 
committed in the intervals between one attack and another. In epilepsy, ac- 
cording to Briand, moral liberty is entirely suspended during the attacks. An 
epileptic who commits a homicide during the height of his disease, has had no 
criminal intention, and therefore cannot incur responsibility. It is also unjust 
to throw upon persons, thus affected, all the responsibility of actions which 
they may commit immediately before or after an attack, for authors are agreed 
in thinking, that whether these attacks occur frequently or rarely, the mind 
never fully recovers all its power. 

§ 145. In particular cases the responsibility of the agent may be destroyed, 
where real symptoms of derangement present themselves, and where it is pos- 
sible or probable that the offence was brought on by such abnormal state of 


(x) See L. Krahmer, Handbuch del Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, 
§ 122; see J. Briand, Méd. Lég. p. 568, Paris, 1852; M. Orfila, Méd. Lég. tome i. p. 
332, Paris, 1848; M. Fairet, Cliniques de Médecine Mentale, p. 521, Paris, 1854. 

(y) Boileau de Castlenau: De l’épilepsie dans ses rapports avec l’aliénation mentale, 
considérés au point de vue médico-judiciare. Annales d’Hygiéne publ. et de Médecine 
Lég., Avril, 1842, No. 94. Erhardt-Ueber Zurechnungsfaihigkeit der Epileptischen. 

(z) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 565. 

10 145 


x 
§ 148] RELATIONS OF EPILEPSY TO INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


the faculties. The higher grades of the disease, where it is of long standing, 
and where the attacks recur at brief intervals, cast a doubt upon the psychical 
‘requirements of responsibility, even where nothing is observed which expressly 
characterizes an aberration of the mental faculties. The stage which imme- 
diately precedes an attack, the premonitory symptoms of heaviness in the head, 
dizziness, loss of consciousness, &c., as well as that which immediately suc- 
ceeds an attack, and consists in a manifest disorder of the bodily and mental 
functions of the subject, is to be treated as connected with the immediate 
attack. (a) 

§ 146. The moral requirements of responsibility are satisfied when the dis- 
ease is not of great intensity, and where the intervals show no trace of an 
alteration of the intellectual functions produced by it, and the incitement to 
the act complained of is found not in the obtuseness or ebullition generally 
peculiar to such patient, but in a selfish motive, and where the execution of 
the act betrays forethought, reflection, and wilfulness. 

§ 147. Persons truly epileptic are easily excited to anger and revenge on the 
slightest provocation, in the intervals between their attacks. Although these 
attacks do not always attain to such a degree as to deserve the name of mental 
derangement, yet it should never be forgotten that there is always a morbid 
predisposition to insane ebullitions, and in general a morbid irritability, which 
must impair, if not destroy, the moral responsibility of actions growing out 
of them. And even where a sentence of punishment is pronounced, it must 
not be overlooked that its execution may possibly exercise a most deleterious 
influence on the health of the individual, by aggravating the disease, and per- 
haps in forcing it into real insanity. Jt is not advisable, therefore, to exe- 
cute a sentence of punishment upon an epileptic, without having submitted 
the case to the examination of a duly authorized forensic physician. (b) 

§ 148. Different views, however, have existed on this point. Platner(c) 
denies the responsibility of any epileptic whatever. Clarus(d) takes a view 
more in harmony with those we have just advanced, maintaining the following 
propositions ;— 

1. All actions and omissions which take place during the paroxysm of epi- 
lepsy, are neither valid nor the subjects of responsibility. 

2. When the attack of habitual epilepsy is succeeded by, or alternates with, 
a state of mania or imbecility, all responsibility is at an end, even where this 
latter state is but transitory, because no human insight or experience can decide 
with certainty, whether the patient, at that particular instant, was in an en- 
tirely sane condition. On the other hand, there are no reasons against the 
validity of civil acts done under such cireumstances. 

3. Swooning, heaviness of the head, weakness of memory, restlessness, en- 
hanced irritability, &c., which precede or follow the attack, destroy as well the 
responsibility as the validity of acts committed during their continuance. 

4, Where it is capable of proof, that the epileptics, in the intervals of their 


(a) Sehiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 567. (6) Ibid. § 568. 
(c) Quaest. Med. For. p. vi. 
(d) Beitrage zur Erkenntniss und Beurtheilung zweifelhaften Seelenzustaendu, 
Leipsic, 1828, p. 96. 
146 


BOOK I.] EPILEPTICS. [$ 148 


attacks, betray symptoms of malice and obtuseness, justice demands that their 
faults should be regarded as effects of the disease, and that they should be held 
irresponsible for acts committed in an ebullition of rage or other passion, 
while such condition should operate in mitigation where the crime presupposes 
forecast and reflection. 

5. Where the signs of an altered state of mind are wanting both before 
and after the attacks, the possibility still remains that these signs continue 
undetected because of their minuteness, and that patients of this description 
are less able to resist sudden impulses than persons in good health; which 
would suggest a mitigation of punishment for actions of violent passion, but 
not for those involving reflection. 

6. All these propositions only apply to idiopathic and habitual epilepsy ; 
not to isolated attacks, which ensue upon other diseases, and where no trace 
remains, after their cessation. 

T. The diseases connected with epileptic symptoms, particularly hysterical 
spasms, accompanied with insensibility, and diseases of the generic character 
of St. Vitus’s Dance, are subject to the rules above laid down, under the re- 
strictions mentioned in the last head, because the presumption of a latent pro- 
pensity to ebullitions of passion is not, in such cases, vouched by experienced. (e) 


(e) Compare, on the responsibility of epileptics, Friedreich, Handbuch der gericht- 
lichen Psychologie, p. 637, and Henke, Abhandlungen aus dem Gebiete der gericht- 
lichen Medizin, vol. iv. p.1. The Am. Journal of Insanity, vol. xii. p. 122, gives us a 
translation from portions of Delasiaure on Epilepsy. From this translation we extract 
the following passages :— 

“ Independently of a full appreciation of the disease in itself, and its mental conse- 
quences, the expert cannot examine too carefully the circumstances which attend the 
crime, the form under which it is accomplished, the motives which may have governed 
the epileptic, his subsequent conduct, his own plan of defence, &. We notice, in 
almost all the cases reported in the public papers and judiciary debates, singularities 
of expression, and strange details, which make us doubt, from the first, if they ema- 
nated from a sane intelligence. 

“With regard to the execution of the deed, ordinary criminals use all due precau- 
tions against discovery. It may be the same with some individuals who have acted 
under the impulse of an epileptic attack. More frequently, however, regardless of the 
effects and the morality of their actions, they make but feeble efforts at concealment. 
There are those who abandon themselves openly to their fury, multiplying their vic- 
tims without hesitation, gloating over their bodies, and, far from being intimidated 
by the presence of witnesses, seem often to find in them a new cause for excitement. 

“This disregard of every feeling of self-preservation, this contempt of danger, are, 
when found united, the best proofs of the absence of moral liberty. ‘ All epilepsy,’ 
says Mare, ‘warrants, upon the event of a criminal act, the suspicion of mental dis- 
order ;’ and he adds, ‘this suspicion is increased in absence of any strong personal 
motive.’ With this view other authors, and in the number Orfila, with more apparent 
sagacity, perhaps, than actual observation, considered, on the other hand, as an evi- 
dence of culpability the intentional secrecy by which the acts were characterized. 

“ However, some reflections suggested by the case of the patient H , to whom a 
feeling of jealousy could not have been foreign, make it obvious that it is necessary 
to modify this doctrine; since, in developing a peculiar irritability, ungovernable and 
fatal propensities, the mortal influence does not absolutely prevent the association and 
arrangement of ideas. Such an individual, who, in his intervals of reason and calm, 
would be able to control his impulses, runs the chance of yielding to them during 
intellectual excitement; as a man who would accomplish, under the influence of 
intoxication, a deed from which in cooler blood he might have recoiled. Epilepsy, 
judiciously remarks M. Boileau de Castelnau, destroys the power of justly estimating 
these prejudices, of duly appreciating their foundation, or resisting the extravagances 
to which they tend. 

“This epileptic susceptibility does not serve as a medium only for evil propensities : 


147 


§ 149] RELATIONS OF EPILEPSY TO INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


V. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS AS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP.(/) 


§ 149. Under this general head may be grouped Somnoleniia, or Sleep 
drunkenness (Schlaftrunkenheit), Somnambulism, and Nightmare, the two 
(f) See Méd. Lég. M. Orfila, tome i. p. 456. Paris, 1848; Méd. Lég. M. Briand, p. 


563. Paris, 1852; Renaudin sur L’Alienation Mentale, Chap. 6th, p. 255. Paris, 
1854; Lecon’s Cliniques de M. Falret. Legon 4th, p. 117. Paris, 1854. 


it can of itself call them directly into play, excite and foster the idea of misdeed, and 
lead to its fatal realization. 

“A meningeal congestion, the result of numerous paroxysms, has recently carried 
off one of our most interesting patients. With a quick intelligence, a mild and be- 
nevolent disposition, none was more ready than he to recognize the least mark of 
solicitude of which he might be the object; but in the way of retaliation he was 
utterly ungovernable towards those who opposed his wishes. Nothing could induce 
him to renounce such prejudices ; and even with a disposition less yielding, the burn- 
ing threats to which he abandoned himself could have been easily carried into culpa- 
ble execution. 

“Scenes of vindictiveness and brutality, otherwise inexplicable, arise from this 
cause in our asylums. We had, during the past year, in our department, a poor 
Italian, the victim of the blind malevolence of some of his companions in misfortune, 
who combined to entrap him and overcome him with blows. None of the accomplices 
betrayed the plot. Such wanton cruelty could evidently be attributed only to morbid 
perversion, and a lethargic condition of moral liberty. 

“The situation and conduct of epileptics after the perpetration of a crime has been 
justly insisted upon as a matter of importance. They generally exhibit evident indi- 
cations of moral agitation. A dull expression, and a sinister lighting up of the coun- 
tenance, reveal in them a vague and gloomy inquietude. The co-ordination of ideas 
is usually slow and difficult. They confess, moreover, the crime with the less reserve, 
as they see in it only the effect of a justifiable defence, or of an involuntary impulse, 
and feel grief rather than remorse, regret rather than fear. If ignorant of the fatal 
consequences of their madness, they receive intelligence of it with strange impassa- 
bility, and, indifferent to the perils which threaten either their existence or their 
liberty, they neglect either to destroy the traces of their guilt, or to elude pursuit. 
When they fly, it is less to escape justice than the imaginary danger with which their 
persistent hallucinations surround them; and, finally, they make no resistance to the 
confinement to which they are subjected. 

“‘ Nevertheless, here, as in all opinions relative to epileptics, we must admit certain 
exceptions. Of those who, among others, appear to have been governed by a voluntary 
tendency, many appreciating the extent of the crime, not considering the influence 
exercised by the disease, and believing in an evil intention and in the existence of 
moral liberty, feel themselves under a serious responsibility. In this situation, and 
as epilepsy tends to exaggerate the instinct of cunning and of self-preservation, they 
have recourse, generally, to the artifices and subterfuges usually practised by ordi- 
nary criminals. Should the crime be evident, they appeal to their malady as an ex- 
cuse. In the other case, they endeavor to obscure the truth, contradict the testimony, 
establish an alzbi, and willingly conform to the plea of their counsel. 

“These circumstances do not necessarily imply to the criminal action an origin ab- 
solutely independent of a morbid impulse. It does not follow that, from the apparent 
consciousness which the criminal may have of his fault, and the manner in which he 
may repel the charges of the accusation, the magistrates should infer the freedom of 
will, and responsibility in the commission of the act. 

“There are, at times, certain accessory considerations, in reference to epilepsy, which 
may arise during the progress of a judicial trial. Dr. Jahn has very wisely observed, 
that certain sensorial impressions are of a nature, owing to the bias which they im- 
parted to the mind, to suggest pernicious fancies. For example, the sight of blood- 
shed is sufficient to create in a patient, either the apprehension of criminal designs 
upon himself, or the imagined necessity of killing others. A young man, under the 
influence of his epileptic fears, saw a hatchet in an unaccustomed place, and supposed 
it designed for his destruction; thus showing that this instrument, to which is at- 
tached a sinister impression, had been capable of awakening a series of analogous 
conceptions. Who is ignorant of the strange effects of the imagination—the singu- 
larities of the imitative faculty? Who has not seen that the simple reading of a noto- 
rious criminal affair—the recital of a murder, of an incendiarism, or of a suicide— 
lead, in predisposed organization, to the perpetration of the identical deed ? 


148 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS AS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP. [§ 150 


last of which may be joined.(g) In the forensic treatment of such maladies, 
each case must depend upon its own circumstances, when it will also be im- 
portant for the judge to consider whether*the person subject to such a dis- 
order was properly aware of it, and of the possible consequences, and able to 
take the precautions by which those consequences might have been averted. 

§ 150. Sleep would seem to be only a peculiar form of cerebral life, and not 
a negation of the life of the brain, producing consequent fatigue, exhaustion ° 
or weakness; it is not to be supposed that the state of sleep issues out of the 
intellect itself, but the intellect is diverted by the peculiar change of the action 
of the brain into that state of existence which we call sleep. But the intellect 
does not sleep; nor can it ever be said that its activity diminishes during 
sleep; we merely cease to perceive its activity. But that the activity which 
involves sleep may also be morbid—abnormal—and connected with cramps or 
convulsive symptoms, is not to be doubted. The centripetal action of the 
senses is extinct during sleep, in dreams it is half active, and produces isolated, 
dim, and hazy sensations, forming the usual substratum of dreams. Sleep is 
interrupted by whatever terminates the peculiar condition of the brain upon 
which sleep depends; by the natural expiration of the state of the brain, by 
vivid and sudden impressions on the senses, and by disagreeable sensations. 
Now, in a certain morbid condition of the brain this awaking is not complete, 
and does not restore the waking state with a full and correct perception of 
surrounding things—but an intermediate state between sleeping and waking 
is produced, which resembles intoxication, and is called the intoxication of 
sleep (schlaftrunkenheit). This state admits of action, which is directed by 
the phantoms of the dream; talking in sleep being very nearly allied to wak- 
ing, and dreams themselves being midway between sleeping and waking, for in 
the depths of sleep we no longer become conscious of dreams.(h) The neght- 


“Certain atmospherical conditions have also an influence. We know, especially,. 
that intense heat, in creating a flow of blood to the brain, often produces mental dis- 
turbance. Admissions to our insane hospitals are never more frequent than during 
the dog-days. It would, therefore, be advisable to take into consideration such an 
influence, if, by its coincidence with the period of the crime, it would seem to have 
acted upon the moral disposition of the accused. 

‘‘There would be, above all, strong reasons for believing in the absence of moral 
liberty, if it were proven that the epileptic had lately abandoned himself to the use of 
alcoholic drinks ; nothing, we repeat with M. Renaudin, being more capable, not only 
of aggravating the attacks, but, still more, of giving rise to sinister hallucinations. = 

“We have now examined the principal elements of epileptic responsibility which 
are calculated to enlighten the judgment of magistrates. The necessity of more ex- 
tended information on this subject becomes more pressing when we reflect that 
instances are not wanting where justice has visited with unmerited punishment those 
who have unhappily yielded only to a pathological instigation. In some cases the 
proofs are sufliciently evident to admit of an easy demonstration; in others, on the 
contrary, the known quantities of the problem are much more uncertain. It is here 
that wisdom in the judge should be united with a lively solicitude. Therefore, with 
the purpose of promoting the success of his examinations, upon a subject compara- 
tively new, and which has excited but little attention, we think we are responding to 
an absolute necessity when we support the preceding rules by a brief exposition of 
several judicial causes, capable of serving as a guide in cases under analogous circum- 
stances.” 

(g) Siebold—Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med. Berlin, 1847, § 196; L. Krahmer, Hand- 
buch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 115. 

(h) The following extract from the Médecine Légale, &c. J. Briand, is very pertinent 
to this point :— 

“De méme que, lorsque nous nous endormons, nous conservons encore plus ou moins 


149 


§ 152] SOMNOLENTIA, OR SLEEP-DRUNKENNESS. [BOOK I. 


mare is grounded upon a morbid aggravation of abnormal sensations in sleep 
as colored by dreams; under certain external circumstances, and certain forms 
of transition into the state of semi-consciousness, it may lead to acts of vio- 
lence. In examining such cases it is important to inquire into the existence 
of abnormal physical conditions, such as plethora, predisposition to conges- 
tions in the head or breast, actual congestions, diseases of the heart, abnormal 
plethora, suppressed hemorrhoids, eruptions of the skin, or other habitual 
secretions which have been driven in, nervous affections of various kinds, im- 
pure air in the bed-room, a hearty meal, or indulgence in ardent spirits 
immediately or shortly before going to sleep. Somnambulism is not a mere 
intensified dream, but in foro medico, must be treated as a morbid inde- 
pendent state, and in a legal point of view, every act shown to have been 
committed under its influence is to be disconnected with voluntary moral 


agency.(7) 
1st. Somnolentia, or Sleep-drunkenness. 


§ 151. Sleep-drunkenness may be defined to be the lapping over of a pro- 
found sleep on the domains of apparent wakefulness, producing an involuntary 
intoxication on the part of the patient, which destroys at the time his moral 
agency. Under the name of Somnolentia, which was given to it by Ploucquet 
and the consequent French writers, and of Schlaftrunkenhett, which it was 
styled by the German school, it became the subject of general discussion at 
the beginning of the present century. The first case in which the symptoms 
were unmistakably observable, was that of Buchner.(j7) A sentry, who had 
fallen asleep during his watch, being suddenly aroused by the officer in com- 
mand, fell upon the latter with his drawn sword, with an attack so furious 
that the most serious consequences were only averted by the interposition of 
bystanders. The result of the medical examination was, that’ the act was 
involuntary and irresponsible, being the result of a violent confusion of mind 
consequent upon the sudden involuntary waking from a profound sleep. 

§ 152. Shortly afterwards occurred the case of a day-laborer, who killed his 
wife with a wagon-tire, the blow being struck immediately upon his starting 
up from a deep sleep, from which he was forcibly awakened. In this case, 
there was evidence aliunde that the defendant was seized when waking with a 
delusion that a “‘woman in white” had snatched his wife from his side and was 
carrying her away, and that his agony of mind was so great that his whole 
body was wet with perspiration. There was no doubt of the defendant’s irre- 


longtemps Vidée des objets dont nous venons de nous occuper, et que notre imagina- 
tion nous les retrace souvent dons nos réves ; de méme aussi, lorsque des idées plus ou 
moins bizarres, plus ou moins extravagantes, se sont emparées de notre esprit pendant 
le sommeil, elles ne nous quittent pas tout d’un coup, quand nous nous réveillons. 
Pour peu que le réveil soit brusque, les premiers objets qui frappent nos sens sont mo- 
difiés por ces idées antécédentes, comme 4 la faible lumére de la nuit les objets qu’ 
nous voyons sont alterés par les fantémes de notre imagination. Nous sommes deja 
en état d’éxecuter des mouvements avec une certaine précision que nos sens ne sont 
pas encore completément éveillés: et souvent ces mouvements se rapportent, non pas 
a notre état réel, mais 4 celui dans lequel nous croyons étre, en melant aux idées qui 
nous ont occupés les sensations obscures des objets qui nous environnet reellement.” 
—WMéd. Lég. p. 563. Paris, 1852. 
(i) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 561. (7) See Henke’s Zeitschr. 10 B. p. 39. 
150 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP. [$ 158 


sponsibility.(4) In this country, the case properly would fall under the head 
of excusable homicide by misadventure.(/) In point of result, these cases vary 
little from an early English case, in which, though there was no psychological 
question opened, there were the same delusions as to danger heightened by the 
same disturbance of mind as is produced by a sudden waking up from a deep 
sleep. The defendant, being in bed and asleep in his house, his maid-servant, 
who had hired the deceased to help her to do her work, as she was going to 
let her out about midnight, thought she heard thieves breaking open the door, 
upon which she ran up stairs to the defendant, her master, and informed him 
thereof. Suddenly aroused, he sprang from his bed, and running down stairs 
with his sword drawn, the deceased hid herself in the butlery, lest she should 
be discovered. The defendant’s wife, observing some person there, and not 
knowing her, but conceiving she was a thief, cried out, ‘“ Here are they who 
would undo us ;’’ and the defendant, in the paroxysm of the moment, dashing 
into the butlery, thrust his sword at the deceased and killed her.(m) The 
defendant was acquitted under the express instructions of the court, and the 
case has stood the test of the common law courts for over two hundred years, 
during which it has never been questioned. It is important to observe, how- 
ever, that if it differs from the two cases already noticed under this head, in 
the increased naturalness of the delusion under which the defendant was labor- 
ing, it differs from them in the comparatively longer interval in which his 
perceptive faculties had the opportunity to arrange themselves. Let it be 
supposed that it was the wife, and not the husband, who had slain the 
deceased. Under the circumstances, the result would hardly have been differ- 
ent, and yet in this case the distinction between her responsibility and that of 
the laborer who killed his wife on the waking spasm, is simply in the degree 
of probability of delusions, which in both cases were unfounded: If in the one 
case, this improbability was more glaring, let it be recollected that there was 
much less time afforded to the patient to compose himself to a reasoning state 
of mind. 

§ 153. Much more recently, a case has occurred which has led to the whole 
question being re-examined and discussed. A young man, named A. F., about 
twenty years of age, was living with his parents in great apparent harmony, 
his father and himself being alike distinguished for their extravagant devotion 
to hunting. In consequence of the danger of nocturnal attacks, they were in 
the habit of taking their arms with them into their chamber. On the after- 
noon of September Ist, 1839, the father and son having just returned from 
hunting, their danger became the subject of particular conversation. The next 
day the hunting was repeated, and on their return, after taking supper with 
the usual appearance of harmony, the family retired at about ten o’clock, the 
father and mother occupying one apartment, and the son the next, both father 
and son taking their loaded arms with them to bed. At one o’clock, the father 
got up to go into the entry, and on his return, jarred against the door opening 
into the entry, upon which the son instantly sprang up and discharging his 


(k) Wildberg’s Jahrbuch, 2 Bd. p. 32. (1) See Wharton on Hom. 210. 
(m) Levet’s case, Cro. Car. 438; 1 Hale, 42, 474. igs 


§ 153] SOMNOLENTIA, OR SLEEP-DRUNKENNESS, [BOOK I. 


gun at the father, gave the latter a fatal wound in the breast, crying at the 
same time, ‘‘Dog, what do you want here?’ The father fell immediately to 
the ground, and the son, then first recognizing him, sank on the floor crying, 
—“O! Jesus, it is my father.”” The evidence was, that the whole family were 
subject to great restlessness in their sleep, and that the defendant in particular 
was affected by a tendency to be easily distressed by dreams, which lasted for 
about five minutes on waking, before their effect was entirely dissipated. His 
own version of the affair was, ‘‘I must have fired the gun in my sleep; it was 
moonshine, and we were accustomed to talk and walk in our sleep. I recol- 
lect hearing something jar; I jumped up, seized my gun and shot where I 
heard the noise. I recollect seeing nothing, nor am I conscious of having 
spoken. The night was so bright that everything could have been seen. I 
must have been under the delusion that thieves had broken in.”? The concur- 
rent opinions of the medical experts examined on the trial were, that the act 
was committed in a state of Somnolentia or Sleep-drunkenness, and that it 
was not that of a free and responsible agent. (7) 

It is important to distinguish Somnolentia, or Sleep-drunkenness, which is 
a state which to a greater or less extent is incidental to every individual, from 
Somnambulism, which is an abnormal condition incident to a very few. The 
experience of every-day life demonstrates how much the former enters into 
almost every relation. Children, particularly, sometimes struggle convulsively 
in the effort to wake up, which often is continued for several minutes. The 
very exclamations, “Wake up,’’—“ Come to’’—which are so common in ad- 
dressing persons in the waking condition, are scarcely necessary to bring to 
the mind many recollections of cases where the waking struggle has been pecu- 
liarly protracted. Of course there are constitutions where this struggle is 
peculiarly distressing, just as there are constitutions in which the tendency to 
sleeplessness is equally marked. Dr. Kriigelstein tells us of a merchant of 
distinction who had an irrepressible tendency to sleep in the afternoons, and 
yet who, whenever he was wakened up, was for a few moments overcome with 
a paroxysm, over which he had no control. Dr. Meister himself(o) relates 
the following phenomenon: ‘I was obliged to take a journey of eight miles 
on a very hot summer’s day, my seat being with my back to the horses, and 
the sun directly in my face. On reaching the place of destination, and being 
very weary and with a slight headache, I laid myself down, with my clothes 
on, gn a couch. I fell at once asleep, my head having slipped under the back 
of the settee. My sleep was deep, and, as far as I can recollect, without 
dreams. When it became dark, the lady of the house came with a light into | 
the room. I suddenly awoke, but for the first time in my life, without collect- 
ing myself. I was seized with a sudden agony of mind, and picturing the 
object which was entering the house as a spectre, I sprang up and seized a 
stool, which, in my terror, I would have thrown at the supposed shade. For- 
tunately, I was recalled to consciousness by the firmness and tact of the lady 


(n) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1853, vol. Ixv. pp. 190-1; and see also a case of much 
greater doubt in Klein’s Annalen der Gesetzgebung, Sc. viii. B. Berlin, 1798; and 
Mollers gerichtliche Arzneiwissen-schaft, vol. i. 302. 

(0) Henke’s Zeitschrift, vol. Ixv. 456. 


152 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP. [8 157 


herself, who, with the greatest presence of mind, succeeded in composing my 
attention until I was entirely awakened.’ 

§ 154. The existence of this intermediate state between sleeping and wak- 
ing, and of the “drunkenness” by which it is sometimes accompanied, is recog- 
nized by even the older elementary writers. Thus Wendler(p) says: ‘ Dis- 
cerni autem possit expergefactio naturalis a preternaturali. Etenim somno 
sensim reficitur sensibilitas animi, que, cum in eum evehitur gradum, ut 
solemnibus pistoque non fortioribus excitamentis ad cogitandum excitetur, 
naturalis expergefactio est; contra ubi facultate illa parum aucta, insolita 
incitamentorum vis animum cogit ad statum vigilis, preternaturalem hance 
dicimus expergefactionem.”’ 

§ 155. The following tests it is important to apply in order to determine 
the question of responsibility :— 

(a.) A general tendency to deep and heavy sleep must be shown, out of 
which the patient could only be awakened by violent and convulsive effort. 

(b.) Before falling asleep, circumstances must be shown producing disquiet 
which sleep itself does not entirely compose. 

(c.) The act under examination must have occurred at the time when the 
defendant was usually accustomed to have been asleep. | 

(d.) The cause of the sudden awakening must be shown. It is true that 
this cannot always happen, as sometimes the start may have come from a vio- 
lent dream. 

(e.) The act must bear throughout the character of unconsciousness. 

(f) The actor himself, when he awakes, is generally amazed at his own 
deed, and it seems to him almost incredible. Generally speaking, he does not 
seek to evade responsibility, though there are some unfortunate cases in which 
the wretchedness of the sudden discovery overcomes the party himself, who 
seeks to shelter himself from the consequences of a crime of which he was 
technically, though not morally, guilty. 

§ 156. A late very intelligent observer, Dr. Kriigelstein, has given us a 
critical and extended observation of those cases in which crimes have been 
committed in the supposed somnambulic state, in which he draws the infer- 
ences that this species of mania occurs chiefly, if not entirely, with persons 
who are sound sleepers and are suddenly startled by some violent exterior 
cause, from a sleep which, from indigestion or other causes, has been already 
disturbed and excited by dreams of peculiar vivacity. Such cases are univer- 
sally marked with a want of consciousness in the actor, and followed, when 
he awakes, with entire astonishment and then violent remorse. (q) 

§ 157. Dr. Taylor, in his admirable treatise,(7) gives us the following cases 
on the same point :— 

A peddler who was in the habit of walking about the country armed with a 
sword-stick, was awakened one evening, while lying asleep on the high road, 
by a man who was accidentally passing, seizing him and shaking him by the 


(p) Dissertatio de Somno. Lipsiz, 1805, p. 23. 
(q) Kriigelstein, Ueber die in Zustande der Schlaftrunkenheit veriibten Gewalttha- 
tigkeiten in gerichtsarztlicher Beziehung. 
(r) Med. Jur. 599, 600. 
153 


§ 153] SOMNOLENTIA, OR SLEEP-DRUNKENNESS. [BOOK I. 


shoulders. The peddler suddenly awoke, drew his sword and stabbed the man, 
who afterwards died. He was tried for manslaughter. His irresponsibility 
’was strongly urged by his counsel on the ground that he could not have been 
conscious of an act perpetrated in a half-waking state. This was strengthened 
by the opinion of the medical witness. The prisoner was, however, found 
guilty. Under such circumstances it was not unlikely that an idea had arisen 
on the prisoner’s mind that he had been attacked by robbers, and therefore 
stabbed the man in self-defence.(s) 

Dr. Hartshorne, in a note, tells us that a somewhat similar case occurred in 
Philadelphia, a few years back, in which a man was shot with a pistol by an 
acquaintance, whom he had suddenly aroused from sleep, late at night, in an 
open market house. The plea was, that the deceased was mistaken for a 
robber when the pistol was fired; but the jury found a verdict of man- 
slaughter. 

§ 158. Two persons, in a case cited by Mr. Best, who had been hunting 
during the day, slept together at night. One of them was renewing the chase 
in a dream, and imagining himself present at the death of the stag, cried out 
“Vl kill kim! Pll kill him!” The other, awakened by the noise, got out of 
bed, and by the light of the moon beheld the sleeper give several deadly stabs 
with a knife, in that part of the bed which his companion had just quitted. 
Suppose a blow, given in this way, had proved fatal, and the two men had 
been shown to have quarrelled previously to retiring to rest! But a defence 
of this kind, as is well remarked by Dr. Taylor, may be unduly strained. 
Thus, where there is an enmity, with a motive for the act of homicide, the 
murderer while sleeping in the same room may select the night for an assault, 
and perpetrate the act in darkness in order the more effectually to screen him- 
self. In the case of Reg. v. Jackson,(¢) it was urged in defence that the 
prisoner, who slept in the same room with the prosecutor, had stabbed him in 
the throat, owing to some sudden impulse during sleep; and the case of Mil- 
ligan, above given, was quoted by the learned counsel, in support of the view 
that the prisoner was irresponsible for the act. It was proved, however, that 
the prisoner had shown malicious feeling against the prosecutor, and that she 
wished him dead. The knife with which the wound had been inflicted bore 
the appearance of having been recently sharpened, and the prisoner must 
have reached over her daughter (the prosecutor’s wife), who was sleeping in 
the same bed with him, in order to produce the wound. These facts are quite 
adverse to the supposition of the crime having been perpetrated under an im- 
pulse from sleep, and the prisoner was convicted. In another case, Reg. v. 
French,(u) it was proved that the prisoner while sleeping in the same room 
had killed the deceased, who was a stranger to him, under some delusion. 
There was, however, clear evidence that the prisoner was insane, and on this 
ground he was acquitted under the direction of the judge.(v) 


(s) The Queen v. Milligan. Lincoln Aut. Assizes, 1836. 
(¢) Liverpool Anptumn Ass. 1847. (u) Dorset Autumn Ass. 1846. 
(v) Taylor’s Med. Jurisprudence, pp. 599, 600. 


154 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP. _[§ 160 


2d. Somnambulism.(w) 


§ 159. “Dreaming,” says Dr. Rush, ‘‘is a transient paroxysm of delirium. 
Somnambulism is nothing but a higher grade of the same disease. It is a 
transient paroxysm of madness. Like madness, it is accompanied with mus- 
cular action, with incoherent or coherent conduct, and with that complete 
oblivion of both which takes place in the worst grade of madness. Coherence 
of conduct discovers itself in persons who are affected with it undertaking, or 
resuming certain habitual exercises or employments. Thus we read of the 
scholar resuming his studies, the poet his pen, and the artisan his labors, while 
under its influence, with their usual industry, taste, and correctness. It ex- 
tended still further in the late Dr. Blacklock, of Edinburgh, who rose from his 
bed, to which he had retired at an early hour, came into the room where his 
family were assembled, conversed with them, and afterwards entertained them 
with a pleasant song, without any of them suspecting he was asleep, and 
without his retaining after he awoke the least recollection of what he had 
done.’ (x) 

§ 160. A late authoritative writer(y) gives us, in great minuteness, a nar- 
rative of a young woman, a somnambulist, who, when twenty-three years old, 
having been previously in good health and regular in her menstruation, was 
seized with epilepsy in consequence of a fright produced by an attack of rob- 
bers. She soon became the victim of somnambulism, which manifested itself 
in all its ordinary incidents, such as deep sleep, want of memory, and firmness 
in her movements when under its influence. While in the somnambulic con- 
dition she had the habit of concealing articles of various kinds, the result of 
which was that she was charged with theft. Under the advice of Dr. Dorn- 
bliith she was finally acquitted, and under his care was gradually restored to 
health. 

Dr. Upham gives us the following American illustration: “A farmer, in 
one of the counties of Massachusetts, according to the account of the matter 
which was published at the time, had employed himself for some weeks in the 
winter, thrashing his grain. One night, as he was about closing his labors, 
he ascended a ladder to the top of the great beams in the barn, where the rye 
which he was thrashing was deposited, to ascertain what number of bundles 
remained unthrashed, which he determined to finish the next day. The en- 
suing night, about two o’clock, he was heard by one of the family to arise and 
go out. He repaired to his barn, being sound asleep and unconscious of what 
he was doing, set open his barn doors, ascended the great beams of the barn 
where his rye was deposited, threw down a flooring, and commenced thrashing 
it. When he had completed it, he raked off the straw and shoved the rye to 
one side of the floor, and again ascended the ladder with the straw, and depo- 
sited it on some rails that lay across the great beams. He then threw down 


(w) H. L. Heim, vermischte med. Schriften, herausg. von A. Paetsch. Leipsic, 
1836, § 336. L. Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, 
§ 115. Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med. Berlin, 1847, § 196. : 

(x) Rush on the Mind, pp. 302, 303. 

(y) Dornbliith, Geschichte einer Nachtwandlerin, Henke’s Zeitschrift, xxxii. 2. 


155 


§ 161] SOMNAMBULISM. [BOOK I. 


another flooring of rye, which he thrashed and finished as before. Thus he 
continued his labors until he thrashed five floorings, and on returning from 
throwing down the sixth and last, in passing over part of the haymow, he fell 
off, where the hay had been cut down about six feet, to the lower part of it, 
which awoke him. He at first imagined himself in his neighbor’s barn; but 
after groping about in the dark for a long time, ascertained that he was in 
his own, and at length found the ladder, on which he descended to the floor, 
closed his barn doors, which he found open, and returned to his house. On 
coming to the light he found himself in such a profuse perspiration that his 
clothes were literally wet through. The next morning, on going to his barn, 
he found that he had thrashed during the night, five bushels of rye, had raked 
the straw off in good order, and deposited it on the great beams, and carefully 
shoved the grain to one side of the floor, without the least consciousness of 
what he was doing, until he fell from the hay.’’(z) 

“A man in this state,” says Falret, ‘has no longer the same relations with 
the exterior world. He enters into movements which seem the result of the will, 
since he avoids blows and falls with the greatest nicety; and yet he does not 
seem to see, or at least his sight appears very confused. The mind is evidently 
in action, since somnambulists often write things which they were unable to 
do when awake; maintain conversation, and perform actions implying regular 
ideas. And yet after the attack they preserve no remembrance of their thoughts, 
feelings, or actions, as if consciousness had been entirely obliterated whilst it 
lasted.’’ (a) 

§ 161. The views of Abercrombie have been so long the standard on this 
point that we cannot refrain from giving them here in full: “Somnambulism,” 
he says, “appears to differ from dreaming chiefly in the degree in which the 
bodily functions are affected. The mind is fixed in the same manner as in 
dreaming, upon its own impressions as possessing.a real and present existence 
in external things; but the bodily organs are more under the control of the 
will, so that the individual acts under the influence of erroneous conceptions, 
and holds conversation in regard to them. He is also, to a certain degree, 
susceptible of impressions from without, through his organs of sense; not, 
however, so as to correct his erroneous impressions, but rather to be mixed up 
with them. A variety of remarkable phenomena arise out of these peculiari- 
ties, which will be illustrated by a slight outline of this singular affection. 
The first degree of somnambulism generally shows itself by a propensity to 
talk during sleep—-the person giving a full and connected account of what 
passes before him in dreams, and often revealing his own secrets or those of 
his friends. Walking during sleep is the next degree, and that from which 
the affection derives its name. The phenomena connected with this form are 
familiar to every one. ‘The individual gets out of bed; dresses himself; if not 
prevented, goes out of doors ; walks frequently over dangerous places in safety ; 
sometimes escapes by a window and gets to the roof of a house; after a con- 
siderable interval, returns and goes to bed; and all that has passed conveys to 


(z) Upham on Mental Action, pp. 182, 183. 


(a) Legons Cliniques de l’Alienation Mentale, par M. Falret, Legon 4, p. 121. Paris, 
1854. 


156 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP. [$ 161 


his mind merely the impression of a dream. A young nobleman mentioned 
by Hortensius, living in the citadel of Breslau, was observed by his brother, 
who occupied the same room, to rise in his sleep, wrap himself in a cloak, and 
escape by a window to the roof of the building. He there tore in pieces a 
magpie’s nest, wrapped the young birds in his cloak, returned to his apart- 
ment, and went to bed. In the morning he mentioned the circumstance ag 
having occurred in a dream, and could not be persuaded that there had been 
anything more than a dream, till he was shown the magpies in his cloak. 
Dr. Prichard mentions a man who rose in his sleep, dressed himself, saddled 
his horse, and rode to the place of a market which he was in the habit of at- 
tending once every week; and Martinet mentions a man who was accustomed 
to rise in his sleep and pursue his business as a saddler. There are many in- 
stances on record of persons composing, during the state of somnambulism: 
as of boys rising in their sleep and finishing their tasks which they had left 
incomplete. A gentleman at one of the English universities had been very 
intent during the day in composition of some verses, which he had not been able 
to complete : during the following night he arose in his sleep and finished his 
composition, then expressed great exultation, and returned to bed. In these 
common cases, the affection occurs during ordinary sleep; but a condition very 
analogous is met with, coming on in the daytime, in paroxysms, during which 
the person is affected in the same manner as in the state of somnambulism, 
particularly with an insensibility to external impressions: this presents some 
singular phenomena. These attacks. in some cases come on without any 
warning ; in others, they are preceded by a noise or sense of confusion in the 
head. The individuals then become more or less abstracted, and are either 
unconscious of any external impressions, or very confused in their notions of 
external things. They are frequently able to talk in an intelligible and con- 
sistent manner, but always in reference to the impression which is present in 
their own minds. ‘They in some cases repeat long pieces of poetry, often more 
correctly than they can do in their waking state, and not unfrequently things 
which they could not repeat in their state of health, or of which they were 
supposed to be entirely ignorant. In other cases they hold conversations 
with imaginary beings, or relate circumstances or conversations which occurred 
at remote periods, and which they were supposed to have forgotten. Some 
have been known to sing in a style far superior to anything they could do in 
their waking state ; and there are some well-authenticated instances of persons 
in this condition expressing themselves correctly in languages with which they 
were imperfectly acquainted. I had lately under my care a young lady who 
is liable to an affection of this kind, which comes on repeatedly during the day, 
and continues from ten minutes to an hour at atime. Without any warning, 
her body became motionless, her eyes open, fixed, and entirely insensible, and 
she became totally unconscious of any external impression. She has been 
frequently seized while playing on the piano, and has continued to play, over 
and over, part of a tune with perfect correctness, but without advancing be- 
yond a certain point. On one occasion she was seized after she had begun to 
play from the book a piece of music which was new to her. During the pa- 
roxysm she continued the part which she had played, and repeated it five or 
157 


§ 161] SOMNAMBULISM. [BOOK I, 


six times with perfect correctness; but on coming out of the attack, she could 
not play it without the book. During the paroxysms the individuals are, in 
some instances, totally insensible to anything that is said to them; but in 
others, they are capable of holding conversation with another person with a 
tolerable degree of consistency, though they are influenced to a certain degree 
by these mental visions, and are very confused in their notions of external 
things. In many cases, again, they are capable of going on with the manual 
occupations in which they had been engaged before the attack. This occurred 
remarkably in a watchmaker’s apprentice mentioned by Martinet. The pa- 
roxysms on him appeared once in fourteen days, and commenced with a feeling 
of heat extending from the epigastrium to the head. This was followed by 
confusion of thought, and this by complete insensibility: his eyes were open, 
but fixed and vacant, and he was totally insensible to anything that was said 
to him, or to any external impression. But he continued his usual employ- 
ment, and was always much astonished, on his: recovery, to find the change 
that had taken place in his work since the commencement of his paroxysm. 
This case afterwards passed into epilepsy. Some remarkable phenomena are 
presented by this singular affection, especially in regard to exercises of memory 
and the manner in which the old associations are recalled into the mind: also, 
in the distinct manner in which the individuals sometimes express themselves 
on subjects with which they had formerly shown but an imperfect acquaintance. 
In some of the French cases of epidemic ‘‘extase,’’ this had been magnified 
into speaking unknown languages, predicting future events, and describing 
occurrences of which the persons could not have possessed any knowledge. 
These stories seem, in some cases, to resolve themselves merely into embellish- 
ment of what really occurred, but in others there can be no doubt of connivance 
and imposture. Some facts, however, appear to be authentic, and are suffi- 
ciently remarkable. Two females, mentioned by Bertrand, expressed themselves 
during the paroxysm very distinctly in Latin. They afterwards admitted that 
they had some acquaintance with the language, though it was imperfect. An 
ignorant servant-girl, mentioned by Dr. Dewar, during paroxysms of this kind 
showed an astonishing knowledge of geography and astronomy ; and expressed 
herself in her own language in a manner which, though often ludicrous, showed 
an understanding of the subject. The alternations of the seasons, for example, 
she explained by saying that the world was set a-gee. It was afterwards dis- 
covered that her notions on this subject had been derived from hearing a tutor 
giving instructions to the young people of the family. A woman who was 
some time ago in the Infirmary of Edinburgh on account of an affection of 
this kind, during her paroxysms mimicked the manner of the physicians, and 
repeated correctly some of their prescriptions in the Latin language. Another 
very singular phenomenon presented by some instances of this affection is what 
has been called, rather incorrectly, a state of double consciousness. It consists 
in the individual recollecting, during a paroxysm, circumstances which occurred 
in a former attack, though there was no remembrance of them during the in- 
terval. This, as well as various other phenomena connected with the affection, 
is strikingly illustrated in a case described by Dr. Dyce, of Aberdeen, in the 
Edinburgh Philosophic Transactions. The patient was a servant-girl, and 
158 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP. [$ 161 


the affection began with fits of somnolency, which came upon her suddenly 
during the day, and from which she could, at first, be aroused by shaking, or 
by being taken out in the open air. She soon began to talk a great deal 
during the attacks, regarding things which seemed to be passing before her, as 
a dream; and she was not, at this time, sensible of anything that was said to 
her. On one occasion she repeated distinctly the baptismal service of the 
Church of England, and concluded with an extemporary prayer. In her sub- 
sequent paroxysms she began to understand what was said to her, and to 
answer with a considerable degree of consistency, though the answers were 
generally, to a certain degree, influenced by her hallucinations. She also be- 
came capable of following her usual employments during the paroxysm ; and 
at one time she laid out the table correctly for breakfast, and repeatedly 
dressed herself and the children of the family, her eyes remaining shut the 
whole time. The remarkable circumstance was now discovered, that during 
the paroxysm she had a distinct recollection of what took place in her former 
paroxysms, though she had no remembrance of it during the intervals. <At 
one time she was taken to church while under the attack, and there behaved 
with propriety, evidently attending to the preacher; and she was at one time 
so much affected as to shed tears. In the interval she had no recollection of 
having been at church; but in the next paroxysm she gave a most distinct 
account of the sermon, and mentioned particularly the part of it by which she 
had been so affected. This woman described the paroxysm as coming on with 
a cloudiness before her eyes, and a noise in the head. During the attack her 
eyelids were generally half-shut: her eyes sometimes resembled those of a 
person afflicted with amaurosis—that is, with a dilated and insensible state 
of the pupil, but sometimes they were quite natural. She had a dull, vacant 
look; but, when excited, knew what was said to her, though she often mistook 
the person who was speaking; and it was observed that she seemed to discern 
objects best which were faintly illuminated. The paroxysms generally con- 
tinued about an hour, but she could often be roused out of them; she then 
yawned and stretched herself, like a person awaking out of a sleep, and in- 
stantly knew those about her. At one time, during the attack, she read dis- 
tinctly a portion of a book which was presented to her; and she often sung, 
both sacred and common pieces, incomparably better, Dr. Dyce affirms, than 
she could do in a waking state. The affection continued to recur for about 
six months, and ceased when a particular change took place in her constitution. 

We have another very remarkable modification of this affection, referred to 
by Mr. Combe, as described by Major Elliot, Professor of Mathematics in the 
United States Military Academy at West Point. The patient was a young 
lady of cultivated mind, and the affection began with an attack of somnolency, 
which was protracted several hours beyond the usual time. When she came 
out of it, she was found to have lost every kind of acquired knowledge. She 
immediately began to apply herself to the first elements of education, and was 
making considerable progress, when, after several months, she was seized with 
a second fit of somnolency. She was now at once restored to all the know- 
ledge which she had possessed before the first attack, but without the least 
recollection of anything that had taken place during the interval. After ano- 

159 


§ 162] SOMNAMBULISM. — [BOOK I. 


ther interval she had a third attack of somnolency, which left her in the same 
state as after the first. In this manner she suffered these alternate conditions 
for a period of four years, with the very remarkable circumstance that during 
one state she retained all her original knowledge, but during the other, that 
only which she had acquired since the first attack. During the healthy inter- 
val, for example, she was remarkable for the beauty of her penmanship; but 
during the paroxysm, wrote a poor, awkward hand. Persons introduced to 
her during the paroxysm, she recognized only in a subsequent paroxysm, but 
not in the interval; and persons whom she had seen for the first time during 
the healthy interval, she did not recognize under the attack. (bd) 

§ 162. Carus tells us in his lectures (Leipsic, 1831) of a clergyman who 
was a somnambulist, who would get up in his sleep, take paper, and write out 
a sermon. If a passage did not please him, he would strike it out, and cor- 
rect it with great accuracy. We are told by Steltzer of a somnambulist who 
clambered out of a garret window, descended into the next house, and killed 
a young girl who was asleep there.(¢) As a counterpoise to these, we have 
the case of a preassumed somnambulism for the purpose of cloaking an in- 
tended crime. (d) 

A curious. example of somnambulism, observed in a monk, is mentioned by 
M. de Savarin, as related to him by the Prior of the convent where it hap- 
pened, who was.an eye-witness of the occurrence. ‘‘ Very late one evening 
the patient somnambulist entered the chamber of the Prior, his eyes were open 
but fixed, the light of two lamps made no impression upon him, his features 
were contracted, and he carried in his hand a large knife. Going straight to 
the bed, he had first the appearance of examining if the Prior was there. He 
then struck three blows, which pierced the coverings, and even a mat which 
served the purpose of a mattress. In returning, his countenance was unbent, 
and was marked by an air of satisfaction. The next day the Prior asked the 
somnambulist what he had dreamed of the preceding night, and the latter 
answered that he had dreamed that his mother had been killed by the Prior, 
and that her ghost had appeared to him demanding vengeance, that at this 
sight he was so transported by rage, that he had immediately run to stab the 
assassin of his mother; that a little while after, he awoke bathed in perspira- 
tion, and very content to find he had only dreamed.’”’ M. de Savarin adds, 
that if under these circumstances the Prior had been killed, the monk somnam- 
bulist could not have been punished, because it would have been upon his part 
an involuntary murder. (e) 

‘“You have all heard,’’ said Sir William Hamilton, in one of his lectures 
on metaphysics, “of the phenomenon of somnambulism. In this remarkable 
state the various mental faculties are usually in a higher degree of power than 
in the natural. The patient has recollections of what he has wholly forgotten. 
He speaks languages of which, when awake, he remembers not a word. If he 
uses a vulgar dialect when out of this state, in it he employs only a correct 


(b) Abercrombie on the Intellectual Powers, p. 238, &c. 

(c) Steltzer, uber den Willen, Leips. 1817-8, p. 273. 

(d) Fahner, System der Ger. Arznei. 1 Bd. p. 43. 

(e) Physiologie du gout, tome ii. p. 3. Paris, 1834. 
160 


BOOK I.] MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS CONNECTED WITH SLEEP. [§ 162 


and elegant phraseology. The imagination, the sense of propriety, and the 
faculty of reasoning, are all in general exalted. The bodily powers are in high 
activity, and under the complete control of the will; and, it is well known, 
persons in this state have frequently performed feats, of which, when out of it, 
they would not even have imagined the possibility. And, what is even more 
remarkable, the difference of the faculties in the two states seems not confined 
merely to a difference in degree. For it happens, for example, that a person 
who has no ear for music when awake, shall, in his somnambulic crisis, sing 
with the utmost correctness and with full enjoyment of his performance. Under 
this affection persons sometimes lie half their lifetime, alternating between the 
normal and abnormal states, and performing the ordinary functions of life in- 
differently in both, with this distinction, that if the patient be dull and doltish 
when he is said to be awake, he is comparatively alert and intelligent when 
nominally asleep. I am in possession of three works, written during the crisis 
by three different somnambulists. Now it is evident that consciousness, and 
an exalted consciousness, must be allowed in somnambulism. This cannot 
possibly be denied—but mark what follows. It is the peculiarity of somnam- 
bulism—it is the differential quality by which that state is contra-distinguished 
from the state of dreaming—that we have no recollection, when we awake, of 
what has occurred during its continuance. Consciousness is thus cut in two; 
memory does not connect the train of consciousness in one state with the train 
of consciousness in the other. When the patient again relapses into the state 
of somnambulism, he again remembers all that had occurred during every for- 
mer alternation of that state; but he not only remembers this, he recalls also 
the events of his normal existence; so that, whereas the patient in his som- 
nambulic crisis, has a memory of his whole life, in his waking interval he has 
a memory only of half his life. At the time of Locke, the phenomena of 
somnambulism had been very little studied; nay, so great is the ignorance 
that prevails in this country in regard to its nature even now, that you will 
find this, its distinctive character, wholly unnoticed in the best works upon the 
subject. But this distinction you observe is incompetent always to discrimi- 
nate the state of dreaming and somnambulism. It may be true that if we 
recollect our visions during sleep, this recollection excludes somnambulism, 
but the want of memory by no means proves that the visions we are known 
by others to have had, were not common dreams. The phenomena, indeed, 
do not always enable us to discriminate the two states. Somnambulism may 
exist in many different degrees; the sleep-walking from which it takes its 
name is only one of its higher phenomena, and one comparatively rare. In 
general, the subject of this affection does not leave his bed, and it is then fre- 
quently impossible to say whether the manifestations exhibited, are the phe- 
nomena of somnambulism, or of dreaming. ‘Talking during sleep, for exam- 
ple may be a symptom of either, and it is often only from our general know- 
ledge of the habits and predispositions of the sleeper, that we are warranted 
in referring this effect to the one and not the other class of phenomena. We 
have, however, abundant evidence to prove that forgetfulness is not a decisive 
criterion of somnambulism. Persons whom there is no reason to suspect of 
this affection, often manifest during sleep the strongest indications of dreaming, 
11 161 


§ 163] DEPRESSION, [BOOK I, 


and yet, when they awaken in the morning, retain no memory of what they 
may have done or said during the night. Locke’s argument, that because we 
do not always remember our consciousness during sleep, we have not therefore, 
been always conscious, is thus on the ground of fact and analogy disproved.’’(ee) 


VI. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS AFFECTING THE TEMPERAMENT. (/) 


Ist. Depression. (g) 


§ 163. By this term may be designated a condition, which continues for a 
long time, even for years, without assuming the form of real aberration of 
mind, but which derives peculiar importance and significance in matters of 
penal jurisprudence, from the fact that a criminal act introduces the transition 
to a disordered mental state, inasmuch as it makes its appearance as the first 
decisive symptom, which is rapidly followed by others. It develops itself in 
a diminished estimation of self, in a want of self-reliance and peculiar morbid 
despondency. 

Dr. Johnson thus describes this state in Rasselas: ‘To indulge the power 
of fiction, and send imagination out upon the wing, is often the sport of those 
who delight too much in silent speculation. He who has nothing external 
that can divert him, must find pleasure in his own thoughts, and must con- 
ceive himself what he is not ; for who is pleased with what he is? He thus 
expatiates on boundless futurity, and culls from all imaginary conditions that 
which, for the present moment, he would most desire ; amuses his desires with 
impossible enjoyments, and confers upon his pride unattainable dominion. 
The mind dances from scene to scene, unites all pleasures in all combinations, 
and riots in delights which nature and fortune, with all their bounty, cannot 
bestow. In time, some particular train of ideas fixes the attention ; all other 
intellectual gratifications are rejected; the mind, in weariness or leisure, re- 
turns constantly to the favorite conception, and feasts on the luscious false- 
hood whenever she is offended with the bitterness of truth. By degrees the 
reign of fancy is confirmed; she grows first imperious, and in time despotic. 
Then fictions begin to operate as realities—false opinions fasten upon the 
mind—and life passes in dreams of rapture or of anguish.” 

The celebrated physician Boerhaave was once engaged in so profound a 
meditation that he did not close his eyes for six weeks. And, in general, 
“any fixety of thought may be considered a monomania.”(h) Pascal being 
thrown down on a bridge, fancied ever after that he was standing on the brink 
of a terrific precipice, which appeared to him an abyss, ever ready to engulf 
him. So immutable was this dread, that when his friends conversed with him 
they were obliged to conceal the imaginary perils with chairs, on which they 


s 


(ee) Sir William Hamilton’s Lectures on Metaphysics, p. 222. 

(f) See Etudes Médico-Psychologiques sur ]’Aliénation Mentale, par L. F. E. Re- 
naudin, Chapter II. p. 36. Paris, 1854. 

‘(g) Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 109 ; 
Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med. Berlin, 1847, § 200. 

(h) Curiosities of Medical Experience, second edition; On Ecstatic Exaltation, p. 
38; Mind and Matter, by J. G. Millingen, M. D., M. A., pp. 80, 81, 82. 


162 


BOOK I.] DEPRESSION. [$ 168 


seated themselves, to tranquillize his perturbed mind Archimedes, it is re- 
lated, was heedless of the slaughter around him in a most dreadful siege. Father 
Castel, the inventor of the ocular harpsichord, spent an entire night in one posi- 
tion, ruminating on a thought that struck him as he was retiring to rest. (7) 


(2) Morel gives the following powerful sketch of primitive or simple depression : 
(Traité theorique et pratique des Maladies Mentales, par M. Morel, tome i. p. 386. 
Paris, 1852.) As there exists a mania which shows itself rather in insanity of action 
than of mind (manie instinctive), so likewise there exists a state of melancholy with- 
out delirium. Without our often being able to instance other causes than those 
phenomena which accompany the change from adolescence to puberty, from puberty 
to age, and from mature age to the critical period; at the happiest periods of life, we 
feel a vague weariness, a motiveless fear, an indefinable sadness, which sometimes is 
only transitory, and at others is the starting point of the most serious disturbances. 
It is, says Guislain, a state of sadness, of dejection accompanied with or without the 
shedding of tears, without any notable aberration of imagination, intelligence or feel- 
ing. It is the heart which exclusively suffers, but soon this suffering of the heart 
shows itself in a prostration of all the intellectual powers, a state which absorbs all 
individual energy, and appears only to leave the capacity of suffering. Where is the 
man who has not experienced these painful feelings? and if by an effort of reasoning 
we are able to affix the form of continuity to these sensations, which are only some- 
times fugitive, we will have a perfect idea of this intolerable state. Madame de Stael 
vividly touches on this in Corinne. 

“She (Corinne) had taken such a horror for all the common pursuits of life that to 
take the least resolution, to give the least order, caused her an increase of pain. She 
was unable to live except in perfect inactivity. She arose, laid down, arose again, 
opened a book without being able to understand a line; often she remained for hours 
at her window, and then would walk with rapidity in her garden. At another time 
she would take a bouquet of flowers and try to make herself dizzy with their perfume. 
Time, a never ceasing pain, the feeling of existence pursued her, and she sought relief 
in a thousand ways from that devouring faculty of thought which did not now yield, 
as formerly, a variety of reflections, but one single idea, one single image, armed with 
cruel points that tore her heart. Every word was formed with difficulty, and often she 
traced words conveying no sense, words that even frightened her, when she attempted 
to re-read them, as if the pain of the fever was there written. Feeling herself then 
incapable of turning her thoughts from her own condition, she painted all that she 
had suffered, but it was no longer in those general ideas, those universal feelings that 
find a response in every heart; but it was the cry of anguish, a long monotonous cry, 
it was misfortune, but it was no longer genius. ‘4 

When a like condition, says Guislain, is accompanied with anxieties, groanings, 
sobs, a desire to commit suicide, or any other determination, it is no longer in its sim- 
plest state. * * I on the contrary think that a like condition can continue in 
connection with the above mentioned tendencies. How else could we explain those 
suicides without name, those irregular actions of which we see so many examples in 
instinctive mania, the affection which, above all others, has the closest relation to 
melancholy? In the greater number of cases, these forms are distinguishable less 
perhaps by the diversity of the acts than by the nature of the depressive principles. 
We may readily admit that instinctive maniacs generally betray themselves by more 
froward deeds, and by more sudden and more cruelly energetic and destructive deter- 
minations than the simple hypomaniacs who rather turn against themselves their 
fatal homicidal impulses. In the first case also the depravity of the instincts is more 
often connected with the organic affections, a vicious education or a prior state of im- 
morality, whilst in the latter class, the impulses which they themselves deplore are 
the harder to be understood, because (1), the individual is generally placed in the 
most favorable social condition ; (2), his education has left nothing to be wished for, 
and (3), his delicate sensibility would never cause the actions to which he is irresisti- 
bly forced in this unfortunate unhealthy state, to be suspected. 

This mental condition which I have often had opportunity of observing, was strik- 
ingly illustrated in the general state of a deranged female, who, in 1842, was placed 
under the care of M. Falret, at la Salpétriére hospital. The patient showed no in- 
sanity in her language. Gifted with high intelligence and great tenderness of heart, 
belonging to a family that had suffered misfortune, but who, in the time of their pros- 
perity had neglected nothing for her education, Virginia Mac A e, who had 
courageously suffered the reverses of fortune, and created for herself a new position, 
was unable to explain the loss of her moral sensibility and the causes of an inex- 
pressible sadness which left her no other resource but tears. 

163 


§ 164] DEPRESSION: [BOOK I. 


§ 164, “ Depression of mind,’ says Reid, “‘ may be owing to melancholy, a 
distemper of the mind which proceeds from the state of the body, which throws 


“The future,” she writes, “ which presents hope to every reasonable being, offers to 
my mind an abyss of evils which it is impossible for me to bear. I want nothing; the 
beings that I most cherish, I wish their death, because I have always seen that that 
which forms the happiness of others, is my affliction. I, the eldest, who should have 
been the consolation of the mother whom Iso much loved, have caused her nothing 
but misery. When I experienced the incomprehensible disgust for life, then, lying 
beside her, I dared propose to her to set fire to the bed, in order that we might die 
together ; she whom I have seen lose her consciousness at the idea only of seeing one 
of her children die, she who would still sacrifice herself if she could return to me the 
force and energy that are wanting, I have only the more discouraged, by constantly 
telling her that we were entirely without hope. The child also, who was formerly my 
delight, has become an object of indifference. The night is for me more sad than for 
a criminal whom the laws have condemned to die, because he knows that his life will 
soon end; whilst in spite of the despair of my soul, in spite of my disturbed sleep, I 
find myself every day in sound health, and yet without force and without courage. 
The beautiful sky that God created to delight his children, serves only to sadden still 
more my thoughts. I would wish to again become a child, to recover the innocence 
_ of childhood; why cannot I feel that calm which is sometimes felt in the spring im- 
mediately after the winter. I compare myself to a poor woman who has for a long 
time had nothing but the produce of her hands, whereby to raise up her children, and 
who, in spite of fatigue and watching, does not abandon them like I abandoned my 
Marie. I, who am only thirty-four, who am in full possession of strength and health, 
and who have not power of directing to any useful end the faculties imparted me by 
heaven.” 

Such was the position of a patient who now presents us the example of simple 
melancholy without delirium. In such cases we will observe that this state, so 
full of agony, is often nothing but a period of transition to systematic delirium; and 
we will also remark the differences existing between this primitive depression and 
the incubation of mania, which may, it is true, commence with depression and finish 
‘with exhalation, but which, in the greater number of cases, betrays itself in an abnor- 
mal activity, and in the development of intellectual aptitudes, which have not been 
before remarked in the patient. Here, on the contrary, all the faculties appear over- 
whelmed by the depressive principle. The occupations they most cherished are in- 
supportable to them, and the intellectual labors in which they most excelled, they are 
unable to perform. The poet loses his art, and the author his skill, the mathemati- 
cian notes down false numbers, and the artist and the workman no longer possess 
their aptness for the performance of the mechanical parts or manual of their profes- 
sion. Nor can it be otherwise. Without doubt, to write and think well we must be 
under the influence of some emotion, but this emotion should be true and not morbid. 
Contentment is necessary to everything, and the most gloomy poetry must be inspired 
by a kind of spirit, which presupposes both energy and intellectual possessions. True 
grief has no natural fecundity, that which it produces is nothing but a gloomy agita- 
tion which constantly brings back the same thoughts. (See Traité Theorique et Pra- 
tique des Maladies Ment. de M. Morel, tome i. p. 336. Paris, 1852.) 

Melancholy, or “‘ Aliénation partielle depressive,’ as it has been called by Falret, 
has, as its name indicates, for its principal characteristic, a depression, slowness and 
prostration of all the faculties united with general anxiety. This fundamental dis- 
position of the sensibility and intelligence, produces in the greater number of those 
thus affected, a crowd of analogous consequences. Everything is viewed by them in 
a distorted light; all their relations with the external world are changed ; they look 
‘upon everything with repulsion and antipathy; they bear with difficulty the kindest 
remarks of their relations and friends, and consolation itself irritates them. In 
entire contradiction to nature, the patient cannot retire within himself. He finds 
nothing within but anxiety, doubt and mistrust, both of himself and others. LEvery- 
thing seems changed around him. He is often afflicted, and sometimes irritated by 
it, and thinks the alteration due to those that surround him, rather than to any 
personal change. Thence come irritation, anger and violence, against himself and 
others. He then abandons the world that injures him, and sinks into complete in- 
activity. 

Frequently it is not only against the world in general, but against his best friends 
that the patient directs his suspicions, his mistrusts and his hatred. To this general 
state of depression, anxiety and gloominess succeed. After this comes both a phy- 
sical and moral prostration, in which there is a more or less complete suspension of 
sensibility and intelligence. 


164 


BOOK I.] AFFECTIONS OF THE TEMPERAMENT. [$ 164 


a dismal gloom upon every object of thought, cuts all the sinews of action, 
and often gives rise to strange and absurd opinions in religion, or in other 
interesting matters. Yet, where there is real worth at the bottom, some rays 
of it will break forth even in this depressed state of mind. A remarkable 
instance of this was exhibited in Mr. Simon Brown, a dissenting clergyman 
in England, who, by melancholy, was led into the belief that his rational soul 
had gradually decayed within him, and at last was totally extinct. From this 
belief he gave up his ministerial function, and would not join with others in 
any act of worship, conceiving it to be a profanation to worship God without 
a soul, In this dismal state of mind he wrote an excellent defence of the 
Christian religion against Tindal’s ‘ Christianity as old as the Creation.’’ To 
the book he prefixed an epistle, dedicatory to Queen Caroline, wherein he 
mentions “that he was once a man, but by the immediate hand of God for his 
sins, his very thinking substance has, for more than seven years, been continu- 
ally wasting away, till it is wholly perished out of him, if it be not utterly 
come to nothing.” And having heard of her Majesty’s eminent piety, he begs 


Whilst the sensibility is thus oppressed and affected, the will is equally enfeebled, 
inactive and powerless. Indecision and slowness of resolution are frequently to be 
met with, to such a degree as to produce a total want of volition and incapacity of 
movement. We should note, however, under this head, two principal modes of reac- 
tion. In certain cases, the reaction is of no effect; the patient resembles a statue, 
being insensible and without will. At other times, on the contrary, he is shocked by 
everything that surrounds him, and reacts strongly, it may be directly, through the 
violence of a desire which betrays itself in action, or it may be indirectly, by an in- 
cessant instability. A constant desire to complain follows, with groans and laments, 
which, when it arrives at its maximum, constitutes a grade of exaltation, intermediate 
between melancholy and mania. Intelligence is enfeebled, and depressed like the 
sensibility and the will; the capacity for the generation of ideas is enfeebled, their 
course is diminished, their circle narrowed. The patient talks only of himself and 
his misfortune; he utters monotonous complaints, and sighs, or pronounces broken 
words. Sometimes the need of expressing ideas not being felt, he speaks only with 
difficulty, and sometimes even, instead of answering, he contents himself with a rude 
and silent movement. Sometimes, also, he speaks a great deal and to every body, but 
it is only to speak of himself, to give utterance to the same complaints and the same 
lamentations: he is morally what the hypochondriac is physically. 

The physiognomy is concentrated and anxious, expressing dulness and stupidity, 
followed by habitual, and sometimes entire silence, and slowness of movement, car- 
ried sometimes to immobility. These external signs correspond with the internal 
condition we have just described, and form an exact picture of this kind of mental 
disease. 

Among the melancholics, in fact, some feeling a general anxiety, think they have 
done a bad action, have committed a crime, suppose themselves reserved for severe 
punishments,, both in this world and the other, and overwhelmed with scruples, they 
criminate themselves for the most innocent actions of their lives, or imagine them- 
selves possessed by the devil and abandoned of God. Others, in consequence of the 
sentiment of mistrust which controls them, imagine themselves to be surrounded by 
spies or invisible enemies, and according to their previous ideas, their education or 
the age in which they live, think themselves under the power of sorcery, inagic, 
magnetism, the police, &c. Others, entirely wrapped in their sadness, think them- 
selves ruined, accused, dishonored or even betrayed by their relations and friends. 
In a word, the delirious ideas which become the centre of the greater part of the pre- 
occupations of the intelligence and of the feelings, and which appear, at first sight, to 
constitute all the delirium, are in reality only the relief to the general condition 
which gives birth to them. In spite of their infinite variety, they all partake of the 
general character of the disease. 

There is not, then, in Melancholy, as has often been asserted, a concentration of the 
attention, or even of all the moral and intellectual powers, upon one sad idea, but a 
general state of sadness and depression which shapes itself in one predominant idea, 
and manifests itself by a crowd of other morbid phenomena. (See Lecons Clinique 
sur l’Aliénation Mentale, de M. Falret. Legon 9. Paris, 1854.) ° 
7 16 


§ 165] DEPRESSION. [BOOK I. 


the aid of her prayers. The book was published after his death without the 
dedication, which, however, having been preserved in manuscript, was after- 
wards printed in the “ Adventurer.” Thus this good man, when he believed 
that he had no soul, showed a most generous and disinterested concern for 
those who had souls. As depression of mind may produce strange opinions, 
especially in the case of melancholy, so our opinions may have a very consider- 
able influence either to elevate or depress the mind, even where there is no 
melancholy. Suppose, on one hand, a man who believes that he is destined 
to an eternal existence; that He who made and who governs the world, 
maketh an account of him, and hath furnished him with the means of attain- 
ing a high degree of perfection and glory. With this man compare, on the 
other hand, the man who believes nothing at all, or who believes that his 
existence is only the play of atoms, and that after he has been tossed about 
by blind fortune for a few years, he shall again return to nothing. Can it be 
doubted that the former opinion leads to elevation and greatness of mind, and 
the latter to meanness and depression !’’(7) 

§ 165. “A pleasant season,” says Dr. Rush, ‘“a fine day, or even the morn- 
- ing sun, often suspend the disease. Mr. Cowper, who knew all its symptoms 
by sad experience, bears witness to the truth of this remark, in one of his 
letters to Mr. Haly. ‘I rise,’ says he, ‘cheerless and distressed, and brighten 
as the sun goes on.’ Its paroxysms are sometimes denoted ‘low spirits.’ They 
continue from a day, a week, a month, a season, to a year, and sometimes 
longer. The intervals differ—l, in being accompanied with preternatural high 
spirits; 2, in being attended with remissions only; and 3, with intermissions, 
or, in other words, in correctness and equanimity of mind. 'The extremes of 
high and low spirits, which occur in the same person at different times, are 
happily illustrated by the following case: A physician in one of the cities of 
Italy, was once consulted by a gentleman who was much distressed with a 
paroxysm of this intermitting state of hypochondriacism. He advised him to 
seek relief in a convivial manner, and recommended him in particular to find 
out a gentleman of the name of Cardini, who kept all the tables in the city, to 
which he was occasionally invited, in a roar of laughter. ‘Alas! sir,’ said 
the patient, with a heavy sigh, ‘I am that Cardini.’ Many such characters, 
alternately marked by high and low spirits, are to be found in all the cities in 
the world.”’(£) 

In melancholy the patient on the one hand is fully convinced that his notions 
and wishes ought to be realized; but on the other he feels the impossibility of 
eifecting their realization. He therefore makes no effort to render possible 
the impossible; yet he cannot resign the ideal, which he bears in his bosom ; 
he loves his fictions, or the objects of his wishes so much, that he cannot part 
with them. Thus he consumes his existence in a monotonous grief; he cannot 
take interest in anything except the object of his sadness. (/) 


(j) Reid on the Active Powers of Opinion, p. 576. . : 
(k) Rush on the Mind, pp. 82, 83. (1) Rauch’s Psychology, 151... *. 


166 


BOOK I.] DERANGED TEMPERAMENT. [$ 166 


2d. Hypochondria.(m) 


§ 166. When the morbid despondency noticed under the last head extends 
to the general tone of bodily sensations, a condition is produced which we 
commonly call hypochondria. In the inferior stages the patient retains suffi- 
cient self-control to conceal and forget his condition, and proceed unhindered 
in his occupations; but in the higher degrees he becomes so absorbed in his 
bodily sensations as to exhibit it in his appearance and conduct, disregarding 
every effort made to raise his spirits, and reducing all his reflections to the 
common machinery of personal questions and answers.(n) As this sort of 
selfishness increases, the mind is often filled with envy, hatred, bitterness, sus- 
picion, and revenge towards others, and particularly towards those in whom 
the patient believes himself to detect a want of sympathy, or even of respect, 
or whom he regards as the authors of his distress. The result of this is too 
apt to be a series of unjust surmises and accusations, personal ill-treatment of 
others, and even murderous threats and assaults against their supposed wrong- 
doers, as well as the commission of suicide. In the judicial scrutiny and con- 
sideration of such a case, it is essential to inquire how far and for what length 
of time the attention of the patient can be directed from his bodily feelings to 
other objects; what is his personal opinion of his own condition; whether 
any, and if any, what insane ideas possess his mind, and what is his general 
demeanor. Where the perceptive faculty was not so far involved in the pro- 
gress of the disease as to falsify the impressions of the senses, and deprive the 
consciousness of the power of correcting them, the reasons are wanting for 
deciding against the responsibility of the agent; but the judge, in passing 
sentence, will nevertheless take into account the morbid impulse, which was a 
subsidiary cause in the commission of the crime.(o) 


—_—< 


(m) See Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetzchke, 1851, 
§ 109; Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med. Berlin, 1747, § 208. See De L’Hypochon- 
drie et du Suicide. Par J. P. Palfret. Paris, 1822; Renaudin sur L’Aliénation Men- 
tale, p. 99. Paris, 1854. See also on this point the following works: Confessions of 
an Hypochondriac, or the Adventures of a Hypochondriac in search of Health. Saun- 
ders & Otley, London, 1849; Review of same, Journ. of Psychol. Med. vol. iii. p. 1. 

(n) Ellinger, p. 105. 

(0) See the above views in Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 542. 

The following description of the hypochondriacal character is to be found in the 
Médecine Légale de M. Orfila, tome i. p. 416. Paris, 1848. : 

Hypochondriacs are above all reinarkable for their exaggerated fears upon the state 
_ of their health—and the foolish ideas they give utterance to in expressing their suffer- 
ings. Their temper is very unequal, they pass almost without motive from hope to 
despair, from grief to gayety—from bursts of passion to gentleness, from laughter to 
tears; many are timid, pusillanimous, fearful, morose, irascible, restless, hard to 
please, a torment and fatigue to every body. They are easily moved, a trifle vexes 
and agitates them, producing fears, torments, and attacks of despair. The greater 
number show a marked change in their affections, they are egotistical, the slightest 
motives cause them to pass from attachment to indifference or to hate. They are 
often susceptible of an exaltation or depression of spirits, of a rapid succession of the 
most opposite ideas and emotions, without the will being able to control the thought. 

But those thus affected have a very good judgment in whatever relates to their own 
interests, and generally in everything which is foreign to their health, unless the dis- 
ease should finish in a total loss of reason, a thing which is of very rare occurrence. 
It is only the character above described which renders hypochondriacs more likely to 
yield to fear, and more easily moved to contract engagements ; suggestive and inveig- 


167 


§ 167] HYPOCHONDRIA. [BOOK I. 


§ 167. Sometimes, as we are told by Dr. Rush, the pain of a bodily disease 

suspends, for a short time, the mental distress. Mr. Boswell, in his life of Dr. 
- Johnson, relates a story of a London tradesman who, after making a large 
fortune, retired into the country to enjoy it. Here he became deranged with 
hypochondriasis, from the want of employment. His existence became finally 
a burden to him. At length he was afflicted with the stone. In a severe 
paroxysm of this disease a friend sympathized with him. “No, no,” said he, 
‘don’t pity me, for what I now feel is ease, compared with the torture of mind 
from which it relieves me.’’ A woman in this city bore a child, while she was 
afflicted with this disease. She declared immediately afterwards that she felt 
no more pain from parturition than from a trifling fit of the colic. Where 
counteracting pains of the body are not induced by nature or accident to relieve 
anguish of mind, patients often inflict them upon themselves. Walking bare- 
footed over ground covered with frost and snow was resorted to by a clergyman 
of great worth in England for this purpose. Carden, an eminent physician of 
the fifteenth century, made it a practice to bite his lips and one of his arms, in 
order to ease the distress of his mind. Kempfer tells us that prisoners in 
Japan, who often became partially deranged from distress, used to divert their 
mental anguish by burning their bodies with moxa; the same degree of pain, 
and for the same purpose, is often inflicted upon the body, by cutting and 
mangling it in parts not intimately connected with life. But bodily pain, 
whether from an accidental disease, or inflicted by patients upon themselves, is 
sometimes insufficient to predominate over the distress of their minds. Dr. 
Herberden mentions an instance of a man who was naturally so afraid of pain, 
that he dreaded even being bled, who in a fit of low spirits cut off his penis 
and scrotum with a razor, and declared after he recovered the natural and 
healthy state of his mind, that he felt not the least pain from that severe 
operation. A similar instance of insensibility to bodily pain is related by Dr. 
Ruggieri, an Italian physician, of a hypochondriac madman, of the name of 
Louvel, who fixed himself on a cross and inflicted the same wounds upon him- 
self, as far as he was able, that had been inflicted upon our Saviour. He was 
discovered in this situation and taken down alive. During the paroxysms of 
his madness he felt no pain from dressing his wounds, but complained as soon 
as they were touched, in the intervals of his disease.(p) 

Dr. Haindorft, in his German translation of Dr. Reid’s “Essay on Hypo- 
chondriasis,” in alluding to the possibility of a patient laboring under hypo- 
chondriasis being able, by an exercise of the power of volition, to control his 
morbid sensations, justly observes, ‘We should have fewer disorders of the 
mind if we could acquire more power of volition, and endeavored by our own 
energy to disperse the clouds which occasionally arise within our own horizon; 
if we resolutely tore the first threads of the net which gloom and ill-humor 
may cast around us, and made an effort to drive away the melancholy images 
of a morbid imagination by incessant occupation. How beneficial would it be 


ling measures exercise considerable influence upon their mind. Finally, the jealous, 
suspicious, irritable, headstrong character of hypochondriacs would be an extenuating 
circumstance, if, under a first impulse, they should commit a reprehensible act. 

(p) Rush on the Mind, pp. 90, 91, 92. 


168 


BOOK I.] HYSTERIA. [$ 169 


to mankind if this truth were universally acknowledged and acted upon, viz: 
that our state of health, mental as well as bodily, principally depends upon 
ourselves |”? 


“By seeming gay we grow to what we seem.” 


It was the remark of a man of great observation and knowledge of the world, 
‘Only wear a mask for a fortnight, and you will not know it from your real 
face.’’(q) 

§ 168. A late French writer mentions the case of a rich peasant who was 
possessed with the idea that he was bewitched, and who complained to his 
medical attendant that seven devils had taken up their abode in his body. 
‘Seven, not more ?”’ was the physician’s inquiry. ‘‘ Only seven,” was the re- 
ply. The physician promised him to rid him of the visitors, one each day, upon 
condition that for the first six he was paid twenty francs, but for the séventh, 
who was the chief of the band, forty. The patient agreed, and was subjected 
by the physician, who set apart the fee for charity, to a series of daily shocks 
from the Leyden jars, the seventh and last of which was so powerful as to 
produce a fainting fit in the supposed demoniac, who, however, awoke from it 
entirely freed from his delusion.(7) 

Burns suffered much from indigestion, producing hypochondria. Writing 
to his friend, Mr. Cunningham, he says: ‘“ Canst thou not minister to a 
mind diseased? Canst thou speak peace and rest to a soul tossed on a sea 
of troubles, without one friendly star to guide her course, and dreading that 
the next surge may overwhelm her? Canst thou give to a frame, tremblingly 
alive to the tortures of suspense, the stability and hardihood of a rock that 
braves the blast? If thou canst not do the least of these, why wouldst thou 
disturb me in my miseries with thy inquiries after me?”? From early life, the 
poet was subject to a disordered stomach, a disposition to headache, and an 
irregular action of the heart. He describes, in one of his letters, the horrors 
of his complaint: ‘‘I have been for some time pining under secret wretched- 
ness. The pang of disappointment, the sting of pride, and some wandering 
stabs of remorse, settle on my life like vultures, when my attention is not 
called away by the claims of society, or the vagaries of the muse. Even in 
the hour of social mirth, my gayety is the madness of an intoxicated criminal 
under the hands of an executioner. My constitution was blasted, ab origine, 
with a deep, incurable taint of melancholy that poisoned my existence.”’(s) 


3d. Hysteria. (t) 


§ 169. Hysteria, which only attacks individuals of the female sex, or males 
having a feminine organization, resembles hypochondria in its mental and 
moral symptoms; but the nauseous and painful feelings manifest themselves 


(g) Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, pp. 169, 170. 

(r) Démonomanie, singuliére guerison. Annales méd. psychol. 1847. 

(s) Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, pp. 147-8. 

(t) Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med., Berlin, 1847, § 208 ; Krahmer, Handbuch 
der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 110. 


169 


§ 169] | HYSTERIA. [BOOK I. 


in convulsions, and the alternation between the different states of feeling is 
_ far more abrupt. (w) 


(wu) Schtirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 543; Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. 
Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 109. 

Burton, in his Anatomy of Melancholy, has described this state: “They are soon 
tired with all things; they will now tarry, now begone; now in bed they will rise, 
now up, then they go to bed; now pleased, and then again displeased ; now they like, 
by and by they dislike all, weary of all. ‘Sequitur nune vivendi, nunc moriendi, 
cupido,” saith Aurelianus. Discontented, disquieted upon every light occasion or no 
occasion, often tempted to make away with themselves; they cannot die, they will 
not live; they complain, weep, lament, and think they live a most miserable life ; 
never was any man so bad. Every poor man they see is most fortunate in respect of 
them. Every beggar that comes to the door is happier than they are. Jealousy and 
suspicion are common symptoms of this misanthropic variety. They are testy, pettish, 
peevish, distrustful, apt to mistake, and ready to snarl, upon every occasion and with- 
out any cause, with their dearest friends. If they speak in jest, the hypochondriac 
takes it in good earnest; if the smallest ceremony be accidentally omitted, he is 
wounded to the quick. Every tale, discourse, whisper, or gesture, he applies to him- 
self; or, if the conversation be openly addressed to him, he is ready to misconstrue 
every word, and cannot endure that any man should look steadfastly at him, laugh, 
point the finger, cough, or sneeze. Every question or movement works upon him and 
is misrepresented, and makes him alternately turn pale or red, and even sweat with 
distrust, fear, or anger.” 

And thus says Charles Lamb :— 


‘* By myself walking, 
To myself talking ; 
When, as I ruminate 
On my untoward fate, 
Scarcely seem I 
Alone sufficiently : 
Black thoughts continually 
Crossing my privacy ; 
They come unbidden ; 
Like foes at a wedding, 
Thrusting their faces 
In better guests’ places ; 
Peevish and malcontent, 
Clownish, impertinent, 
Dashing the merrinient. 
So, like the fashions, 
Dim cognitions 
Follow and haunt me, 
Striving to daunt me; 
In my heart festering, 
In my ears whispering, 
‘Thy friends are treacherous, 
Thy foes are dangerous, 
Thy dreams are ominous.’ 


Fierce Anthropophagi, 
Spectra Diaboli, 
What scared St. Anthony; 
Hobgoblins, Lemures, 
Dreams of Antipodes, 
Night-riding incubi, 
Troubling the fantasy, 
All dire illusions 
Causing confusions ; 
Figments heretical, 
Scruples fantastical, 
Doubts diabolical. 
Abaddon vexeth me, 
Mahro perplexes me, 
Lucifer teareth me, 
Jesu! Maria! liberate nos ab his dires tentationibus inimici.’’—Miscellaneous 
ene B. 6. Hd. Moxon: 1841. Mind and Matter, by J. G. Millingen, M.D., M. A. pp. 
’ ’ c 


170 


BOOK I.] MELANCHOLY. [$ 171 


4th. Melancholy.(v) 


§ 170. The state of depression undergoes a change, in consequence of which 
the complaints of bodily indisposition diminish, and the patient comes to regard 
his former sufferings as delusions, and his present condition as a healthy one. 
When such a person is found to have committed an act forbidden by the penal 
code, it may be assumed, without hesitation, that his liberty of action is gone. 
In the higher degrees of melancholy, the various gloomy and morbid feelings 
are accompanied by distinct imaginings, which take their character from the 
sort of agitation in which the disease commenced, the general opinions and 
character of the individual, the pursuits which last occupied him, and the dread 
and bitter experience which have produced them.(w) For all these feelings the 
patients seek explanations, and find them either in themselves (melancholia 
concentrica), or in surrounding things and circumstances (melancholia peri- 
pherica). In the former case they take themselves severely to task for small 
or inconsiderable errors, or declare, with an air of so much conviction, calm- 
ness, and firmness, as sometimes to mislead the judge himself, that they have 
committed great crimes, as murder, &c., and have incurred, by their own inex- 
piable fault, the displeasure of God and of the world, and eternal damnation. 
In melancholia religiosa they ask to be tried and punished; they complain of 
the loss of what is most dear to them, apprehend poverty for themselves and 
their families in the future, or even imagine themselves possessed by demons. 
In melancholia dzmonica, they accuse other persons of malevolence and 
persecution, to which they ascribe their ailments. It is characteristic of the 
general phase that the patient never sees surrounding things as they are, but 
always in a light corresponding to his gloomy frame of mind; frequently, also, 
this false coloring turns into a real illusion of the senses, particularly in the 
peripheric form of the disease, which is the reason that it so frequently ends in 
lunacy. The external conduct of the patients, the manner in which they exe- 
cute the dictates of their wills, is very various. In melancholia attonita they 
sit motionless and speechless ; in other cases, they can hardly find words enough 
to depict their distraction ; sometimes they are perpetually in motion—melan- 
cholia activa et errabunda. In peripheric melancholy they scold and swear 
about their grievances, become noisy and excited, and resort to violent means 
of resistance or revenge. In this manner, melancholy often becomes the occa- 
sion of murderous assaults, and sometimes murders of the most cruel kind, as 
well as of suicide. (x) 

§ 171. In a mature case falling under this head, the motives are often not 


(v) Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med., Berlin, 1847, § 208. Dr. Cheyne, rather 
jocularly than otherwise, applied the term, “The English Malady,” to that species of 
melancholy which is most affected by the weather and by other depressing circum- 
stances. This term has been seriously adopted by Siebold, Gericht. Med. § 212. Me- 
lancholia Anglica, sive Autochira. Fr. B. Osiander, in his interesting volume on 
Suicide, discusses the same topic. Hannov. 1813, 8, § 207. 

(w) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 544; compare Ellinger, p. 108; Lecons Cliniques 
sur l’Alienation Mentale; Falret, Legon 7th, p. 185. Paris, 1854. Etudes Medico- 
Psychologiques sur l’Alienation Mentale. L. F. E. Renaudin, chap. iv. p. 178. Paris, 
1854. 

(x) The above summary is taken from Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 544. 


171 


§$ 173] DERANGEMENT OF THE TEMPERAMENT. [BOOK I. 


even present to the consciousness, and the act is committed in a state of intoxi- 
cation, hlind frenzy, fury, and confusion, preceded sometimes by the almost 
imperceptible symptoms of silent depression, sometimes by the traces broad 
and deep of havoc in the affective faculties, and accompanied often by a sud- 
den loss of self-control, visible paroxysms of terror, and a fancied pursuit by 
fiends.(y) The transition from melancholy to mania is open to the simple 
explanation, that depression is the first stage of psychical disease in general, 
and contains within itself the germs of all other phases.(z) 

§ 172. In other cases there is also an absence of conscious motives, but in 
their place an uncontrollable restlessness, an indistinct but overawing feeling 
of dread, and an incessant morbid approach of those abnormal moral propen- 
_ sities which will be considered under the next head. LEllinger correctly ob- 

serves,(a) that “impulses of this kind often excite the most desperate struggles 
in the mind ; evoke the most various external means to overcome them; place 
the murderous instrument into the hands of the individual, from which reason 
wrests it again; drive him into solitude and far from the subject of the mad 
desire, and induce him to give warning to the threatened victim ; to meditate 
and to attempt suicide ; and when at last the fatal deed is nevertheless accom- 
plished, there is a calmness and a clearness in the manner in which he antici- 
pates the impending punishment, which to an unpractised observer must 
exclude every idea of an underlying mental derangement. Such subjects either 
betray the ordinary symptoms of depression, or only those incident to the © 
specific propensity, which throws the consciousness into a state of distraction, 
and fills the mind with fear and dread. In either case, the impulse, whether 
preceded or not by a brief relaxation, comes suddenly, in which case it will be 
found in connection with disturbances of the bodily functions, among which 
may be enumerated cessation of the natural period or of other natural or ordi- 
nary evacuations, rush of blood to the head, exhaustion by loss of blood, 
protracted nursing, excesses, epilepsy, approach of severe attacks of sickness. 
The «mmediate occasion of the act may be the view of a naked figure, the sight 
of an execution, of blood, of a murderous instrument or other means of com- 
mitting crimes, or the recital of such an occurrence; the ultimate cause is 
found, according to Ideler, in the associations of feelings and desires according 
to their contrast, and the struggle and contradiction thus arising.” 

§ 173. In still another order of cases, as we are told by Schiirmayer, the 
consciousness is not only in full possession of the motives, but the act is con- 
ceived on the ground of a chain of reasoning and executed with a degree of 
arrangement and circumspection apparently inseparable from a clear state of 
the understanding. Here, as will be seen more fully hereafter, the motives 
are sometimes hallucinations, particularly of the ear (voices heard), which 
give commands to the madman, sometimes a wish to die without the courage 
to commit suicide directly, but with the design of incurring capital punishment 
by the murder of others (persons the subjects of an old grudge, or such as are 
entirely innocent, as children) ; sometimes the notion that the destruction of | 


(y) Hllinger, p. 112. (z) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 545, 
(a) Ellinger, p. 114. 


172 


BOOK I.] GENERAL MORAL MANIA. [$ 1v4 


the world is at hand, or that a terrible misfortune impends, against which it 
was necessary to’ protect the object of particular affection, which is best effected 
by death. In the latter case, as will presently be more fully seen,(b) suicide, 
or self-inculpation, is common, and sometimes a vindictive feeling against the 
supposed authors of the person’s suffering, which the mind often debates with 
itself for a length of time, until all doubt is removed by some new hallucina- 
tion.(c) 

Attacks of hysteria, although in appearance bearing considerable analogy 
to those of epilepsy, rarely produce a state of complete insensibility, and 
although they may last longer, they never leave behind them that bewilder- 
ment of mind. However frequently they may occur, they hardly ever produce 
mania or dementia, and therefore they rarely exclude responsibility.(d) 


VII. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS AFFECTING THE MORAL SYSTEM. 


Ist. General Moral Mania. 


§ 174. As depression is based upon an unduly subdued state of the feeling 
of self and a want of self-confidence, so the fundamental trait of mania con- 
sidered in its present relation, is an exaggeration of the feeling of self and of 
self-confidence.(e) Unsoundness of mind rarely takes this form at first; it is 
usually developed from depression, the mistaken idea usually reversing its pur- 
port, while the impulses of expression in some manner overstep their normal 
limits, compelling the will to act in a corresponding manner. Here the mad- 
man either makes constant motions with his head or his arms, or runs about 
until he is completely exhausted, which might be called the madness of mo- 
tion ;(f) or he vents his humor in gestures and declamations, or the motive 
impulse is confined to the tongue, and becomes morbid garrulity or madness 
of the tongue. This talkativeness is not the effect of a superabundance of 
ideas, but all the thoughts are uttered hastily as they occur, without being 
shaped or sifted, giving rise to contradiction, incoherence, and the semblance 
of a wandering imagination. If in the end the malady is imparted not only 
to the will but also to the sentiments, the undefined impulse of action and 
expression receives the form and color of chagrin and anger, which the suf- 
ferer supposes to be well founded and directed to real objects, and the disease 
becomes frenzy or fury, which may take some specific form, as that of general 
destructiveness, or of a thirst for blood. This also includes many unnatural 
cravings, such as a desire to bite, or to do something extravagant; a sort of 
mental or moral vertigo, which develops itself sometimes, though more 
rarely, in the propensity to steal. In cases of this class it is impossible for 
the patient to resist the morbid impulse. He has lost his self-possession, that 


(b) Post, §§ 206-208, 247-253. 

(c) Schiirmayer, § 547; Ellinger, p. 116; Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med. Ber- 
lin, 1847, § 208; Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle. C. A. Schwetschke, 
1851, § 110. 

(d) Briand, Méd. Lég. p. 569. Paris, 1852. 

(e) See Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 548. 

(f) Compare Hagen in R. Wagner’s Handworterbuch der Physiologie, vol ne 819. 

oO 


§ 176] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


is, the power of contrasting the necessary consequences of the action with his 
present position and its requirements, and the calculations of prudence, as 
well as the impulses of conscience, are alike unheeded. The morbid sentiment 
_thus controls his entire perceptive faculty, admitting of no other perception in 
connection with the subject, and cutting off all reflection, all doubt of the 
fitness of the action and its relation to the laws of the land.(g) 

§ 175. In the lower stages of mania there is generally so much external 
self-control, and such a connection and logical consistency in the ideas, that 
the process of mental evolution becoming more compact and rapid, produces 
a vivacity of combination, of memory, and imagination, which a layman is 
not easily induced to suspect to arise from a disorder of the reasoning facul- 
ties, particularly when external circumstances concur to furnish an explana- 

tion of the condition in which the person is found. This may throw difficul- 
ties around the medico-legal consideration of such a case, and under such 
circumstances the true view in those penal systems where the correct principle 
is observed of graduating the punishment of the insane to the degree of their 
freedom of agency and consequent responsibility, is to declare moral responsi- 
bility in its common-law sense to have ceased. It happens that the offences 
committed during and in consequence of mental aberrations of this descrip- 
tion, are either petty misdemeanors, or of a nature to.call for the interference 
of the police only, or resolve themselves into mere civil questions, or into ob- 
jections to the competency of witnesses. The higher grades of mania involve | 
far more serious considerations of responsibility for any action, which will 
presently be fully considered.(h) 

§ 176. “In this form of insanity,’’ according to Dr. Ray, ‘‘the derangement is 
confined to one or a few of the affective faculties, the rest of the moral and in- 
tellectual constitution preserving its ordinary integrity. An exaltation of the 
vital force in any part of the cerebral organism, must necessarily be followed 
by increased activity and energy in the manifestations of the faculty connected 
with it, and which may even be carried to such a pitch as to be beyond the 
control of any other power, like the working of a blind instinctive impulse. 
Accordingly, we see the faculty thus affected, prompting the individual to ac- 
tion by a kind of instinctive irresistibility, and while he retains the most per- 
fect consciousness, of the impropriety and even enormity of his conduct, he 
deliberately and perseveringly pursues it.’’(2) 

The following cases are given us by Ray, in which this perversion of the 
moral faculties was accompanied in its latter stages by some delusions, fur- 
nishing a striking illustration of this form of disease, as well as its intimate 
connection with intellectual mania :— 

Col. M. was a man of superior intellectual powers, and moved in the higher 
walks of society. He was a lawyer by profession, and was appointed district- 
attorney in one of the southwestern states by President Jackson, whom he 
had previously served in a military capacity. Towards the meridian of life, 


(g) Schirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 548. 
(h) Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle. G. A. Schwetschke, 1851. § 110. 
Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med. Berlin, 1847. § 208. 
(2) Ray on Insanity, 189. 
174 


BOOK I.] GENERAL MORAL INSANITY. [$ 176 


his conduct became so disorderly and boisterous, that he was often confined in 
jails or hospitals for the insane. On one of these occasions he cut off his 
nose, and subsequently came to Boston in order to have it replaced by Dr. J. 
Mason Warren, by means of the rhinoplastic operation, which proved quite 
successful. While in Boston he made the acquaintance of Dr. Bell, of the 
McLean Asylum, for the purpose, as he declared, of getting his aid in obtain- 
ing redress for the wrongs he had sustained in being placed under guardian- 
ship, and confined in jails and hospitals, his object being not to retaliate, but 
to protect his future reputation, The Dr. has kindly furnished such particu- 
lars of his case as came to his knowledge from various sources. ‘I inferred 
that he was naturally of a proud, arrogant, and extravagant spirit, which 
was kept in check, while she lived, by the discretion of his wife. He was sen- 
sual but not intemperate, until his nervous system had become excited. His 
peculiar theory was, that while he admitted that he had held—and, towards 
the last of my interview, avowed that he then held—certain fanciful notions 
which we might term delusions, if we pleased, still they were such as did not 
interfere with his right to entire liberty of action. ‘For instance,’ said he, 
‘T feel that Iam cousin to the Duke of Wellington and to Napoleon. It 
seems ridiculous. I can’t make it out by any kind of proof. I even laugh 
-atit. But still, I dwell upon it as a reality. It concerns nobody else. It 
has in it no dangerous element. Why, then, should I be interfered with for 
harboring a delusion, if you choose to call it so, no more absurd than a thou- 
sand religious sects feel themselves happy in resting upon.’ He would often 
argue thus: ‘I protest against being called insane on account of my ideas. 
For my actions I am accountable. I never yet claimed—I never will clain— 
immunity as an irresponsible being. I will permit no one to set up such a 
defence for me. Try me by the laws of the land and the strict rules of evi- 
dence, and I will abide by the result, as a good citizen; but I must have op- 
portunity to argue my own cause, and examine the witnesses brought before 
me.’ 

‘“‘He had often been arrested for assault and battery, but always continued 
to beat the complainants, by his familiarity with legal proceedings, and by his 
quick perception of whatever made for or against himself. If, in his best 
estate, he had been counsel for another party, he could not have managed the 
ease better than he did his own. However wild, extravagant, and boisterous 
at hotels and such places, of which he was the terror, as soon as he was in the 
atmosphere of a court of justice, he became calm, dignified, and respectful, 
but tenacious to the last degree. For example, when carried before the 
police-judge of New York, on a warrant, the printed form of which had been 
in use for twenty years, setting forth that in consequence of insanity ‘or 
otherwise,’ he was dangerous to be at large, he, at once, advocated success- 
fully his constitutional right to have the offence set forth specifically and 
precisely. . 

“He had most carefully considered the extent of his rights—the precise 
amount of force justifiable in ejecting an unwelcome guest, or, what was a 
more common event, in resisting an ejectment; the obligation of innholders 


to receive applicants, and the value of proving the first blow in defence of as- 
175 


§ 177] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [Book I, 


saults. On one occasion, thinking the hack-men and cab-men of New York 
were insolent and exacting in regard to the right of way, he armed himself 
with a heavy whip, took a good witness by his side, and drove through 
Broadway in a strong carriage, running against every charioteer who failed 
to give him his exact half of the road. This, of course, produced a collision 
of tongues as well as wheels. . His peculiarly sarcastic language tempted a 
touch of the whip from some of his opponents, and upon this, our hero turned 
to and thrashed them within an inch of their lives. They appealed to the 
courts, but his witness soon and truly proved the aggression on them. 

‘“While in the Pennsylvania Hospital for the insane, and again, I believe, 
while in the jail in Washington, he got discharged by means of a writ of 
habeas corpus, which he was allowed to sue out. When thus brought before 
the court, he argued his case upon the settled legal doctrine that an ability to 
distinguish right from wrong is the sole test of sanity. Of course, no judge 
could, or did, hesitate in opinion, that a gentleman who was able to make an 
elegant and an astute argument on the nature, origin, and protection of the 
rights of the subject, could, by any means, be within the category of indi- 
viduals intellectually incapable of discriminating between right and wrong. 
In fact, processes of detention as a lunatic, held, in his case, only until he 
could get before some tribunal. And yet when thus turned loose upon society, 
he was a passionate, dangerous lunatic. When hard pushed by evidence of 
extravagant and boisterous actions, he would attribute the fact to his having 
unfortunately taken a little too much wine (which was probably true to some 
extent), comprehending perfectly that an offence of that kind would be fol- 
lowed by a much lighter consequence—a mere fine, in fact—than seclusion as 
a lunatic. When the self-mutilation was alluded to, he would most frankly 
attribute it to his ignorance of physiological laws, and allege that his lost 
organ, being covered with blotches and carbuncles, he cut it off, absurdly sup- 
posing that nature had a renewing power, as in the growth of the hair. 

‘‘ After he became so wild in his conduct in Boston as to be a universal an- 
noyance, I advised his friends in Missouri to place him under care as a lunatic. 
They replied that the thing was impracticable; that no institution had been 
found able to hold him, and they would not arouse his vindictive feelings by 
any further trials of that sort. His intemperate habits increased, and his 
delusions became more palpable, yet without affecting his intellectual power. 
The idea returned that parts of his face, if removed, would grow again, and 
he cut out the cicatrix on his forehead whence the nasal flap had been taken. 
Fortunately death stepped in at this point, and removed a man whose fate 
was so melancholy ; for, under all the ravages of mental disease, there were - 
traces of noble sentiments and lofty aspirations.”(/) 


2d. Moral Monomania. 


§ 177. It has been already observed(X) that on the subject of moral insanity 
psychological opinion is so divided as to deprive it, in this respect, of any 


(j) Ray on Insanity, 181, 182, &e, (k) Ante, § 59. 
176 


BOOK I.] MONOMANIA. [$ 179 


authoritative weight in courts of justice. Even as to the name there is irre- 
concilable conflict. The specific form appears to have been first mentioned by 
Ellinger, under the name of melancholia sine delirio sive perturbatio mentis, 
melancholia sine delirio. Pinel subsequently called it manié sans delire, 
after having made the assertion, based upon facts, “‘that there are madmen in 
whom there is no perceptible alteration of the intellectual process, of the per- 
ceptions, judging faculty, imagination, or memory, and yet a perversion of the 
manifestations of the will, in a blind impulse to the commission of violence, or 
even of bloodthirsty rage, without any assignable dominant idea, any delusion 
of the imagination, which could cause such a propensity.” By Ray, Taylor, 
and Pritchard the term moral insanity is used; by Dr. Carpenter, ¢mpulsive 
insanity. On the other hand, the existence of this type as a distinct and 
substantive form of insanity, disconnected with mental disturbance, is rejected 
by high authorities, some of whom will be shortly quoted,(Z) in addition to 
whom may be named Heinrich,(w) Leubuscher,(v) Elwell,(#) and the author 
of several recent interesting essays in the American Journal of Insanity.(z) 

§ 178. The position has been already advanced that the common law limits 
the defence of moral insanity to cases where there is a cognate mental un- 
soundness.(@) When there is no such unsoundness, the propensity cannot, 
from a penal stand-point, be distinguished from mere malice or badness. But 
it does not follow from this that when there is proved to exist an insane moral 
perversion, which manifests itself in the making of a will, or in the discharge 
of business duties, this will not be a ground for setting aside the will, or taking 
out a commission of lunacy. As has already been noticed, the criminal and 
the civil tests of insanity are widely different. The policy of the law may, on 
the one hand, reject moral insanity when it is used as a defence for crime, and 
yet, on the other hand, acknowledge it as a disability when it is sought to be 
used to prejudice third persons. While, however, there is too great a difference 
of opinion among experts in this respect to justify a writer on legal medicine 
in accepting either view as authoritative, the question is too vital to be passed 
over without a notice of the grounds on which the controversy rests. These 
will now be noticed. 

§ 179. Authorities sustaining Insanity merely Moral.—Among those who 
assume that moral insanity is a distinct type, I may again quote Dr. Ray. 
“In fact, it has always been observed,’’ says this eminent and experienced 
physician, “that insanity as often affects the moral as it does the intellectual 
perceptions. In many cases there is evinced some moral obliquity quite un- 
natural to the individual, a loss of his ordinary interests in the relations of 
father, son, husband, or brother, long before a single word escapes from his 
lips ‘sounding to folly.’ Through the course of the disease the moral and 
intellectual impairments proceed par? passu, while the return of the affections 


(1) Post, § 183. 

(u) Kritische Abhandlung tiber die von Prichard als Moral Insanity geschilderte 
Krankheitsform. Allgemein. Zeitschr. fiir Psychiatrie, V. Bd. 4 Hft. 

(v) Bemerkungen iiber Moral Insanity und ahnliche Krankheitszustiinde. Casper’s 
Wochenschr., Nr. 59 u. 51. 

(x) Malpractice and Medical Evidence. (z) Vols. xii. p. 334, xiv. p. 314. 

(a) Ante, § 61. 

12 177 


§ 180] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


to their natural channels is one of the strongest indications of approaching 
recovery. Such being the fact, it ought not to be a matter of surprise that in 
some cases the aberration should be confined to the moral impairment, the 
intellectual, if there be any, being too slight to be easily discerned.”’ 

“The reality and importance of this distinction,” says the same author 
subsequently, ‘‘which thus establishes two classes of mania, is now generally 
acknowledged by practical observers, among whom it is sufficient to mention 
Hsquirol, Georget, Gall, Marc, Rush, Reil, Hoffbauer, Andrew Combe, Conolly, 
and Prichard, though some of them are inclined to doubt whether the integrity 
of the understanding is as fully preserved in moral mania as Pinel affirmed. 
Still, its apparent soundness, and the difficulty, at least, of establishing the 
existence of any intellectual derangement, while the moral powers are unequi- 
vocally and deeply deranged, render it no less important in its legal relations 
than if the understanding were unequivocally affected. It is defined by Prich- 
ard, who has strongly insisted on the necessity of assigning it a more distinct 
and conspicuous place than it has hitherto received, as ‘consisting in a morbid 
perversion of the natural feelings, affections, inclinations, temper, habits, and 
moral dispositions, without any notable lesion of the intellect or knowing and 
reasoning faculties, and particularly without any maniacal hallucination.’ It 
will be convenient, even if not scientifically precise, to consider it under two 
divisions, according as it is general or partial.’’(b) 

Take also the following less positive, though still very impressive, argument 
of Dr. Carpenter, the most authoritative of recent physiologists :— 

§ 180. ‘The more active forms of delirium pass by almost imperceptible 
gradations into the state of manza, which is usually characterized by the com- 
bination of complete derangement of the intellectual powers with passionate 
excitement upon every point which in the least degree affects the feelings. 
There is, however, a considerable amount of variety in the phases of mania, 
depending upon differences in the relative degree of intellectual and of emo- 
tional disturbance. For there may be such a derangement of the former as 
gives rise to complete incoherence in the succession of ideas, so that the 
reasoning power is altogether suspended; and yet there may be at the same 
time an entire absence of emotional excitement, so that the condition of the 
mind is closely allied to that of dreaming or of rambling delirium. On the 
other hand, the intellectual powers may be themselves but little disturbed, the 
trains of thought being coherent, and the reasoning processes correctly per- 
formed ; but there may be such a state of general emotional excitability, that 
nothing is felé as it should be, and the most violent passion may be aroused 
and sustained by the most trivial incidents, or by the wrong ideas which are 
formed by the mind as a consequence of their misinterpretation. Between 
these two opposite states, and that in which the disturbance affects at the same 
time the intellectual and emotional parts of the mental nature, there is a com- 
plete succession of transitional links; but under all the phases of this condition 
(these often passing into each other in the same individual) there is one con- 
stant element, namely, the deficiency of volitional control over the succession 


(b) Ray on Insanity, p. 166. 
178 


BOOK I.] | MONOMANIA. [$ 181 


of thought. This deficiency appears to be a primary element in those forms 
which essentially consist in intellectual disturbance ; whilst in those of which 
emotional excitement is the prominent feature it seems rather to result from 
the overpowering mastery that is exercised over the will by the states of un- 
controllable passion which succeed each other with little or no interval. It 
seems probable, however, from the phenomena of intoxication, that the very 
same agency which is the cause of the undue emotional excitability also tends 
to produce an absolute diminution in the power of volitional control.” 

“There may, however, be no primary disorder of the intellectual faculties, 
and the insanity may essentially consist in a tendency to disordered emotional 
excitement, which affects the course of thought, and consequently of action, 
without disturbing the reasoning processes in any other way than by supplying 
wrong materials to them. Now, the emotional disturbance may be either 
general or special; that is, there may be a derangement of feeling upon 
almost every subject—matters previously indifferent becoming invested with 
strong pleasurable or painful interest, things which were previously repulsive 
being greedily sought, and those which were previously the most attractive 
being in like manner repelled; or, on the other hand, there may be a peculiar 
intensification of some one class of feelings or impulses, which thus acquire a 
settled domination over the whole character, and cause every idea with which 
they connect themselves to be presented to the mind under an erroneous aspect. 
The first of these forms, now generally termed moral insanity, may, and fre- 
quently does, exist without any disorder of the intellectual powers, or any 
delusion whatever; it being (as we shall presently see) a result of the gene- 
rality of the affection of the emotional tendencies, that no one of them main- 
tains any constant hold upon the mind, one excitement being, as it were, 
driven out by another. Such patients are among those whose treatment 
requires the nicest care, but who may be most benefited by judicious influences. 
Nothing else is requisite than that they should exercise a moderate amount of 
self-control; but the best directed moral treatment cannot enforce this if the 
patient do not himself (or herself) co-operate. Much may be effected, however, 
as in the education of children, by presenting adequate motives to self-control; 
and the more frequently this is exerted, the more easy does the exertion 
become.”’(c) 

§ 181. To the same effect speaks Dr. McCosh, who may be appealed to as 
one of the ablest, and in his theological relations, one of the most conservative 
of the representatives of Scotch psychology :— 

“The fact that man’s mind is self-acting, and in particular, that the will is 
self-acting—has its power or law in itself—is one of the conditions of responsi- 
bility. The other two conditions of responsibility seem to be conscience and 
intelligence. There must be conscience to distinguish between right and wrong, 
and to announce to us which is the one and which is the other. There must 
also be such an amount of intelligence as to enable the mind to comprehend 
the true state of the case, and to separate, in the complex acts of life, that 
which is moral from that which is indifferent. These three, then, seem to be 
the essential elements or conditions of responsibility. Every human being, 


(c) Carpenter’s Physiology, Phil. 1856, §§ 704, 707. 
179 


§ 182] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


in a sane state of mind, is in possession of all the three. The maniac in some 
cases has lost the first, and has no proper power of will. The idiot, and in 
some cases the maniac, is without the third, or the power of discovering what 
is really embraced in a given phenomenon. Without the one or the other of 
these necessary adjuncts, there is no room for the right exercise of the second 
—that is, the conscience; and the party therefore is not responsible.”’(d) 

§ 182. As holding the same view, though with much greater cautiousness 
of expression, we may cite Morel, a recent distinguished French writer on 
insanity, from whom we translate the following :— 

“Tnstinctive mania (manie raisonnante of Pinel) includes homicidal and 
incendiary monomaniacs, &c. Those thus affected seldom complain of being 
tormented with hallucinations of the senses, but are subject to indefinable pains 
which betray themselves exteriorly in headaches, roaring in the ears, dazzlings 
and indescribable sensations. If we sometimes see in them perfect digestive 
powers or an exaggerated appetite, the opposite phenomena of want of appe- 
tite, depraved tastes, &c., are much more frequent symptoms. ‘They feel an 
incessant need of movement, an activity out of all proportion with their phy- 
sical forces, alternating with an insurmountable apathy. If, under certain 
circumstances, the absence of sleep astonishes us, we on the contrary often 
observe them in a torpid and almost death-like state. Sometimes their 
sensibility is so exalted that the whole exterior world becomes for them nothing 
but a source of pain, anguish, and irritability. Sometimes the most unhappy 
sensations, and the most painful emotions do not seem to affect either their 
physical or moral nature. 

‘“‘When these patients are brought into a court of justice they are unanimous 
in attributing the same motives to their actions. They accuse themselves of 
irresistible impulses; they are ignorant why they so acted, and in this respect 
are very different from those suffering from hallucinations or systematic mad- 
ness, who astonish and frighten us by the inexorable logic of their actions, 
who express only imperfectly shaped regrets; who are indifferent as to the 
condition of their victims, as much as to their own interests, and who are not 
able to say but that they will perform the same act again if the opportunity 
should occur. In scrutinizing the former life of such patients we must remain 
convinced that the lesions of their intelligence, the disorganization of their 
instincts and tendencies must be due to deep organic disturbances. Hereditary 
influences, malformation of the great organ of the intelligence, certain diseases 
which may have changed the general health, idiopathic affections, arrests of 
development; troubles at the period of puberty, or in the normal phenomena 
of gestation, are so many involuntary causes. These causes are the more 
striking and palpable as the patients cannot always be excused on account of 
a vicious education. The malady with which they are afflicted has sometimes 
attacked them in the midst of the best social conditions, and when a relatively 
feebler intelligence and the manifestation of depraved instincts have early been 
remarked in them; conditions of system which have not always found their 
corrective in an appropriate hygienic treatment and education. And this is 


(d) McCosh on Divine Government, 270. 
180 


BOOK I.] MONOMANIA. [§ 182 


why we have called this form of mania, instinctive mania, because we see in it 
something so essentially connected with the organic conditions, that it is im- 
possible for ‘us to consider such patients as other than what they really are, 
viz., things deprived of their free-will and reason. There do exist voluntary 
causes which produce identical consequences as regards the derangement of the 
tendencies. The subversive and selfish passions, debauchery, lewdness, 
drunkenness, and solitary habits, are of this class. This form of mania 
will be best shown in the following case, of an educated maniacal woman who 
was irresistibly urged on to attempt the lives of her companions and rela- 
tions :— , 

“The previous mode of living of Marie C. by no means explains the aberra- 
tion of her sentiments and the disorganization of her feelings. Born of honest 
parents, who spared nothing for her education, she embraced, early in life, the 
profession of teacher in a small village. She quitted this position, which was 
too laborious for her, and entered as domestic into a family, where she was 
treated rather as one of the household than as a servant. She remained there 
eight years, as happy as it was possible for one so afflicted to be. 

“<T do not know,’ she says, ‘how to explain my mode of life. I never 
amused myself like the other children of the village; I possessed a ridiculous, 
fantastical, capricious temper, and I generally preferred seeing evil done than 
good. I was sometimes extravagantly gay, but more generally I was sad.’ 

““Question.—‘ Had you any cause for being so?’ Answer.—‘ None. My 
parents loved me, if possible, more than my other brothers and sisters; but I 
really took pleasure in nothing. I have been a teacher, but that became very 
wearisome to me. I have been for eight years in the household of M. P., but 
it was always the same thing; however, I never said anything, I kept every 
thing to myself.’ @.—‘ Have you ever thought of marrying?’ .A.—‘ Never; 
and when any one made such proposals to me, I thought that they wished to 
insult me.’ @.—‘ Have you suffered from violent grief?’ .A.—‘I cannot 
truly say that I have suffered more pain than pleasure; it was only when my 
brother was accidentally drowned that I experienced a great blow; but, what 
is singular, I was not grieved at the idea of having lost him, but at the thought 
of his dying unconfessed.’ @.—‘Have you ever been dangerously sick ?’ 
A,—‘Six months after the death of my brother, I was attacked with a severe 
illness (typhoid fever). Since that time I have been very restless; I get up 
during the night; I cannot sleep. The blood rushes to my head, and the 
desire of doing evil then takes possession of me.’ @.—‘ Explain clearly all 
that you have done up to this period.’ A.—‘I used to arise at night and 
go torment my sister; I used to awake her and draw her to the foot of her bed. 
Once I bit her very badly in the hand.’ @.—‘On these occasions were you 
conscious of any pain, had you no longer any appetite?’ A»—‘I suffered 
pain nowhere, except that my courses had stopped, and the physicians bled 
and put leeches on me to rectify that; but the more I was bled the more wicked 
I became, I only thought of evil, and I only wished for evil; so much so, 
that I once told my sister to bring me an axe, to cut some wood with, and 
when she brought it I tried to split her head. Iran after her, and if our 
parents had not interfered, I should certainly have killed her. As to appe- 

181 


§ 183] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


tite, I have always had too good a one; I eat like an animal. I was in the 
habit of taking pieces of bread and carrots from the troughs in our cow-stable. 
IT am never able to satisfy myself.’ @.—‘If you had killed your sister, would 
you have been much grieved?? .A.—‘I think not; it would not have worried 
me at all. In the same manner, when I was at the hospital of Remiremont, 
I was always trying to kill somebody. Once I grasped a woman so hard by 
the throat, that I should have strangled her, if she had not cried out, and put 
out her tongue so far as to frighten me. I did nothing but dream of shedding 
blood ; I could have drank it. Once I enticed six old women into the dormi- 
tory, wishing to strangle them; I commenced with one, but the others crying 
out obtained assistance. J was confined alone, and as I could injure no one, I 
commenced biting my own hands (the signs of the cicatrices are still visible).’ 
@.—‘Do you hear voices commanding you to do these frightful acts? Explain 
how it is possible for a girl well brought up to behave in such a manner.’ 
A.—‘T hear no voices, but I am pushed on to such a degree as to be unable 
to stop myself from performing them. When I am at church, instead of say- 
ing prayers, I blaspheme. ‘They tried to place rosaries and images of the 
Holy Virgin in my hands, but I destroyed them. I always am desirous of 
overturning whatever is on the altar, and when I see any girl by my side say- 
ing her prayers, I worry and pinch her.’ 

“With regard to the two months that Marié C. has been at the asylum, she 
did not exaggerate the bad instincts that control her. She has become the 
terror of: her ward. We have been obliged to isolate her because she arises 
during the night, drags the other patients out of bed, and tries to strangle 
them. She however works and occupies herself; but suffer her to escape out 
of sight for a moment, and she leaves her work in order to tear up that of her 
companions. Approaching them with a sympathizing manner, and under 
pretence of seeing what they are doing, she twists their hands in her attempts 
to break their fingers. | 

“Tf the strait-waistcoat is put upon her, she finds means of placing herself in 
the way of every body, and tries to trip up her companions and to bite, all 
the while deploring her situation and wishing to be delivered from it. But 
. even in expressing her regrets, her face betrays no emotion, she remains im- 
passible, and it is difficult to read upon her features any expression of the 
perverted sentiments which force this unfortunate to the performance of such 
deplorable acts, &c.”’(d) | 

§ 183. Authorities rejecting Insanity merely Moral.—On the other hand, 
in addition to the authorities already noticed(dd), as rejecting the theory of 
mania sine delirio, we may add the great body of recent German psycholo- 
gists. Of these, we may take Schiirmayer as a representative. He insists 
that it is not to be supposed that a single impulse is diseased, while all the 
other functions of the mind retain their healthy action. While the entire 
intellect enjoys sound health, there is nothing in which a morbid desire of 
theft, murder, &c., could originate, and such a phenomenon is a psychological 


(d) See Traité Théorique des Maladies Mentales, par M. Morel, tome i. p. 310. 
Paris, 1852. 


(dd) Ante, § 177. 
182 


BOOK §.] MORAL INSANITY. [$ 184 


impossibility, and the assumption of such requires a psychological contradic- 
tion. A mania sine delirio, a mania without a morbid participation or dis- 
turbance of the perceptive faculties, is therefore out of the question, as a 
desire to injure or destroy is impossible without an act of the mind by which 
this purpose is entertained, and as reason and understanding are alike dis- 
ordered whether they insinuate a wrong motive for the morbidly conceived pur- 
pose of the act, or whether they entirely omit the suggestion of any reason 
whatever. (e) 

§ 184. The same position is thus defended by Dr. Winslow: ‘‘Is there 
not,’’? he says, ‘‘a mysterious, inscrutable, and inexplicable oneness in the 
constitution of the human mind, defying all attempts at an accurate and 
minute classification and separation of its powers? If such a state of mutual 
dependence, action, and union obtains between various states of mind (I will 
not use the arbitrary terms ‘faculty’ or ‘power’) in a condition of health, a 
fortiort how impossible is it to disjoin, separate, and individualize the mental 
faculties when under the influence of disease? Can we draw the line of 
demarcation between a diseased and healthy condition of the delicate structure 
of the vesicular neurine of the brain? Is it not obviously impossible for the 
most experienced anatomist to say, This is the territory which separates the 
morbid from the healthy portion of the brain ? or for the physician to assert 
such an extent of disorder of the mind is consistent with safety and responsi- 
bility, but beyond the boundary, danger and irresponsibility commence ?”’ 

‘But, apart altogether from the metaphysical objection to the theory, let 
us for a moment consider whether such a form of disease as partial insanity 
or monomania comes under the observation of the practical physician. There 
are, undoubtedly, forms of insanity in which there is an unhealthy predomi- 
nance and exaltation given to particular mental impressions or delusions ; 
that certain states of morbid thought and feeling stand out in bold and promi- 
nent relief, giving, as it were, a character or type to the mental disease; but I 
never yet saw a case of alienation of mind in which the delusion or halluci- 
nation was in reality confined to one or two ideas, those ideas exercising no 
influence over the conduct of the person, and not implicating, to a certain 
degree, the other faculties of the mind. It is impossible to circumscribe the 
operation of morbid conditions of thought, or to draw a line of demarcation 
between those states of mind that are clearly under the influence of disease, 
and those operations or faculties of the intellect that remain apparently unaf- 
fected. A man believes himself to be our Saviour, or Mahomet the prophet. 
Apparently the man’s mind is sound upon all other points; but within what 
limits can we confine and restrain the influence of so serious a delusion ?”’ 

‘“‘ A slight accession of bodily disease, a severe attack of indigestion, con- 
gestion of the liver, or a torpid state of the bowels, may make all the differ- 
ence between security and safety in such a case. A person laboring under the 
dominion of one palpable, insane delusion or hallucination (I am now using 
the term delusion in its strictly medical acceptation), ought not to be treated 
quoad the question of criminality as a sane and rational man. But let me for 


(ce) Schiirmayer,.Gericht. Med. § 549; ante, § 58, &c. 
183 


§ 184] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


a minute revert to the question as to the existence of partial insanity, or 
-monomania. Foville, a French physician of great celebrity, who had for 
many years the medical charge of the Charenton Lunatic Asylum near Paris, 
when speaking of monomania, observes: ‘ Monomania consists in a delirium, 
partial and circumscribed to a small number of objects. Monomania, in its 
most simple condition, is excessively rare; the number of patients who only 
rave on one subject is infinitely small compared to the number of those who 
are called monomaniacs. Under this head are often confounded all those 
who have some habitual dominant idea. I have only seen two cases which 
rigorously merit the name, and these two even were affected from time to time 
with more extended delirium.’ 

‘‘He again remarks : ‘ Let any one examine the hospitals of Paris, of Bicétre, 
of Charenton, and he will see that amongst the thousands of insane, there is 
scarcely one true monomaniac, perhaps not one. Insanity attacks principally, 
at one time the intellectual, at another the moral or affective faculties; and, 
again, the sensations and movements. Hach of these may be more or less 
affected than the others; and so, when the intellect, without being unaffected, 
is less deeply involved than the other faculties, we fall into the error of con- 
sidering it sound, and call these monomaniacs. Indeed, it seems to me as 
though the descriptions of monomania had been written upon the word, and 
not from nature; that is to say, that writers have described what mzght merit 
the title of monomania, but of which they can find no instance in practice.’ | 

“‘Moreau, also a great authority in France, says: ‘It is impossible to admit 
that the intellectual faculties can be modified in a partial manner. In the 
slightest as well as the most severe forms of insanity, there is necessarily a 
complete metamorphosis—a radical and absolute transformation of all the 
mental powers of the onE. In other words, we are insane or we are not in- 
sane; we cannot be half deranged, or three-quarters, full face or profile.’ 

“ Baillarger, an eminent French psychological physician, adopts the same 
view of the question, and maintains that the alleged monomaniacal idea is 
more frequently predominant than exclusive. If we look to Germany, we 
find the first psychological authority of that country, Damerow, declaring that 
‘he never knew a case of the disease of the mind called monomania, in which 
there was not a fundamental, general psychical disorder.’ ”’(/) 

§ 184(1). Dr. Mayo thus speaks on the same point: ‘I may observe that 
the theory of either moral or impulsive insanity is too liable, for anything that 
Dr. Pritchard has suggested, to occasion the sudden outbreaks of the brutal 
character—a character under rapid development, at present, in the lower orders 
of the country, to find refuge under this plea. Such was the application of 
it which, some years ago, protected the Honorable Mr. Touchet from the penal 
consequences of a great crime. That gentleman put to death, by a pistol-shot, 
the marker of a shooting-gallery. The act was sudden, and there was no ap- 
parent motive; but it was not performed under any semblance of delirium. 
Mr. Touchet was eccentric, and he was blasé. He fancied that he desired to 


(f) Dr. Forbes Winslow’s Essay on the Legal Doctrine of Responsibility, reprinted 
in Am. Journal of Insanity, vol. xv. p. 173. 


184 


BOOK I.] MORAL INSANITY. [$ 184 


be hanged—at the gallows he would probably have thought differently—and 
he was reckless and brutal enough to give himself a chance of this fate, at the 
expense of the life of a fellow creature. JI have noticed him since, in the 
criminal department of Bedlam, ensouciant and indifferent enough, but cer- 
tainly not insane in any sense of the word that would not entirely disintegrate 
its meaning; neither when we proceed to consider the sense which the law 
intends to give to the expression of the certificate ‘ unsoundness’—shall we 
find this epithet at all more appropriate to Mr. Touchet’s case, which was 
simply one of brutal recklessness. With respect to the misapplication of the 
plea of insanity to hysteria, we have the case of a nursery-maid, placed in 
Bethlehem Hospital in 1846. A trifling disappointment, relative to an article 
of dress, had produced in her a wayward state of mind. She labored, at the 
time, under diminished catamenia. An object to which she was generally much 
attached came in her way, namely, the infant whom she had nursed, and she 
destroyed it, as a fanciful child breaks, in its moodiness, a favorite doll. No 
fact more nearly approaching to delirium than the above, was stated in excul- 
pation or excuse at the trial. But Dr. Pritchard’s work on the different forms 
of Insanity, in relation to Jurisprudence, was published in 1842; and, by 
1846, juries had learned to convert the uncontrolled influences of temper into 
what he terms Instinctive Insanity.” 

‘“‘ As an instance of this class of cases in which the judicial authorities came 
rightly to a very different conclusion, I will quote to you the following one, 
from Sir Woodbine Parrish’s last work on Buenos Ayres. Having spoken of 
a certain wind occasional in that climate, which in some persons produces pe- 
culiar irritability and ill-humor almost amounting to a disorder of their moral 
faculties, he proceeds as follows: ‘‘Some years ago, Juan Antonio Garcia, 
aged between thirty-five and forty, was executed for murder at Buenos Ayres. 
He was a person of some education, and rather remarkable for the civility and 
amenity of his manners; his countenance open, his disposition generous. 
When this vento-norte—this peculiar north wind set in, he appeared to lose 
all command over himself; and such became his irritability, that during its 
continuance he was engaged in continual quarrels and acts of violence. Be- 
fore his execution, he admitted that it was the third man he had killed, besides 
being engaged in various fights with knives. When he arose from his bed in 
the morning, he told Sir Woodbine’s informant, he was always aware at once 
of its accursed influence upon him; a dull headache first, and then a feeling 
of impatience at everything about him. If he went abroad his headache 
generally became worse ; a heavy weight seemed to hang over his temples. He 
saw objects as it were through a cloud, and was hardly conscious where he went. 
He was fond of play, and if, in such a mood, a gambling house was in his way, 
he seldom resisted the temptation. Once there, a turn of ill luck would so irri- 
tate him, that he would probably insult some one of the bystanders ; if he met 
with any one disposed to resent his abuse they seldom parted without blood- 
shed. The relations of Garcia corroborated this account, and added that no 
sooner had the cause of excitement passed away, than he would deplore and 
endeavor to repair the effects of his infirmity. ‘The medical man,’ says Sir 
Woodbine, ‘ who gave me this account, attended him in his last moments and 

185 


§ 184] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


expressed great anxiety to save his life, under the impression that he was hardly 
to be accounted a reasonable being.’ ‘But,’ he adds, ‘to have admitted that 
plea, would have led to the necessity of confining half the population of the 
city when the wind sets in.’ I quite agree with the conclusion which this 
remark implies, as to the fate of Garcia. He was himself aware of the mur- 
derous instinct to which he was liable, and of its exciting causes. Surely, 
when such knowledge is in the possession of the delinquent, he must be made 
responsible for the non-avoidance of exciting causes.’’(g) 

§ 184(2). It is further insisted, as a question of fact, that in the so-called © 
cases of moral insanity, mental unsoundness can almost in every instance be 
shown to exist by positive proof. This is illustrated by an ‘“ Analysis of fifty- 
two Cases of Insanity marked by a Disposition to Homicide,” furnished to the 
American Journal of Insanity for October, 1857, by Dr. J. P. Gray. From 
this the following summary is extracted :— 

“ Sex.—Of those who committed the act, nineteen were males and five 
females; of those who made unsuccessful attempts, twenty were males and 
five females. 

“ Habits.—Of the entire number (fifty-two) twenty-three were intemperate, 
or vicious, bad men, and twenty-nine were of unexceptionable character and 
habits. J 

“ Hereditary Predisposition.—In twenty-one of the fifty-two cases there 
existed a marked hereditary predisposition, in nine no such predisposition 
existed, and in twenty-two no facts touching this point were ascertained. 

“« Mental Disease.—The form of mental disease was acute mania in four- 
teen cases, subacute mania in three, paroxysmal mania in two, chronic mania 
in four, dementia in twenty-four, melancholia in four, mania-A-potu in one. 
Four of the cases of mania and one of dementia were accompanied by epilepsy. 

“« Time.—Twenty-two of the twenty-four homicides were committed in the 
daytime, the remaining two in the early part of the evening. Of the twenty- 
five attempts, twenty-one were made in the daytime, two in the night, and two 
both in the day and night. 

“ Object of Attack.—A father was the victim in one case, a brother-in-law 
in one, a husband in one, wives in four, children in ten, a cousin in one, neigh- 
bors in four, neighbors’ children in three, and entire strangers in seven cases. 
In nearly the same proportion the immediate relations of the patients were 
the objects of attack in those cases in which the attempt was unsuccessful. 

““ Suicidal Disposition.—In ten of the fifty-two cases a suicidal tendency 
accompanied the disposition to homicide. 

“ Commitment to Asylum.—Of the twenty-four homicides, eleven were 
acquitted by the courts before which they were arraigned, on ground of in- 
sanity, and ordered to the asylum; one was found guilty, but sentence was 
suspended ; four were sent here on preliminary trial, six without any criminal 
proceedings ; and two were placed in the asylum by their friends. 

“ Resulis.—Of the twenty-four patients who committed homicide, seven 
recovered, eleven are unimproved, two eloped, and four have died. Of the 


(g) Mayo on Medical Testimony in Lunacy, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62. 
186 


BOOK I.] MORAL INSANITY. [$ 184 


twenty-five patients who were prevented from carrying their homicidal purpose 
into execution eight recovered, thirteen are unimproved, and four have died. 

“Arranging these cases under Dr. Bucknill’s very convenient modified 
classification of Esquirol,(h) we have the following result :— 

‘‘], ‘Those wherein the crime has been occasioned by delusion, and no 
reasonable person can doubt or object to the irresponsibility of the offender.’ 
In this class we have thirty-four of the fifty-two cases. 

“2, ‘Wherein the offender, though suffering from cerebro-mental disease, 
has committed the crime under the influence of some motive not of a delusive 
character.’ In this class we have seven of the fifty-two cases. 

‘3, ‘Where with general symptoms of cerebro-mental disease neither de- 
lusion nor motive for the crime are discernible.’ In this class we have eleven 
of the fifty-two cases.”’ 

§ 184(3). Tests of Moral Insanity.—Whether, however, moral insanity 
is regarded, as holds the first class of observers, as a distinct phase, or whether 
it be merely the predominant type of a mind in other respects unsound, there 
are certain tests which may be applied to it as indicating its existence and 
character. These we may notice in the language of a paper read before the 
Imperial Academy in 1859 by M. Devergie :— 

‘“‘ No incentives to the deed, either in passions not sufficiently repressed, or 
in an acquired fixed idea; antecedents and manners irreproachable; absence 
of hallucinations ; outbreak of insanity manifested by a criminal act, and in- 
stantaneous return to reason as soon as the deed was accomplished—these are, 
according to us, the characters of transitory insanity. Nevertheless, the word 
transitory, perfectly just for the world in general, in the sense that the mad- 
ness is but transient, though the deed done be of the most criminal description, 
does not appear to me sufficiently exact for the physician. Individuals of the 
character described ought not to be considered of sound mind when an idea of 
crime has suddenly risen within them, when this idea has constituted with 
them a dominant and irresistible thought, stronger than the Me, stronger than 
the will. 

“ Antecedents of family, divers acts of social life, propensities, tastes more or 
less perverted, tendencies to taciturnity, ideas of suicide, are often manifested 
many years before the explosion of the irresistible criminal idea. So that to 
say that the passage from reason to insanity can be hasty or instantaneous, 
in the opinion of the physician is to commit an error. This state has prodro- 
mata, as every malady has; and, according to us, 2f these prodromata do not 
exist, it would be impossible to see in the reported criminal act an act of 
insanity. 

‘Moreover, M. Lelut(z) has said, with much truth, in regard to this species 
of insanity, that at its commencement, and in the mental tendencies which 
are the predisposing or constitutional cause of it, insanity is still reason, as 
reason is already insanity (la folie est encore de la raison, comme la raison est 


(h) Bucknill on Criminal Lunacy, p. 100. 
(i) Recherches des Analogies de la Folie et de la Raison, a la suite de son ouvrage 
Le Démon de Socrate, p. 318. 


187 


§ 184] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


déja de la folie). This constitutes, for the physician, one of the first elements 
towards the solution of the question. 

- “ A-second datum of great interest, in a medical and moral point of view, 
_ is the disproportion which exists between the enormity of the offence and the 
motive or interest which has led to its committal. 

“If we examine all the criminal processes which have been instituted on the 
occasion of similar offences, and which have, moreover, been diversely adjudi- 
cated upon, but which, for the physician, have been acts of madness, it will be 
seen that the motive which led to the committal of the deed was not, so far 
as its consequences were concerned, in. relation with the action itself. In 
other words, the accused, in committing the crime, had in prospect the scaf- 
_ fold; and, even in the case of impunity from it, he derived frequently no 
advantage, material or moral, from the act which he had committed. 

“‘Now, every important act of a man of sound mind has one end. That 
end is the attainment of an advantage proportionate to the consequences of 
the act. When an individual stakes his life upon it, he hopes to obtain in 
exchange material or moral advantages, more or less considerable, and by 
which he expects to profit largely. 

“Tf it be asked what are the conditions under which the reputed criminal 
act is performed, we are at once struck with the want of foresight which has 
preceded and accompanied its fulfilment. Neither the moment of the deed 
nor the mode by which it has been effected, have been the object of any pre- 
meditation. Moreover, the deed has probably been committed at the most 
unfavorable moment, although the accused had had a thousand opportunities 

of effecting it in secret. 

“Far from avoiding justice, the insane individual, in other respects an 
upright man, comprehending quickly the enormity of the crime that he has 
involuntarily committed, occasionally, nay, most commonly, gives himself up 
to justice. In effect, the dominant notion has hastily ceased to exist ; moral 
freedom has resumed its empire, and the so-called criminal has ceased’to be 
mad. 

“Tf investigation is extended to the mental state of the paternal or maternal 
ancestors of the accused, it is common to find that one or more members of 
the family have committed suicide, or have had a more or less prolonged attack 
of insanity. 

* * * be * * ** * 

“‘ Lastly (and this is a criterion of great value), if we investigate the offence 
from two different points of view, the hypothesis of a criminal act, and the 
hypothesis of an act of folly, in order that either view should be established, 
it is necessary that it should expose all the facts without effort, while the 
opposite view should present a series of improbabilities which at once strike 
the judgment and are inconsistent with experience. The last method leads 
the physician with the greatest certainty to a right apprehension of the facts ; 
by it doubt is dissipated, conviction arrived at, and the conscience relieved.’’(/) 


(7) Extract from a paper read before the Imperial Academy of Medicine, Paris, and 
translated for Winslow’s Journal of Psychological Medicine. 


188 


BOOK I.] MORAL INSANITY. | [$ 184 


§ 184(4). Sometimes monomania may on its face be restricted to a very 
narrow and abnormal propensity. A case is elsewhere mentioned of a young 
man, at Leipsic, who was seized with a passionate desire to strike a lancet in 
the arms of such young women as he could furtively meet. So in England, in 
1789, a man named Williams was arrested under the charge, which was fully 
proved, of having laid wait for the purpose of cutting and tearing the dresses 
of ‘‘spinsters’”? whom he could in like manner approach. But a still more 
curious case is that of a young man, named Charles H. Sprague, who was 
tried in King’s County, New York, in October, 1849. He was shown to have 
left his house immediately after breakfast to go to his business, which was that 
of a printer; to have overtaken a young lady, to have thrown her down, 
to have snatched a shoe from one of her feet, and to have run away. She 
wore a chain and locket, and other jewelry in sight; but he did not attempt 
to take anything except the shoe, nor to do violence to her person in any way. 
He then proceeded round a square, and on his way called at his wife’s father’s, 
and asked if his father was in town, a matter as to which he was perfectly well 
informed. He then left the house, came directly back to the very spot where 
he had just taken the shoe, and continued on, without stopping, to his place 
of business. He was tried for highway robbery, and on trial the defence of 
insanity was set up. ‘The principal witness was the defendant’s father, a 
clergyman of the highest respectability, whose testimony was corroborated in 
every particular by several other witnesses; indeed, by all the court thought 
it worth while to have brought forward. Charles Sprague’s paternal great- 
grandfather, grandmother, great-uncle, and three great-aunts—being four out 
of a family of six—and a cousin, are or have been insane. He had himself in 
youth received several severe blows and falls upon the head, and within a year 
from the last fall he began to suffer headache, and his friends observed an un- 
natural prominence of the eyes, with varying dulness and glassiness of these 
organs. Simultaneously with this, Sprague began to exhibit a propensity to 
abstract and conceal the shoes of the female members of his family. In the 
majority of instances one shoe only was missed, and it was usually found about 
the house, having been thoroughly soaked with water, twisted up like a rope, 
and then hid away between a feather and straw bed, or in the depths of a trunk, 
or hung up in a closet with garments concealing it. 

‘Suspicion at first rested upon the servants, but the real agent being detected 
and questioned, remained silent, and on subsequent explanations generally de- 
nying the possibility of his agency until within the last six years. During this 
period, when remonstrated with on his singular habit, he would admit that he 
must have taken the shoe, though he had no recollection of it, and did not 
know for what he wanted it. The intermissions in this practice have at no 
time exceeded three or four months at one time. 

‘‘ After the practice became established, Sprague’s mother and sisters, and the 
female servants, habitually locked up their shoes; yet occasionally one was 
missed and discovered twisted and crumpled after being wet. It was rumored 
at one time in the family that Sprague had attempted to remove the shoe from 
the foot of a domestic, and his sister once alarmed her father at night on find- 
ing him abstracting her shoes from a locked drawer. In the early part of the 

189 


§ 186] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


year of the trial, two females, one residing in Brooklyn, had a shoe or shoes 
taken from their feet while walking in the street in the evening; but the 
offender has never been certainly known.”’(k) The defendant was acquitted. 

§ 184(5). The legal relations of moral insanity may be recapitulated as 
follows :— 

(1.) The mania sine delirio, if there be such a form of insanity, is no 
defence to a criminal charge; but moral insanity may be so pleaded, (a), when 
there is a cognate mental derangement, either express or implied; (b), when 
there is a consequent perversion of the capacity to determine between right and 
wrong; and (c), when the impulse to the crime is temporarily irresistible. (/) 

(2.) Supposing such a mania (mania sine delirio) to exist as to the sub- 
ject-matter of a will, it vacates such will. 

(3.) Supposing it to exist as to business matters, it is ground for a com- 
mission of lunacy. 

§ 185. Monomania, as affecting the moral sense, will be considered under 
the following heads :— 

(1.) Homicidal mania (morbid propensity to kill). 

(2.) Kleptomania (morbid propensity to steal). 

(3.) Pyromania (morbid incendiary propensity). 

(4.) Atdoiomania (morbid sexual propensity). 

(5.) Pseudonomania (morbid lying propensity). 

(6.) Otkeiomania (morbid state of domestic affections). 

(7.) Suicidal mania (morbid propensity to self-destruction). 
(8.) Fanatico-mania (morbid state of the religious feelings). 
(9.) Politico-mania (morbid state of political feeling). 

§ 186. (1.) Homicidal monomania(a) is not to be confounded, according 
to Mare, with the sudden murderous impulse with which madmen are occa- 
sionally seized under the influence of revenge, or of some other passion which 
controls them; and it is, in like manner, important to distinguish it from 
delirium. Esquirol understands the term to mean a partial insanity, distin- 
guished by more or less violent cravings of a murderous nature ; and subdivides 
it into— 

(a.) Cases in which the murder is caused by a firm but insane conviction— 
the monomaniac being carried away by an avowed but irrational motive, and 
always manifesting conclusive signs of a partial insanity of the understanding 
or the feelings. 

(b.) Cases in which the monomaniac displays no perceptible disturbance of 
the understanding or the feelings, but is carried away by a blind instinct, by 
an inexplicable something, which impels him to the commission of murder. 
As, however, is very pertinently remarked by Schiirmayer, the distinctions and 
definitions of Marc and Hsquirol do not advance us in the field of forensic 
psychology a single step beyond what we had already reached by means of the 
physiology of insanity in general; while their assumed homicidal monomania 


(k) 1 Beck’s Med. Jur., ed. of 1860, p. 732. (1) See § 61. 

(a) Siebold’s Gericht. Med. § 219; Hoffbauer’s Psychologie, § 122; Conradi’s Com- 
mentatio der mania sine delirio, Gott. 1827, 4; Conradi’s Beitrag zur Geschichte der 
Manie sine delirio, Gott. 1835; Artikel Mania sine delirio, in Jesse’s Encyclop. Wor- 
terb. der Med. Wissench. Bd. 22. Berlin, 1840, p. 410. 

190 


BOOK I.] HOMICIDAL INSANITY. [$ 189 


falls, on the one hand, into the well-known rank of mania, and is easily recog- 
nized and considered as one of its accidental manifestations, or, on the other 
hand, draws into the circle of its definition every murder of which the author 
is in a condition to assert, that he was compelled to commit it by an impulse 
which he found to actuate him. 

§ 187. But whether we assign to homicidal mania a distinct place as a pecu- 
liar morbid impulse, or whether it is to be treated as a mere occasional and 
eccentric development of ordinary mania, the result is the same in practice.(b) 
When it involves or implies mental disturbance, it must be recognized, under 
the checks already mentioned,(bb) as a species of derangement which is a legi- 
timate defence in a criminal court.(c) 

§ 188. The inquiry arises, if juries are to acquit for homicidal mania, what 
provision is to be made to protect society? Is not, after all, capital punish- 
ment, or imprisonment for life, the best remedy for a class of men whose very 
essence it is, as declared by judicial sentence, to destroy their fellow creatures ? 
To this, as will be more fully seen hereafter, the answer is, that as the law 
stands now, with homicidal mania recognized by verdicts of juries rather than 
the public policy of the land, the consequences are certainly very mischievous. 
But this arises from the very reluctance of legislatures, and of those recently 
engaged in codifying the criminal code, to provide against a doctrine which, 
after all, whenever the case arrives, will be sustained on trial. Two eminent 
French authorities, Brierre de Boismont and Aubanel, have proposed the pro- 
per remedy, which, in fact, has been partially adopted by several of our legis- 
latures, e. g., Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. When the defendant is to be 
acquitted on this ground, let the jury certify this fact, and the defendant be 
remanded into confinement. But let that confinement be neither with the 
insane nor the criminal, but in distinct apartments adapted for the purpose of 
confining this entire class of monomaniacs or insane convicts.(cc) 

§ 189. Dr. Ray, among all Anglo-American authorities, gives this species 
of mania the widest sweep. ‘“‘It was first distinctly described by Pinel,’’ he 
says, “and though its existence as a distinct form of monomania was for a 
long time after doubted, it has subsequently been admitted by the principal 
writers on insanity—by Gall and Spurzheim, Esquirol, Georget, Marc, Andral, 
Orfila, and Broussais, in France; by Connelly, Combe, and Prichard, in Eng- 
land; by Hoffbauer, Platner, Httmuller, Henke, and Friedreich, in Germany; 
by Otto, of Copenhagen ; and by Rush, in this country. It has received the 
various appellations of monomanie homicide, monomanie meurtriére, melan- 
cholie homicide, homicidal insanity, instinctive monomania. Esquirol, in 


(b) See the remarks, on this point, of Dr. Forbes Winslow, Journ. Psych. Med. vol. 
iii. p. 290. 

(bb) Ante, §§ 61, 184. ; 

(c) See ante, §§ 53, 54,55. See an interesting treatise by Dr. Woodward, 1 Am. 
Journ. of Ins. 322. See also People v. Kleim, reported 2 Am. Journ. of Insan. 245 ; 
Abner Baker’s Case Reviewed, 3 Ibid. 26; Trial of Rabello, reported, Ibid. 41; an 
Essay, by Dr. Aubanel, on the same point, Ibid. 107; Report of Trial of People ». 
Griffin, Ibid. 227; People v. Sprague, 6 Ibid. 254; Com. v. Furbush, 9 Ibid. 151. For 
an interesting though desultory sketch of the law, see Mr. Warren’s Remarks on Ox- 
ford’s and M’Naughten’s cases, 7 Am. Journ. of Ins. 318; Black. Mag. for Nov. 50. 

(cc) See post, §§ 259, 276. 


191 


§ 191] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


his valuable memoir, first published in the shape of a note in the French trans-. 
lation of Hoffbauer’s work, observes, that homicidal insanity, or monomante 
’ homicide, as he terms it, presents two distinct forms, in one of which the 
monomaniac is always influenced by avowed motives more or less irrational, 
and is generally regarded as mad; in the other, there are no motives acknow- 
ledged, nor to be discerned, the individual being impelled by a blind, irresistible 
impulse. It is with the latter only we are concerned, for the other is clearly 
a form of partial intellectual mania; but as this division has not. been strictly 
made by nature, cases often occurring that do not clearly come under either 
category, the subject will be better elucidated by noticing all the forms of this 
affection, and seeing how intimately they are connected together.” 

§ 190. The same distinguished authority suggests the following tests :— 

I. In nearly all, the criminal act has been preceded, either by some well- 
marked disturbance of the health, originating in the head, digestive system, 
or uterus, or by an irritable, gloomy, dejected, or melancholy state; in short, 
by many of the symptoms of the incubation of mania. The absence of par- 
ticulars in some of the cases we find recorded, leaves us in doubt how general 
this change really is; but a careful examination would, no doubt, often, if not 
always, show its existence where, apparently, it has never taken place. 

II. The impulse to destroy is powerfully excited by the sight of murderous 
weapons, by favorable opportunities of accomplishing the act, by contradic- 
tion, disgust, or some other equally trivial and even imaginary circumstance. 

III. The victims of the homicidal monomaniac are mostly either entirely 
unknown or indifferent to him, or they are among his most loved and cherished 
objects; and it is remarkable how often they are children, and, especially so, 
his own offspring. 

IV. While the greater number deplore the terrible propensity by which - 
they are controlled, and beg to be subjected to restraint, a few diligently con- 
ceal it, or if they avow it, declare their murderous designs, and form divers 
schemes for putting them in execution, testifying no sentiment of remorse or 
grief. 

V. The most of them having gratified their propensity to kill, voluntarily 
confess the act, and quietly give themselves up to the proper authorities, a 
very few, only—and these, to an intelligent observer, show the strongest indi- 
cations of insanity—fly, and persist in denying the act. 

VI. While the criminal act itself is, in some instances, the only indication 
of insanity—the individual appearing rational, as far as can be learned, both 
before and after the act—in others, it is followed or preceded, or both, by 
strange behavior, if not open and decided insanity. 

VII. Some plead insanity in defence of their conduct, or an entire igno- . 
rance of what they did; others deny that they labor under any such condition, 
and, at most, acknowledge only a perturbation of mind. 

§ 191. The following are the indicia given by Taylor :— 

1. The acts of homicide have generally been preceded by other striking 
peculiarities of conduct in the individual, often by a total change of cha- 
racter. 

192 


BOOK I.] HOMICIDAL INSANITY. [$ 191 


2. They have in many instances, previously or subsequently, attempted 
sutcide—they have expressed a wish to die or to be executed as criminals. 

The following case, which is one of general insanity, of which homicidal 
mania was the predominant type, is given by Mr. David Paul Brown: 
“The prisoner, John Windsor, was a man of about seventy years of age, of 
small and delicate person, and bore the appearance of having been respectably 
associated in life, and proportionably well educated. Through honest indus- 
try and attention to business he had succeeded in laying up a pretty consider- 
able amount of property. About six years before the time of his trial, he 
lost his first wife, and some two years after that event married the unfortunate 
woman who came to her untimely death by his hands. She was quite young; 
some twenty-three years of age, and described to have been interesting, faith- 
ful, affectionate, and, in a word, all that her husband conceived she was not. 
By this wife, Windsor had two children ; but so far from their births affording 
to their paternal parent the pride and satisfaction that it would be supposed 
his advancing age would receive from such events, they were the innocent 
cause of that unfounded suspicion which finally developed itself in decided 
monomania, and terminated in the murder of this unoffending and innocent 
woman. 

“Windsor conceived the idea that these children were not his own—the no- 
tion originating, no doubt, from his reflection upon his advanced age, and the 
great disparity of years between himself and wife. There was, however, no 
proof of this, though it is a fair surmise, to explain how the demon of jealousy 
and suspicion first crept into his bosom. He had been married before, and 
from all that appeared to the contrary, had lived peaceably enough with his 
first wife, who, we believe, never brought him any children. He had always been 
a strange man, and by ordinary people, would have been considered an insane 
man, as far back as could be traced; but by the extraordinary people of the 
county where he lived, it appears he was regarded without remark or suspi- 
cion. His beliefs and superstitions on many subjects were kindred to those of 
others, and in proportion as he exceeded them in his disordered flights, they 
venerated him rather as a superior being. He believed in ghosts, in fortune- 
tellers, charms, and witches—so did they. Their folly was from ignorance— 
his from a diseased physical organization and perverted mind. But this dis- 
tinction they could not see; and the fact has only been adverted to here for 
the purpose of showing how difficult it would be to convince such a set of 
people that any man could be insane, whatever might be his doctrine or con- 
duct. 

“The doubt of the legitimacy of the children having once entered his mind, 
it-naturally sought for objects to connect with it and strengthen it. It seems 
that there was one Joseph Osborne, who was acquainted with Windsor’s wife, 
and frequently visited the defendant’s store and house—upon this man his 
suspicions fell, though without the slightest foundation. 

‘For some considerable time previous to the murder, Windsor watched every 
action of his wife and this Osborne, closely. Their most innocent and ordi- 
nary actions were construed by him into evidences of the strongest guilt. He 
made memoranda on pieces of paper, and the backs of old almanacs, etc., of 

13 193 


§ 191] DERANGEMENT OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. [BOOK I. 


everything they did and said, every expression of their countenance, their 
slightest gesture, both when they were apart, and together. Some of his 
entries were such as these: ‘14th April.—F ound them fastened up together— 
- wife confused, etc. Quarrelled with wife about it. Wife abused me about 
Osborne. She would delay milking till dark to meet O.; traced their tracks; 
showed them to Ann and John Rollins; caught them together afterwards. 
She went home 5th January, 1848, to her father’s; before she went, she took 
a saunter in the garden to the grape-house, touched the strainer as she passed, 
and O. met her there; saw the track plain; saw him in the cooper shop 
beckoning for her. 

“<January, 1847.—Saw wife and O. winking; he patted her on the shoulder. 
February 14th.—She went to see O. March 14th.—Wife angry because she 
can’t see O., which she says is heaven; says she didn’t like me. May 2d.— 
They meet out—so every opportunity while I was sick. He poisoned my dog. 
July: 9th.—Wife abused me—said I was a fit associate for Billy Briam. Au- 
gust 20th.—She was with O. last night. I looked sulky in the morning, and 
she took the hint and denied it. Oct. 11th.—She was with him in the stable. 
I now found out that rattling the strainer was a sign for him. April lst.— 
Said she was not satisfied with me; said I need not accuse poorO. June 7th 
and 9th.—They were together; also 28th, and 29th. She erased the tracks 
with a hoop; she made sport of my accusations. She found out she was 
pregnant, and tried to make me believe it was mine. I walked with her, and. 
going by where the strainer was hung, she touched it; knowing it was a sign 
for O., I accused her of it, and she ‘blowed me,’ which came near killing me, 
ete. etc.’ 

“These notes contained almost a diary of his suspicions—his wife’s conduct, 
etc.; a note of every one who came to the house, and showed suspicions of 
almost every one. They stated many instances of abuse of himself by his 
wife, by words and blows; most aggravating and tantalizing language, Xe. 
The above extracts, from the original papers kept by the prisoner, and pro- 
duced at his trial, will serve to give a fair idea of his condition of mind at the 
time to which we refer. 

. “Day by day, this delusion strengthened upon him. And there was still an- 
other cause more extraordinary, added to it. He supposed (obviously, from his 
reliance on witchcraft) that his wife and Osborne had acquired the power of 
blowing ‘a hot, poisonous stuff? upon him, and that they were constantly 
exercising this power, for the promotion of their criminal intercourse. Nor 
was this suspicion confined entirely to these two, but he thought that several 
of his neighbors, whom he believed to be confederates with and abettors of his 
wife and Osborne, possessed a similar power of doing him injury. He said 
that they all could blow this hot stuff upon him from a considerable distance, 
and that his nose, face, head, and whole body, were continually burning with 
it. It was to this power he referred, when he speaks in his memorandum of 
his wife’s having ‘ blowed him.’ 

“In a short time from the commencement of these two severe delusions, they 
became combined together—inseparably—and finally took entire possession of 
his mental faculties. His entire hallucination had reference to his wife’s infi- 

194 


BOOK I.] HOMICIDAL INSANITY, [§$ 191 


delity, and the conspiracy to poison him. He would sometimes get up from 
his bed in the middle of the night, and take his clothes and shirts several 
miles off, to a woman, to have the ‘ poisonous stuff’ washed out of them. 

“On one occasion, while driving out with his wife and children, he said that 
they had got along very comfortably for some distance, when all at once the 
horse became frightened so that he could hardly hold him; shortly, the horse 
became frightened again. The first time he said nothing to his wife; the 
second time he spoke to her and said: ‘Nancy, child, if you do not quit 
blowing this poison on me, the horse will run away and kill us and the chil- 
dren; the horse has got the scent of this poison you are blowing on me, and 
is frightened.’ She answered, of course, that she had blown no poison on 
him, but it was impossible to turn his mind from the diseased bent it had 
taken. 

‘“‘He would bore holes all over his house, through which to watch the motions 
of his wife. One day he suddenly took his departure from home and went to 
Wilmington, for the purpose of consulting a fortune-teller as to the fidelity of 
his wife, and legitimacy of the children. While there he called upon an emi- 
nent lawyer to draw up his will, disinheriting his children as bastards, Xe. 
Tt would be impossible, in this brief sketch, to follow him amid all the crooked, 
erratic paths of his disordered intellect. Hach day his monomania took a 
deeper, deadlier hold upon him, until finally he frequently and publicly threat- 
ened to destroy the lives of his wife, Osborne, and some three or four others, 
to whom his suspicions had attached. 

“ About this time, Mrs. W. was cautioned by her friends to beware of her 
husband, but, as he had frequently threatened, without doing her any injury, 
she expressed herself not to be afraid of him. His conduct to her was very 
changeable; at one time he would say, ‘ Nancy, I have told you, that you would 
some day tremble in my presence, and I intend to kill you;’ again, he would 
tell her, ‘I never shall hurt you, unless in self-defence.’ A few days before 
the homicide he was found shut up in his store, lying on the counter, with new 
muslins sewed together for a covering. His own clothes and bed linen, he 
said, were all sprinkled with poison. Being asked whether he had taken any 
nourishment, he replied, that he was afraid to take anything, but hot water 
and crackers. A day or two after this, he wrote out a long account of his 
suspicions of his wife’s infidelity, and referred fully to the contemplated crime. 
The next day after he had written the letter, he loaded his gun and left the 
house, saying to a person he met, ‘If you should hear of anything serious 
happening at my place, don’t disturb me.’ Ina short time after this he re- 
turned home, went to the garret, where his wife was weaving, told her that 
he had often said to her that the time would come when she would tremble in 
his presence; bid her prepare, as her time was short, and then, drawing out a 
pistol, shot her mortally. He then went down stairs, and taking his gun in 
his hand, took his position at his door, and levelled the weapon at a man who 
was passing by. At this moment an acquaintance coming up, said, ‘ Captain, 
what’s the matter ?’? He replied, ‘Where is the d—d son of a b—h? I have 
shot my wife—go up stairs and see her, if you choose.’ At this moment it 
would appear that Windsor was in a state of high excitement. The man ac- 

195 


§ 191] HOMICIDAL INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


cordingly went up stairs, and found Mrs. Windsor lying upon the floor, very 
pale, with a child of eighteen months sitting by her, crying. She at once re- 
quested to be carried down stairs; said that her husband had shot her, and 
that she should die in a few minutes. Immediately before her death she sent 
for her husband, who at once went to her. She desired to be lifted in her bed, 
and said to him, ‘Take care of your children; I have but a few moments to 
live; before God, and on my dying bed, they are yours, and I want you to do 
a father’s part by them.’ She then requested him to look at her wound; he 
began to ery, and said he would not have done it for a thousand worlds, and 
then hurried out of the room. 

“Mrs. Windsor died about three o’clock that afternoon. In her dying mo- 
ments she expressed no anger or reproach towards her husband, but begged 
that he should not be hurt or removed from the house. On his part he ex- 
hibited deep grief for the act he had committed; exclaimed that he had done 
a very wicked deed, and, as for his children, he hoped God would bless them, 
and declared that he would not hurt them for the world. Soon after the 
murder he took a half gill of laudanum, and then locked himself up in his 
store. When found there, he was lying on the counter with a pistol in his 
hand, which, being requested to deliver up, he did so in the most passive man- 
ner. He then rolled up his sleeve, exhibited his bare arm, and remarked that, 
yesterday it was full and fleshy, but now most strangely shrunk; mentioning, 
at the same time, something about that ‘cursed stuff.’ In a short time after 
the murder he seemed to forget all about it, and rarely, if ever, referred to his 
wife again; but his delusion concerning the poisonous stuff that was thrown 
upon him still remained. He imagined, now, that every one who approached 
him was blowing this poison upon him, and when visited in his cell by the 
physician, who asked him how he had slept during the night, replied in a low 
whisper, ‘They put it in the water, and I could not close my eyes.’ He 
seemed particularly to suspect the sheriff and the keepers of the jail, and said 
that they were constantly ‘blowing on him.’ 

“On his trial, which took place some two months after the commission of the 
murder, he was defended by Messrs. Robinson, Houston, James A. Bazard, 
and David Paul Brown. In its progress he appeared to take little or no in- 
terest, and as to the case and all its circumstances and consequences, seemed 
to be the most unconcerned in the room. Not so, however with regard to the 
subject of his hallucination ; from the first moment he entered the court until he 
left it, he sat with a newspaper covering his head, to shield it from the ‘ poi- 
son ;’ watching every man who approached him with an insane quickness of 
eye, crouching under the fear of injury, and presenting really the most painful 
spectacle of a wrecked and ruined mind, that could possibly be imagined. | 

“Notwithstanding all the facts that have been related, and which so clearly 
proved his insanity, and that there was no evidence of any kind offered by the 
prosecution to oppose this proof, the jury in the case, after a long and tedious 
trial, returned a verdict against the prisoner, of ‘Guilty of murder in the first 
degree !’ The court speedily proceeded to pronounce the sentence of the law, 
and the poor old.man was condemned to be executed on the 17th day of Sep- 
tember, 1851, showing, that while a plea of insanity supported by such facts 

196 


BOOK I.] KLEPTOMANIA. [$ 192 


as this case presented, would, in enlightened communities, have assured an ac- 
quittal of the prisoner, yet, in this particular section, where the minds of the 
people were so much imbued with the grossest doubts and superstitions, it 
seemed to have been the weakest of all defences. ‘The old man was, how- 
ever, pardoned by the Governor, but still lives in confinement, a monument of 
the wisdom, intelligence, merey and justice of a Sussex County jury.”’(g) 


(2.) Kleptomania(h)—(Morbid propensity to steal.) 


§ 192. Kleptomanza occurs not unfrequently as a symptom in mania, and 
the mental confusion incidental to it, and in depression and delirium, in which 
its consideration will involve less difficulty. But where it occurs in cases of 
concealed insanity, its discovery is not easy. LHllinger(z) gives the following 
practical directions :— 

1. In the earlier developments of mania, kleptomania is an important symp- 
tom; it will, however, be found accompanied, more or less, by other symptoms 
of incipient derangement, such as a general alteration in the accustomed mode 
of feeling, thinking, occupation, and life of the individual, a disposition to 
scold, dispute, and quarrel, to drink, and to wander about busily doing no- 
thing, and the bodily signs of excitement (restlessness, want of sleep, rapid 
pulse, &c.). 

2. Kleptomania continues after the disease, to all external appearance, has 
ceased. Here the disease also has not yet terminated, which can only be indi- 
cated by a return of the original state of thought and feeling. (This calls for 
a continued course of observation by the examining physician.) 

3. There are distinct but occult hallucinations at work. These are to be 
assumed the more readily, the more bizarre and exclusive is the desire to steal, 
and the more the objects to which it is confined are out of proportion to the 
property of the thief; and particular attention should be paid to the existence, 
present or past, of other symptoms of insanity. 

4, Automatic impulses, such as the cravings of pregnant women, actuate 
the perpetrators, which become the more probable the more strongly reason 
revolts at and abhors the deed, the more inconsiderable and grotesque the 
peculations, the more promptly the stolen articles are returned, and the more 
other morbid symptoms are apparent in the body and the mind when the deed 
is committed. 

“There are persons,” says Dr. Rush, ‘‘who are moral to the highest degree 
as to certain duties, but who, nevertheless, live under the influence of some one 
vice. In one instance, a woman was exemplary in her obedience to every 
command of the moral law, except one—she could not refrain from stealing. 
What made this vice more remarkable was, that she was in easy circumstances, 
and not addicted to extravagance in anything. Such was the propensity to 


(g) 2 Brown’s Forum, pp. 464 to 474. 

(h) See Méd. Lég. M. Orfila, tome i. p. 364, Paris, 1848; Etudes Cliniques des Mala- 
dies Mentales, M. Morel, tome i. p. 319, Paris, 1854. See ante, § 106, as to hereditary 
tendency to steal. 

(¢) T. a. W. P. 159. 

197 


§ 194] KLEPTOMANTA. [BOOK I. 


this vice, that when she could lay her hands on nothing more valuable, she 
would often at the table of a friend fill her pockets secretly with bread. She 
‘both confessed and lamented her crime.’ ‘“‘ Cases like this,’’ says Dr. Ray, 
“are so common, that they must have come within the personal knowledge of 
every reader who has seen much of the world, so that it will be unnecessary to 
mention them more particularly. It would be difficult to prove directly that 
this propensity, continuing as it does throughout a whole life, and in a state 
of apparently perfect health, is, notwithstanding, a consequence of diseased or 
abnormal action in the brain, but the presumptive evidence in favor of this 
explanation is certainly strong. First, it is very often observed in abnormal 
conformations of the head, and accompanied by an imbecile condition of the 
understanding. Gall and Spurzheim saw in the prison of Berne a boy twelve 
years old, who could never refrain from stealing. He is described as ‘ill- 
organized and rickety.’ At Hainau they were shown an obstinate robber, 
whom no corporal punishment could correct. He appeared about sixteen 
years of age, though he was in fact twenty-six; his head was round, and 
about the size of a child’s one year old. He was also deaf and dumb, a com- 
mon accompaniment of mental imbecility. An instructive case has been lately 
recorded, in which this propensity seemed to be the result of a rickety and 
scrofulous constitution. Secondly, this propensity to steal is not unfrequently 
observed in undoubted mania. FPinel says it is a matter of common observa- 
tion that some maniacs, who, in their lucid intervals, are justly considered 
models of probity, cannot refrain from stealing and cheating during the par- 
oxysm. Gall mentions the case of two citizens of Vienna, who, on becoming 
insane, were distinguished in the hospital for an extraordinary propensity to 
steal, though previously they had lived irreproachable lives. They wandered 
over the house from morning to night, picking up whatever they could lay 
their hands upon—straw, rags, clothes, wood, etc.—which they carefully con- 
cealed in their room.’’(/) 

§ 193. The individuality of Kleptomania (Stehltrieb) is demonstrated by 
the remarkable degree to which it prevails among epileptics of all classes and 
conditions. Dr. Hrhardt(%) enumerates many cases where these unhappy 
sufferers have been possessed with irrepressible desires to appropriate to them- 
selves whatever they could secretly lay their hands on, valuable or not. And 
generally with regard to the moral responsibility of epileptics, it is important 
to observe, says the same judicious author, that even after attacks have been 
for months suspended, the mind is in a condition of disorganization which 
should properly divert from it the application of those severe rules which apply 
to minds perfectly sound. (Z) 

§ 194. Gall, says Dr. Ray, met with four examples of women who, when 
pregnant, were violently impelled to steal, though perfectly upright at other 
times. Friedreich gives the case of a pregnant woman who, otherwise perfectly 


(j) Ray on Insanity, 189, 190,191; see ante, § 106. 

(k) Ueber Zurechungsfihigkeit der Epileptischen. 

(/) See also Boileau de Castelnau De l’epilepsie dans ses rapports avec Valiénation 
mentale, considérés au point de vue médico-judiciare. Annales d’Hygiéne publ. et de 
Médecine Lég., Avril, 1852, No. 94. 


198 


BOOK I.] MORBID THIEVING PROPENSITY. [$ 194 


honest and respectable, suddenly conceived a violent longing for some apples 
from a particular orchard, two or three miles distant. Notwithstanding the 
entreaties of her parents and husband not to risk her character and health, and 
their promises to procure the apples for her in the morning, she startéd off in 
company with her husband, at nine o’clock of a cold September night, and was 
detected by the owner in the act of stealing apples. She was tried and con- 
victed of theft, but subsequently a medical commission was appointed by the 
Supreme Court to examine and report uponher case. Their inquiries resulted 
in the opinion that she was not morally free, and consequently not legally re- 
sponsible while under the influence of those desires peculiar to pregnancy; 
adding, that if Eve had been in the condition of the accused when she plucked 
the forbidden fruit from the tree, the curse of original sin would never have 
fallen on the race.(m) 

Fodéré tells us that he has often witnessed an irresistible propensity to steal 
even in persons well educated, and who, during infancy, have often.been chas- 
tised for this vice. They had conceived, in consequence, the greatest horror 
for it, yet, in riper age, could not prevent themselves, when opportunity 
occurred, of indulging it.(n) ‘I had a female servant,’ he adds, ‘‘ who was 
a very good Christian, very wise, and very modest, but who could not prevent 
herself from stealing in secret, from myself and others, even the most trifling 
things, though aware of the turpitude of the action. I sent her to the hospital 
as mad. After a long time, appearing to be reclaimed, she was restored to 
her place among the other servants; by little and little, in spite of herself, the 
instinct returned ; and being distracted on the one hand by the evil propensity, 
and on the other by the horror which she felt of it, she fell into an access of 
mania, and suddenly died in the violence of a paroxysm.”’ 

“The propensity to steal in magpies, and other domesticated birds,’ says 
Dr. Millingen,(o) “‘is daily observed, and we have numerous examples to prove 
that acquired instincts become hereditary in many animals. This fact is illus- 
trated in various races of dogs. Moulin relates that the dogs employed for 
hunting deer in some parts of Mexico seize the animal by the belly, and over- 
turn it by a sudden effort, taking advantage of the moment when the body of 
the deer rests only upon the fore legs; the weight of the animal thus thrown 
over being often six times that of its antagonist. The dog of pure breed 
inherits this disposition, and never attacks the deer from before while running ; 
even should the deer, not perceiving him, come directly upon him, the dog 
slips aside, and makes his assault on the flank ; when as other hunting dogs, 
though of superior strength and general sagacity, which are brought from 
Kurope, are destitute of this instinct.’’(p) 

Very recently (April, 1855) a trial, involving the defence of kleptomania, 
has been the cause of much discussion by the London press. Mrs. R., the 


(m) Ray on Insanity, pp. 192-3. 

(n) For other cases, vide Miinchmeyer, in Henke’s Zeitschrift, vol. xlix. p. 350; 
Dict. des Sciences Médicales, tome xiv. art. Femme, p. 624, and art. Grossesse ; Prager 
Vierteljahrschrift, V. 30, Bd. 2, p. 121. 

(0) Mind and Matter, pp. 22, 23. 

(p) Roulin, Annales des Sciences Naturelles, tome xvi. p. 16, 1829. See as to here- 
ditary kleptomania, § 106. 

199 


§ 195] PYROMANIA. [BOOK I. 


wife of a physician of rank and affluence, was detected in secreting some 
French cambric handkerchiefs in the shop of a respectable haberdasher. The 
jury were unable to agree, and the Times, in discussing the case, made the 
following statement :— 

“Tt is an instance of that not very uncommon monomania which leads 
persons otherwise estimable and well conducted to pilfer articles of a trifling 
value, in obedience to the impulses of a diseased imagination. The fact is 
notorious that many persons of high rank and ample means have been affected 
with this strange disorder. Every one who is acquainted with London society 
could at once furnish a dozen names of ladies who have been notorious for 
abstracting articles of trifling value from the shops where they habitually dealt. 
Their modus operandi was so well known, that on their return from their 
drives their relatives took care to ascertain the nature of their paltry pecula- 
tions, inquired from the coachman the houses at which he had been ordered to 
stop, and, as a matter of course, reimbursed the tradesmen to the full value of 
the pilfered goods. In other cases a hint was given to the various shopkeepers 
at whose houses these monomaniacs made their purchases, and they were simply 
forewarned to notice what was taken away, and to furnish the bill, which was 
paid as soon as furnished, and, as a matter of course, by the pilferer herself, 
without any feeling of shame, or emotion of any kind.” 

The value of the thing stolen, as is pertinently remarked by Dr. Kieser,( pp) 
does not generally enter into the motive. Old bits of iron, wood, or thread, 
are stuck furtively into the pocket. The disease often comes on by paroxysms, — 
and, after the attack, the thing stolen is returned. 


(3.) Pyromania—(Morbid incendiary propensity.) 


§ 195. An independent symptom of this kind may have as little substantive 
existence as homicidal monomania, but it will remain, nevertheless, observable 
as a symptom of the disease in cases of insanity. In investigating such cases, 
the following points should be kept in view :— 

(a.) In persons who have passed the age of puberty, whether there is not 
depression or partial insanity at bottom, whether the individual was not over- 
come and impelled to the deed by a nameless dread which he could not dispel, 
or by some crazy notion before concealed. 

(5.) In persons just arrived at the age of puberty. Here the state of de- 
velopment in general, and in particular that of the mind, of the whole body, 
and of the sexual organs, must be accurately weighed and estimated, with 
special reference to age and sex, education and mode of life, as experience 
teaches that the irregularities of every kind which here occur (such as accele- 
rated and impeded growth, unusual prostration and fatigue of the limbs, with 
painful sensations not produced by adequate visible causes, swellings of the 
glands, anomalies in menstruation, cramps and other nervous attacks, and 
particularly irritations of mind), exert the most important influence on the 
growth and increase of certain desires and inclinations, and easily impair the 


(pp) Elemente der Psychiatrik, Bonn, 1855, p. 195. 
200 


BOOK I.] _ MORBID INCENDIARY PROPENSITY. [$ 196 


power of self-control. These transition states acquire a particular significance 
when accompanied by homesickness, which, without necessarily attaining the 
height of complete melancholy, and when only beyond the ordinary degree of 
development, is sufficient to mislead the poor, tortured, half-grown child to 
the last extremes of action, not to arson alone, but to murder, particularly 
the poisoning of children. 

(c.) Where the individual ts yet in infancy. Here, in the absence of 
reason, reflection, and religious and moral culture, a childish curiosity generally 
furnishes the motive, more rarely, a grudge, anger, or revenge; but physical 
and mental or moral causes may also be at work independently or as auxil- 
iaries.(q) Tender years are sufficient, in such cases, to exclude the idea of 
criminal responsibility. (7) 

§ 196. ‘A morbid propensity to incendiarism, or pyromania, as it has 
been termed, where the person, though otherwise rational,’ says Ray, ‘is 
borne on by an irresistible power to the commission of this crime, has received 
the attention of medical jurists in Hurope, by most of whom it has been re- 
garded as a distinct form of insanity, annulling responsibility for the acts to 
which it leads. Numerous cases have been related, and their medico-legal 
relations amply discussed by Platner, Vogel, Masius, Henke, Gall, Marc, 
Friedreich, and others. In a few of these cases the morbid propensity is ex- 
cited by the ordinary causes of insanity; in a larger class it is excited by that 
constitutional disturbance which often accompanies the menstrual periods; but 
in the larger class of all, it occurs at the age of puberty, and seems to be con- 
nected with retarded evolution of the sexual organs. The case of Maria 
Frane, quoted by Gall from a German journal, who was executed for house- 
burning, may be referred to the first class. She was a peasant of little educa- 
tion, and in consequence of an unhappy marriage, had abandoned herself to 
habits of intemperate drinking. In this state a fire occurred in which she had 
no share. From the moment she witnessed this fearful sight, she felt a desire 
to fire houses, which, whenever she had drunk a few coppers’ worth of spirits, 
was converted into an irresistible impulse. She could give no other reason 
nor show any other motive for firing so many houses, than this impulse which 
drove her to it. Notwithstanding the fear, the terror, and the repentance she 
felt in every instance, she went and did it afresh. In other respects her mind 
was sound. Within five years she fired twelve houses, and was arrested on 
the thirteenth attempt.’’(s) 

The extent to which this mischievous propensity exists can only be deter- 
mined by a very careful examination of local statistics. 

“There is another class of incendiary fires,” says a late number of the 
London Quarterly Review, “ which arise from a species of monomania in boys 
and girls. Not many years ago the men of the Fire Brigade were occupied 
for hours in putting out no less than half a dozen fires which broke out, one 
after another, in a house in West Smithfield: and it was at last discovered 


(q) Ellinger, ib. 158. 
(r) Compare on the subject of Pyromania, Casper, Denkwiirdigkeiten der medicin- 
ischen Statistik und Staatsarzneikunde. Berlin, 1846, p. 251. 
(s) Ray on Insanity, pp. 197, 198. i 
20 


8.197] PYROMANIA. [BOOK I. 


that they were occasioned by a youth who went about with lucifer matches, 
and slyly ignited everything that would burn. He was caught in the act of 
’ firing a curtain in the very room in which a fireman was occupied in putting 
out ablaze. <A still more extraordinary case took place in the year 1848, at 
Torluck House, in the Isle of Mull. On Sunday, the 11th of November, the 
curtains of a bed were ignited, as it was supposed, by lightning ; a window- 
blind followed; and immediately afterwards the curtains of five rooms broke 
out, one after another, into a flame; even the towels hanging up in the 
kitchen were burnt. The next day a bed took fire, and it being thought ad- 
visable to carry the bed-linen into the coach-house for safety, it caught fire 
three or four times during the process of removal. In afew days the phe- 
nomenon was renewed. The furniture, books, and everything else of an 
inflammable nature were, with much labor, taken from the mansion, and again 
some body-linen burst into a flame on the way. Even after these precautions 
had been taken, and persons had been set to watch in every part of the house, 
the mysterious fires continued to haunt it until the 22d of February, 1849. 
It was suspected from the first that they were the act of an incendiary, and 
upon a rigid examination of the household before the Fiscal General and the 
Sheriff, the mischief was traced to the daughter of the housekeeper, a young 
girl on a visit to her mother. She had effected her purpose, which was per- 
fectly motiveless, by concealing combustibles in different parts of the house.’’(¢) 

§ 197. “This plea,’”’ we are told by Taylor, “has been already admitted in 
English Law,(u) but chiefly in those instances in which there was strong rea- 
son to suspect intellectual aberration. In one recent case,(v) the prisoner was 
convicted on the principle that although of weak intellect, she knew right from 
wrong.’”’(w) Among several important trials in which this plea has been 
urged in defence, the one most interesting to the medical jurist is that of 
James Gibson, tried before the High Court of Justiciary, Edinburgh,() of 
which a very full report will be found in Cormack’s Edinburgh Journal, Feb- 
ruary, 1845, p. 141. The prisoner was charged with setting fire to certain 
premises, and the defence chiefly rested upon the allegation that he was in a 
state of mind which rendered him irresponsible for the act. The medical evi- 
dence was generally in favor of the insanity. The Lord Justice Clerk (Hope), 
in a very elaborate charge to the jury, laid down for their guidance most of 
the legal propositions which have been already discussed under homicidal 
mania. He remarked that they were “not to consider insanity according to 
the definitions of medical men, especially such fantastic and showy definitions 
as are found in Ray, whose work was quoted by the counsel for the panel, 
and in many other medical works on the subject. He adopted Mr. Alison’s 
view that the consciousness of right and wrong must be applied to the par- 
ticular act, and not to crime in the abstract. The duty of deciding on this 
question is with the jury; it is not to be delegated to medical men, and by 
relying upon their own judgment, their decisions would be nearer the truth 


(t) London Quarterly Review, January, 1855, p. 11. 

(u) See cases, Med. Gaz. xii. p. 80. 

(v) Reg. v. White, Wilts Summer Ass. 1846. 

(w) See Ann. d’Hyg. 1833, ii. 357; 1834, ii. 94. (x) Dec. 23, 1844. 


202 


BOOK L.] MORBID INCENDIARY PROPENSITY. [$ 198 


than that of any body of medical witnesses.” The jury negatived the plea, 
and the prisoner was sentenced to transportation for fourteen years. (y) 

An extraordinary instance of pyromania may be found in the case of Jona- 
than Martin, who fancied himself to be deputed from God to burn down the 
Cathedral of York, in order to do away with the heresies which he supposed 
to exist in the church.(z) 

§ 198. The following considerations, laid down by Hencke, and adopted by 
Mare, are recommended to us by the additional authority of Dr. Ray:— 

1. To prove the existence of pyromania, produced by the sexual evolution, 
the age should correspond with that of puberty, which is between twelve and 
fifteen. Sometimes, however, it may occur, especially in females, as early as 
the seventh or tenth year, and, therefore, if the symptoms are well marked, 
we have a right to attribute them to this cause. 

2, There should be present symptoms of irregular development; of marked 
critical movements, by means of which nature seeks to complete the evolution. 
These general signs are, either a rapid increase of stature, or a less growth 
and sexual development than is common for the age of the individual; an 
unusual lassitude and sense of weight and pain in the limbs, glandular swell- 
ings, cutaneous eruptions, &e. 

3. If, within a short time of the incendiary act, there are symptoms of de- 
velopment in the sexual organs, such as efforts of menstruation in girls, they 
deserve the greatest attention. They will strongly confirm the conclusions 
that might be drawn from the other symptoms, that the work of evolution 
disturbed the functions of the brain. Any irregularity whatever of the men- 
strual discharge, is a fact of the greatest importance in determining the mental 
condition of incendiary girls. 

4. Symptoms of disturbance in the circulating Aston such as irregularity 
of the pulse, determination of blood to the head, pains in the head, vertigo, 
stupor, a sense of oppression and distress in the chest, are indicative in young 
subjects of an arrest or disturbance of the development of the sexual func- 
tions, and therefore require attention. 

5. For the same reason symptoms of disturbance in the nervous system, 
such as trembling, involuntary motion of the muscles, spasms and convulsions 
of every kind, even to epilepsy, are no less worthy of attention. 

6. Even in the absence of all other symptoms, derangement of the intellec- 
tual or moral powers would be strong proof, in these cases, of the existence of 
pyromania. Of the two, the latter is far the more common, and is indicated 
by a change in the moral character. The patient is sometimes irascible, quar- 
relsome, at others, sad, silent, and weeping, without the slightest motive. He 
seems to be buried in a profound revery, and suddenly starts up in a fright, 
cries out in his sleep, &c. These symptoms may have disappeared and reap- 
peared, or degenerated at last into intellectual mania. 

7. The absence of positive symptoms of mental disorder, as well as the 
presence of those which appear to show that the reason is sound, is not in- 
compatible with the loss of moral liberty. The remarks of Marc on this point 


(y) Taylor’s Med. Jur. 595. (z) Ibid. p. 595. 
2038 


§ 198] PYROMANIA. [BOOK I. 


deserve to be quoted in full: ‘““Hven when, previously to the incendiary act, 
they have shown no evident trace of mental alienation, and been capable of 
attending to their customary duties; when, on their examinations, they have 
answered pertinently to questions addressed to them; when they have avowed 
that they were influenced by a desire of revenge; we cannot conclude with 
certainty, that they were in possession of all their moral liberty, and that, con- 
sequently, they should incur the full penalty of the crime. These unfortunates 
may be governed by a single fixed idea, not discovered till after the execution 
of the criminal act. Pyromania, resulting from a pathological cause, may 
increase in severity, as this cause itself is aggravated, and suddenly be con- 
verted into an irresistible propensity, immediately followed by its gratifica- 
tion.’’(a) 

The theory that pyromania (Brandstiftungstrieb) is often a concomitant of 
the first development of puberty, has led to a series of very interesting disqui- 
sitions by Landsberg. (0d) 

In the case of William Spear, who was tried for arson, in 1858, at Utica, be- 
fore Judge Allen, of the Supreme Court, pyromania was interposed as a defence. 
The weight of medical testimony, however, was against the defence, and the 
jury were so charged by the court. In the course of the charge, Judge Allen 
said: ‘‘The existence of the impulsive mania could only be proved by the 
commission of the acts which it was sought to excuse, which would be no 
evidence at all; and the jury could never know, even should it be conceded 
that such a ‘moral mania’ might and did exist, whether, in a particular case, 
the acts were the result of this impulse, or the fruits of a wicked and depraved 
mind. Courts and juries, in the attempt to determine the existence of moral 
mania, or irresistible impulse, apart from mental disturbance and derangement, 
as evidenced by the well-known symptoms of mental diseases, as an excuse for 
crime, would become bewildered and lost in the labyrinth of scientific niceties 
and fanciful theories. But when called upon to consider the subject of insanity, 
regarded as a derangement of the intellect, a mental disease, or the manifesta- 
tions of disease affecting the mind, whether the moral powers were or were not 
impaired or perverted, they were not entirely without the means of arriving at 
a satisfactory conclusion, with the aid of intelligent and experienced medical 
men, and in the exercise of their good judgment. 

“The judge then commented upon the evidence bearing upon the question 
of the insanity of the prisoner in detail, and suggested that the medical wit- 
nesses, who favored the idea of the insanity and consequent irresponsibility of 
the accused, appeared to think that the particular form of the disease resem- 
bled that called Pyromania, which was evidenced by a morbid propensity to 
incendiarism, and which it was claimed existed when a person otherwise ra- 
tional was impelled irresistibly to the commission of this crime: that this case 
was open to remark in this particular, that in every instance in which the 


(a) Ray on Insanity, pp. 201-203. 
(b) Ueber die Feuerschausucht, Hermann, Vezin (Aerztliches Obergutachten tiber 
den Gemiithszustand der sich wegen Brandstiftung in Untersuchung befindenen) ; 
H6fling (Die Lehre vom krankhaften Brandstiftungstriebe) ; and Meding (Hin Nach- 
trag zu dem Gespenst des Brandstiftungstriebes). See an interesting case of pyro- 

mania in State v. Greenwood, reported in 5 Am. Journ. of Insan. 237. 


204 


BOOK I] MORBID SEXUAL PROPENSITY. [$ 200 


prisoner had fired a building, the act was traceable to motives of hatred, and a 
desire for revenge upon some individual for an act really committed by that 
individual, offensive to the prisoner. When every act of incendiarism could be 
traced directly to a motive which would be influential with a bad man, and 
such as not unfrequently, if not ordinarily, influenced men in the commission 
of like crimes, and when, in no instance, the torch had been applied from mere 
love of burning, it would not be safe to excuse the party, simply because the 
motive might, to the jury, seem inadequate. So long as there was no delusion, 
no loss of memory and judgment, and the party sought the very usual method 
of wicked men to gratify revenge, and resorted to the same means to conceal 
the evidences of his crime, he should not be excused upon any theory of moral 
insanity, or by reason of any sympathy, which would be entirely misplaced.” 
The judge then submitted the case to the jury, with the remark that it was 
their peculiar province to determine whether or not the “prisoner was, within 
the rules thus imperfectly laid down, responsible for the act, and therefore 
guilty of arson.’’(bd) 


(4.) Aidotomania(c)—(Morbid sexual propensity. ) 


§ 199. Mare gives the name of aidoiomania to the excess of the sexual 
impulse, which is called satyriasis when it occurs in the male, and nympho- 
mania, or uteromania, in the female. This abnormal propensity occurs as a 
symptom of mania, lunacy, and depression, as well as of imbecility with ma- 
niacal excitements, but is also found coupled with freedom of reason and of 
self-control; in which case, of course, the responsibility of the agent is not 
suspended. How far the court, in admeasuring the punishment, is to allow 
for the circumstance that the individual was carried away in an extraordinary 
manner by the physical impulse and the external incitement, is a matter which » 
will be considered in future sections.(@) 

§ 200. ‘Morbid activity of the sexual propensity,’ says Dr. Ray, “is un- 
fortunately of such common occurrence, that it has been generally noticed by 
medical writers, though its medico-legal importance has never been so strongly 
felt as it deserves. This affection, in a state of the most unbridled excitement, 
filling the mind with a crowd of voluptuous images, and ever hurrying its 
victims to acts of the grossest licentiousness, though without any lesion of the 
intellectual powers, is now known and described by the name of aidoiomania. 
We cannot convey a better notion of the phenomena of this disorder, than by 
quoting a few examples from Gall, by whom it was first extensively observed 
and its true nature discovered. Its milder forms and early stages, when not 
beyond the control of medical and moral treatment, are illustrated in the fol- 
lowing cases :— ; 


(6b) Am. Journ. of Insan. 1858, p. 200. 

(c) Siebold’s Gericht. Med. § 210. An interesting case of Uterine Furor will be 
found in El. v. Siebold’s Journ. vol. vi. p. 948. See also a case in Henke’s Zeitschr. 
41, p. 393. <A very able essay on Nymphomania will be found in Dict. des Sciences 
Méd. von Louyer, Villermay, tome xxxvi. p. 561. 

(d) Post, §§ 259-276. On the subject of monomania and its species, compare Fried- 
reich, Handbuch der gerichtlichen Psychologie, where the literature bearing on the 
subject is to be found at large. 

205 


§ 201] AIDOIOMANIA. [BOOK I. 


‘A robust and plethoric young man came to reside in Vienna. Having no 
liaisons, he was unusually continent, and was soon attacked with erotic mania. 
Gall, pursuing the treatment indicated by his peculiar views of the origin of 
the disease, succeeded in restoring him in a few days to perfect health. 

‘A well educated, clever young man, who, from his infancy almost, had felt 
strong erotic impulses, succeeded in controlling them to a certain extent by 
means of equally strong devotional feelings. After his situation permitted 
him to indulge without constraint in the pleasures of love, he soon made the 
fearful discovery, that it was often difficult for him to withdraw his mind from 
the voluptuous images that haunted it, and fix it on the important and even 
urgent concerns of his business. His whole being was absorbed in sensuality. 
He obtained relief by an assiduous pursuit of scientific objects, and by finding 
out new occupations.’’(e) 

Pinel has related a very similar case: ‘‘A man had creditably filled his place 
in society till his fiftieth year. He was then smitten with an immoderate pas- 
sion for venereal pleasures ; he frequented places of debauchery, where he gave 
himself up to the utmost excesses, and then returned to the society of his 
friends, to paint the charms of pure and spotless love. His disorder gradually 
increased; his seclusion became necessary; and he soon became a victim of 
furious mania.” 

§ 201. “Many more cases like these might be quoted,” continues Dr. Ray, 
in commenting on the above, “particularly from the writings of Esquirol,. 
Georget, and Mare, but the above are sufficient to illustrate a truth, as gene- 
rally recognized as any other in pathology, and to convince the most sceptical 
mind, that if insanity—or, in more explicit terms, morbid action in the brain 
inducing a deprivation of moral liberty—ever exists, it does in what is called 
aidoiomania.’’(/) 

Under this head may be considered those cases of morbid erotic impulses 
which spend themselves on unnatural objects. The more common of these are 
those which the domestic history of classic antiquity makes familiar to us, and 
which St. Paul adverts to so forcibly in the first chapter of the Epistle to the 
Romans. To what extent these unnatural passions were carried is illustrated 
by the paintings in at least one of the exhumed chambers of Pompeii. And 
recent trials have shown, that if the same morbid developments are less nume- 
rous at the present day, they are at least equally eccentric. | 

Some years since the town of Leipsic was startled by the fact that a number 
of young girls had been assaulted in the streets, by a man wrapped in a cloak, 
who struck a lancet in their arms, just above the elbow, and then vanished. 
It was a long time before the perpetrator was discovered. When he was at 
last detected and put on trial, it turned out that he had been impelled to these 
outrages by a morbid sexual impulse—that the incision of the lancet had been 
accompanied with seminal emission—and that his whole existence had become 
absorbed in the alternate excitement and depression which preceded and suc- 
ceeded the act.(q) 


(e) Ray on Insanity, p. 195. (f) Ray on Insanity, pp. 196, 197. 
(g) Wharton’s Cr. Law, § 824. 


206 


BOOK I.] MORBID SEXUAL PROPENSITY. [§ 201 


The same state of facts was developed in the trial, in London, of a man 
named Williams, for a similar species of assault.(h) 

Similar is the case of Sprague, already cited.(hh) | 

Still more startling were the exposures attending the trial of a sergeant in 
the French army, in 1848. For some time previous, dead bodies had been 
exhumed and had been torn to pieces at or near the graves. On closer inspec- 
tion the horrible fact was disclosed that sexual connection had been attempted 
with the female corpses. The guilty party turned out to have been a young 
man scarcely twenty-five, of prepossessing manner and appearance, and other- 
wise respectable character. The psychological features were the same as in 
the preceding cases. The act was preceded by uncontrollable excitement, and 
followed by great exhaustion. (7) 

Foderé tells us that a young monk who, in travelling, happened to lodge in 
a house where a young girl, who was thought dead, had just been laid out, 
and offered to pass the night in the chamber where the coffin was, and to 
watch the dead. During the night, having uncovered it for the purpose of 
examination, and still finding in her countenance some traces of beauty, he 
determined to satisfy his lust, although the object was not in a condition for 
exciting desire. Nevertheless he satisfied himself, and departed early in the 
morning. 'The dead person came to life, however, the next day, and nine 
months afterwards had a child, to the great astonishment of herself and pa- 
rents. The monk about this time arrived in the same place, and avowed him- 
self the parent of the child, and married the mother after throwing off the 
vows, which he proved he had been forced to pronounce. 

The following fact, taken from Briérre de Boismont, shows a more permanent 
perversion, and reveals a settled pathologic condition. A man was arrested 
in a small town for a crime which no one believed, but which, however, was 
proved at the trial. A young girl, sixteen years old, belonging to one of the 
first families of the town, had just died. A part of the night had passed, 
when the noise of a piece of furniture falling in the room where the dead 
person lay was heard. The mother, whose chamber was next to it, immedi- 
ately ran there, and, in entering, saw a man escaping in his shirt from the bed 
of her daughter. Her fright caused her to utter loud cries, which brought 
around her all the persons of the household. They seized the intruder, who 
appeared almost insensible to everything passing around him, and who an- 
swered but confusedly to the questions addressed him. ‘The first idea was that 
it was a robber; but his dress and certain signs directed suspicion in another 
direction, and it was soon perceived that the young girl had been deflowered 
and polluted several times. It was proved that the guard had been bribed; 
and soon other revelations showed that this was not the first time the patient, 
who had received a good education, was in easy circumstances, and belonged 
to a good family, had performed the act. The trial proved that he had fre- 
quently before gained access to the bed of young dead women, and there given 
himself up to his detestable passion. (j) 


(h) Lawyer’s Magazine, London, 1792, vol. ii. p. 351. (hh) Ante, § 184. 
(7) Journal of Psychological Med. vol. ii. p. 577. 
(7) See Renaudin sur les Maladies Mentales, p. 764, Paris, 1854. 

207 


§ 203] PSEUDONOMANIA. [BOOK I. 


(5.) Pseudonomania—(Morbid lying propensity.) 


§ 202. “There are many instances of persons of sound understandings, and 
some of uncommon talents,”’ says Dr. Rush, “who are affected with this lying 
disease in the will. It differs from exculpative, fraudulent, and malicious 
lying, in being influenced by none of the motives of any of them. Persons 
thus diseased cannot speak the truth upon any subject, nor tell the same story 
twice in the same way, nor describe anything as it has happened to other 
people. Their falsehoods are seldom calculated to injure anybody but them- 
selves, being for the most part of a hyperbolical or boasting nature; but now 
and then they are of a mischievous nature, and injurious to the characters and 
property of others. That it is a corporal disease I infer from its sometimes 
appearing in mad people who are remarkable for veracity in the healthy states 
of their minds, several instances of which I have known in the Pennsylvania 
Hospital. Persons affected with this disease are often amiable in their tempers 
and manners, and sometimes benevolent and charitable in their dispositions. 
Lying as a vice is said to be incurable. The same thing may be said of it as 
a disease, when it appears in adult life. It is generally the result of defective 
education. It is voluntary in childhood, and becomes involuntary, like certain 
muscular actions, from habit. Its only remedy is bodily pain inflicted by the 
rod, or confinement, or abstinence from food; for children are incapable of 
being permanently influenced by appeals to reason, natural affection, gratitude, 
or even a sense of shame.’’(/) 

§ 203. “ An inordinate propensity to lying,” Dr. Ray tells us, ‘is also of 
no common occurrence in society ; and most of the readers of this work have 
probably met with instances of it in people whose morals in other respects 
were irreproachable, and whose education had not been neglected. The maxim 
of Jeremy Bentham, that it is easier for men to speak the truth, and therefore 
they are more inclined to do so than to utter falsehood, seems, in them, to be 
completely reversed, for they find nothing more difficult than to tell the truth. 
In repeating a story which they have heard from others, they are sure to 
embellish it with exaggerations and additions, till it can scarcely be recog- 
nized, and are never known to tell the same story twice alike: Not even is 
the slightest groundwork of truth necessary, in order to call forth the inven- 
tions of perverted minds; for they as often flow spontaneously, in the greatest 
profusion, as when based on some little foundation in fact. This propensity 
seems to result from an inability to tell the truth, rather than from any other 
cause; as it can be traced to no adequate motive, and is often indulged when 
truth would serve the interests of the individual better. Like that last men- 
tioned, it is liable to degenerate into unequivocal mania, of which it is some- 
times a preliminary symptom, and is also quite a common feature in this 
disease—a circumstance which Rush considers as proof of its physical ori- 


gin.’’(/) 


(k) Rush on the Mind, pp. 262-264. 
; (/) Ray on Insanity, p. 193. 
08 


BOOK I.] OIKEIOMANIA. [§ 204 


(6.) Otketomania—(Morbid state of domestic affections.) 


§ 204. Of this, in its general shape, Prichard thus speaks: ‘There are 
many individuals living at large, and not entirely separated from society, who 
are affected in a certain degree by this modification of insanity. They are 
reputed persons of singular, wayward, and eccentric character. An attentive 
observer may often recognize something which leads him to entertain doubts 
of their entire sanity ; and circumstances are sometimes discovered, on inquiry, 
which assist in determining his opinion. In many instances it is found that 
there is an hereditary tendency to madness in the family, or that several rela- 
tives of the person affected have labored under disease of the brain. The 
individual himself is discovered, in a former period of life, to have sustained 
an attack of madness of a decided character. His temper and disposition are 
found, on inquiry, to have undergone a change, to be not what they were 
previously to a certain time; he has become an altered man; and this differ- 
ence has perhaps been noted from the period when he sustained some reverse of 
fortune, which deeply affected him, or since the loss of some beloved relative. In 
other instances, the alteration in his character has ensued immediately on some 
severe shock which his bodily constitution has undergone. This has either 
been a disorder affecting the head, a slight attack of paralysis, a fit of epilepsy, 
or some fever or inflammatory disorder, which has produced a perceptible 
change in the habitual state of the constitution. In some cases the alteration 
in temper and habits has been gradual and imperceptible, and it seems only 
to have consisted in an exaltation or increase of peculiarities which were 
always more or less natural and habitual.’’(m) 

Very often this domestic perversity is associated with the most complacent 
benignity out of doors. Zimmerman, whilst he was inculcating and professing 
the most serene benevolence, was, by his tyranny, driving his son into madness, 
and making his daughter an outcast from home. Goethe—no inapt observer 
of human nature—says, ‘‘Zimmerman’s harshness towards his children was 
the effect of hypochondria—a sort of madness or moral assassination to which 
he himself fell a victim after sacrificing his offspring.’’(7) 


(m) Cited, Ray on Insanity, pp. 168-9. 

See Feuchtersleben’s views on this point. Principles of Medical Psychology, being 
the outlines of a Course of Lectures by Baron von Feuchtersleben, M. D., Vienna, 1845. 
Translated from the German by the late H. Evans Lloyd, Esq. Revised and edited 
by G. B. Babington, M. D., F. R.8., &. London: printed for the Sydenham Society, 
1847, p. 204. 

(n) Dean Swift’s life furnishes a striking illustration of this species of derangement 
of the domestic affections. By the indulgence of this very morbid tendency to torture 
the object of his most cherished love, he first succeeded in crushing under the weight 
of despair a woman whom he really loved, and then, by the recoil, in subjecting him- 
self to that most miserable of all fates, that of an insane old age. Take, as a scene 
in the first awful drama, the following narrative by Mr. Sheridan: ‘A short time 
before Stella died,” says he, ‘‘a scene passed between the Dean and her, an account 
of which I had from my father, and which I shall relate with reluctance, as it seems 
to bear more hard on Swift’s humanity than any other point of his conduct in life. 
As she found her final dissolution approaching, a few days before it happened, in the 
presence of Dr. Sheridan, she addressed Swift in the most earnest and pathetic terms 
to grant her dying request, ‘that, as the ceremony of marriage had passed between 
them, in order to put it out of the power of slander to be busy with her fame after 


14 209 


§ 205] OIKEIOMANIA. [BOOK I. 


§ 205. Illustrations of this phase will be found in the following sections. 
_ At present it is sufficient to call attention to one feature, which is thus ad- 


death, she adjured him, by their friendship, to let her have the satisfaction of dying, 
at least—though she had not lived—his acknowledged wife.’ Swift made no reply, 
but, turning on his heel, walked silently out of the room, nor ever saw her afterwards 
during the few days she lived. This behavior threw her into unspeakable agonies, 
and for a time she sunk under the weight of so cruel a disappointment.” 

No wonder was it that, when under the influence of the remorse which was too late 
awakened, his powerful sensibilities were aroused to the full consciousness of his guilt, 
he would beat his forehead for night after night, and stride to and fro in his deserted 
apartment, until at last the only change became that from delirium to melancholy, 
and from melancholy to delirium. Dr. Winslow gives us the following glimpses of 
the closing scenes :— 

“The most minute account of this melancholy period, founded upon the evidence 
given by Mrs. Whiteaway, as well as upon the testimony of Mr. Dean Swift and others 
who witnessed his bad condition, is given by Dr. Delany :— 

‘“*¢In the beginning of the year 1741 his understanding was so much impaired, and 
his passions so greatly increased, that he was utterly incapable of conversation. 
Strangers were not permitted to approach him, and his friends found it necessary to 
have guardians appointed of his person and estate. Early in the year 1742 his reason 
was wholly subverted, and his rage became absolute madness. The last person whom 
he knew was Mrs. Whiteaway, and the sight of her, when he knew her no longer, 
threw him into fits of rage so violent and dreadful, that she was forced to leave him ; 
and the only act of kindness that remained in her power was to call once or twice at 
the deanery to inquire after his health, and see that proper care was taken of him. 
Sometimes she would steal a look at him when his back was towards her, but did 
not venture into his sight. He would neither eat nor drink when the servants were 
in the room. His meat, which was served up ready cut, he would sometimes suffer 
to stand an hour upon the table before he would touch it, and at last he would eat it 
walking; for during this miserable state of mind it was his constant custom to walk 
ten hours a day. 

“¢In October, 1742, after his frenzy had continued several months, his left eye 
swelled to the size of an egg, and the lid appeared to be so much inflamed and dis- 
colored, that the surgeon expected it would mortify; several large boils also broke 
out on his arms and body. The extreme pain of this tumor kept him waking near a 
month; and during one week it was with difficulty that five persons could prevent 
him from tearing out his eyes. Just before the tumor perfectly subsided and the 
pain left him, he knew Mrs. Whiteaway, took her by the hand, and spoke to her with 
his former kindness; that day and the following he knew his physician and surgeon, 
and all his family, and appeared to have so far recovered his understanding and 
temper, and the surgeon was not without hopes that he might once more enjoy society 
and be amused with the company of his old friends. This hope, however, was but 
of short duration; for a few days afterwards he sank into a state of total insensibility, 
slept much, and could not, without great difficulty, be prevailed on to walk across 
the room. In this state of hopeless imbecility he is said to have remained silent a 
whole year. In 1774 he spoke once or twice to his servant, after which he remained 
perfectly silent until the latter end of October, 1775, when he expired, in the 78th 
year of his age.’ ” 

Lessons enough, indeed, are taught by scenes such as these. The madman howling 
in anguish at one moment, and at another sinking into the lethargy of unrelievable 
despair—the mute but surpassing wretchedness of those broken hearts who were to 
receive soon such terrible retribution in the fate of him to whom their own misery 
was due—have a very solemn moral. It is precisely such a moral that in these days 
we need. We are accustomed to look only at the grosser results with a frown, and 
to tolerate, with something like complacency, that dalliance with the affections merely 
which may by any construction be included within the limits of mere intellectual 
association. Sentimentalism has a great deal to answer for in this respect; for it 
utterly reverses the teachings of nature, treating real affections as if they were shams, 
and shams as if they were real. On the one hand, as Bulwer admirably illustrates it 
in Pelham, a China monster is treated as if it were a child; on the other, a child as 
if it were a China monster. Lady Pelham, in eloping from her husband and child, 
turns back a moment to pick up from the mantel a favorite and very ugly Chinese 
figure which she had forgotten, and on her way back is arrested. But, in point of 
fact, this power of destroying the natural affections is as impossible in many cases as 
it is unnatural in all. The affections will, after all, often return as tyrants, to lay 
havoe that domain from which they were driven as exiles. There is a mysterious 


210 


BOOK I.] MORBID STATE OF DOMESTIC AFFECTIONS. [$ 205 


mirably sketched by Dr. Mayo: “Marital unkindness is subversive of sound- 
ness of mind in the person on whom it is exercised; and exercised it is in a 
thousand ways in this country, without violence being had recourse to. The 
state of the law, as Mr. Dickens well observes, and terrifically proves, is un- 
protective of wives. But the mischief is not unavenged; and here the case of 
the husband retributively commences. Many men are living in a state of 
continuous and exhausting remorse, under the consciousness that this system 
of torture is being carried on by them. For when once the habit is formed, 
they can neither shake it off, nor bear their self-consciousness under it. 


‘Culpam peena premit comes.’ 


I need not speak of their retrospects, if they should outlive the object of. their 
tyranny.’’(0) 

“A very common feature of moral mania,’”’ says Dr. Winslow, ‘‘is a deep 
perversion of the social affections, whereby the feelings of kindness and attach- 
ment that flow from the relations of father, husband, and child, are replaced 


influence which spirit exerts upon spirit, whizh, in its moral aspects, is as infinite as 
in its merely sentimental relations it is ephemeral and unsubstantial. What Dr. 
Mayo tells us in the passage quoted in the beginning of this article is, alas! a fact 
but now too well established. There is no insanity so permanent, so wretched, and 
so incurable, as that which arises from a perversion of the home affections. It is not 
the victim alone whose mind is destroyed. The perpetrator of the act himself, though 
it may be he was led into it by mere want of self-control, feels its recoil. When he. 
sees what he has done, he sinks under the revulsion, if not into insanity, which, after 
all, is the mark of more conscience than the mere trifler can be supposed to possess, 
if not into remorse, which darkens the rest of his days, at least into a state of chronic 
frivolity which leads him through a contemptible old age, in which there is not 
enough of the man left to make the Christian, to a certain and awful judgment. 

It is true that these sombre results do not always follow. All temperaments are 
not equally susceptible. With many, impressions of any kind are so light that they 
are almost immediately effaced. Alas! however, for those the soil of whose heart is 
either thus superficial or thus stony ; and alas for the system that makes it so! Little 
prospect, indeed, is there that when the earth has thus been desolated by fire and 
storm—when its face has been baked and hardened—it will bring forth the fruits of 
the coming harvest. And little chance is there that in the heart that has been made 
thin and superficial, by this very system of treating the affections as things that do 
not exist, there will be mould enough to produce either the delicate foliage or the true 
fruit of refined home affections. Burns’ lines, whatever he may have meant, certainly 
reach to this :— 

‘*T waive the quantum of the sin, 
The hazard of concealing, 
But oh! it hardens all within, 
And petrifies the feeling.” 


But, in point of fact, the world sometimes fails in its own work. The heart cannot 
in every case be sublimated into inanition or ossified into insensibility. It is to be 
recollected that agents which God, in his all-wise purposes, has created for the object 
of sustaining and keeping in healthy activity the entire social system, which he has 
made robust enough to supply all the relations of society, and energetic enough to 
supply its impulses, cannot always be volatilized in the crucible of conventionality 
in such a way as entirely to evaporate. Sometimes the elements so much misunder- 
stood will assert their power. They may in many cases, it is true, be destroyed— 
alas! for the heart when such is the case—but there will remain instances when they 
will rise and gather a storm which human art cannot dispel. The perturbed spirit, 
if not sinking to the grave in very weariness of life—broken-hearted, as the world 
calls it—will be driven to its account under the Avenger’s whip, amid the battle- 
shouts of passions which might once have been made ANGELS, but have now become 
FIENDS. Such, indeed, are the sanctions by which Jesovan THE Just vindicates the 
honor and protects the integrity of His own great purposes for the moral and social 
government of His people. 
(0) Mayo on Medical Testimony in Lunacy, pp. 137, 138. 


211 


§ 205] OIKEIOMANIA. [BOOK I. 


by a perpetual inclination to tease, worry, and embitter the existence of others. 
The ordinary scene of its manifestations is the patient’s own domestic circle, 
the peace and happiness of which are effectually destroyed by the outbreakings 
of his ungovernable temper, and even by acts of brutal ferocity. Frederick 
William of Prussia, father of Frederick the Great, undoubtedly labored under 
this form of moral mania; and it furnishes a satisfactory explanation of his 
brutal treatment of his son, and his utter disregard for the feelings or comfort 
of any other member of his family. About a dozen years before his death, his 
health gave way under his constant debauches in drunkenness; he became 
hypochondriacal, and redoubled his usual religious austerities. He forbade his 
family to talk of any subject but religion, read them daily sermons, and com- 
pelled them to sing, punishing with the utmost severity any inattention to 
these exercises. The prince and his elder sister soon began to attract a pro- 
portionate share of his hostility. He obliged them to eat and drink unwhole- 
some or nauseous articles, and even spit in their dishes, addressing them only 
in the language of invective, and at times endeavoring to strike them with his 
crutch. About this time he attempted to strangle himself, and would have 
accomplished his design had not the queen come to his rescue. His brutality 
towards the prince arrived to such a pitch, that he one morning seized him by 
the collar as he entered his bed-chamber, and began to beat him with a cane in 
the most cruel manner, till obliged to desist from pure exhaustion. On another 
occasion shortly after, he seized his son by the hair, and threw him on the 
ground, beating him till he was tired, when he dragged him to a window, ap- 
parently for the purpose of throwing him out. A servant hearing the cries 
of the prince, came to his assistance, and delivered him from his hands. Not 
satisfied with treating him in the most barbarous manner, he connived at the 
prince’s attempts to escape from his tyranny, in order that he might procure 
from a court-martial a sentence of death; and this even he was anxious to 
anticipate by endeavoring to run him through the body with a sword. Not 
succeeding in procuring his death by judicial proceedings, he kept him in con- 
finement, and turned all his thoughts towards converting him to Christianity. 
At this time, we first find mention of any delusion connected with his son, 
though it probably existed before. In his correspondence with the chaplain 
to whom he had intrusted the charge of converting the prince, he speaks of 
him as one who had committed the most heinous sins against God and the 
king, as having a hardened heart, and being in the fangs of Satan. Even 
after he became satisfied with the repentance of the prince, he showed no dis- 
position to relax the severities of his confinement. He was kept in a miserable 
room, deprived of all the comforts and many of the necessaries of life, denied 
the use of pens, ink, and paper, and allowed scarcely food enough to prevent 
starvation. His treatment of the princess was—no less barbarous. She was 
also confined, and every effort used to make her situation thoroughly wretched ; 
and though, after a few years, he relaxed his persecution of his children, the 
general tenor of his conduct towards his family and others, evinced little 
improvement in his disorder, till the day of his death.’’(p) 


(p) Vide Lord Dover’s Life of Frederick ; Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, pp. 233, 
234, 235. 
212 


BOOK f.] DERANGEMENT OF DOMESTIC AFFECTIONS, [$ 205 


This species of monomania will invalidate a will made under its immediate 
influence.(a) Unless, however, it be accompanied by some degree of mental 
disturbance, it will not, in the opinion of the present writer, be a defence to a 
criminal charge. It is otherwise, however, when accompanied by delusion. (c) 

The wife of John Wesley was afflicted with this disease. ‘The worst part 
of Mrs. Wesley’s conduct,’”’ says Watson, in his life of Wesley, ‘and which 
only the supposition of a degree of insanity, excited by jealousy, can palliate, 
was that she interpolated several letters, which she had intercepted, so as to 
make them bear a bad construction; and as Mr. Wesley had always maintained 
a large correspondence with all classes of persons, and among others with pious 
females, in some of whose letters there were strong expressions of Christian 
affection, she availed herself of this means of defaming him. Some of these 
she read to different persons in private, and especially to Mr. Wesley’s oppo- 
nents and enemies, adding extempore passages in the same tone of voice, but 
taking care not allow the letters themselves to be read by the auditors; and 
in one or two instances she published interpolated or forged letters in the 
public prints. How he conducted himself amidst these vexations, the following 
passage in a letter from Miss Wesley to a friend, written a little before her 
death, will show. ‘They are at once important, and explanatory of the kind 
of annoyance to which this unhappy marriage subjected her uncle, and as con- 
taining an anecdote strongly illustrative of his character :— 

“T think it was in the year 1775 my uncle promised to take me with him 
to Canterbury and Dover. About this time Mrs. Wesley had obtained some 
letters which she used to the most injurious purposes, misinterpreting spiritual 
expressions, and interpolating words. These she read to some Calvinists, and 
they were to be sent to the Morning Post. A Calvinist gentleman, who 
esteemed my father and uncle, came to the former, and told him that for the 
sake of religion, the publication should be stopped, and Mr. Wesley be allowed 
to answer for himself. As Mrs. Wesley had read, but did not show the letters 
to him, he had some doubts of their authenticity; and though they were 
addressed to Mr. John Wesley, they might be forgeries; at any rate he ought 
not to leave town at such a juncture, but clear the matter satisfactorily. 

‘“‘My dear father, to whom the reputation of my uncle was far dearer than 
his own, immediately saw the importance of refutation, and set off to the 
Foundery to induce him to postpone his journey, while I, in my own mind, 
was lamenting such a disappointment, having anticipated it with all the impa- 
tience natural to my years. Never shall I forget the manner in which my 
father accosted my mother on his return home. ‘My brother,’ says he, ‘is 
indeed an extraordinary man. I placed before him the importance of the 
character of a minister; the evil consequences which might result from his 
indifference to it; the cause of religion; stumbling-blocks cast in the way of 
the weak; and urged him by every relative and public motive to answer for 
himself, and stop the publication. His reply was, Brother, when I devoted to 
God my ease, my time, my life, did I except my reputation? No. Tell Sally 
J will take her to Canterbury to-morrow.’”’ 


(a) Ante, § 14. (c) Ante, § 51. 
213 


§ 205] OIKEIOMANTA. [BOOK I. 


- “T ought to add, that the letters in question were satisfactorily proven to 
be mutilated, and no scandal resulted from his trust in God. 

“Some of these letters, mutilated, interpolated, or forged by this unhappy 
woman, have got into different hands and are still preserved. In the papers 
of the Wesley family, recently collected, there are, however, sufficient materials 
for full explanation of the whole case in detail; but as Mr. Wesley himself 
spared it, no one will, I presume, ever farther disturb this unpleasant affair, 
unless some publication on the part of an enemy, for the sake of gain, or to 
gratify a party feeling, should render it necessary to defend the character of 
this holy and unsuspecting man.’’(d) 


(d) The following is the inscription on a monument erected in Horsley Down church, 
in Cumberland, England :— 


Here lie the bodies of 
Thomas Bond and Mary his wife. 
She was temperate, chaste, and charitable. 
But 
She was proud, peevish, and passionate. 
She was an affectionate wife, and a tender mother. 
But 
Her husband and child whom she loved, seldom saw her countenance without a 
disgusting frown, 
Whilst she received visitors whom she despised, with an endearing smile. 
Her behavior was discreet towards strangers, 
But 
Imprudent in her family. 
Abroad her conduct was influenced by good breeding, 
But 
At home by ill temper. 
She was a professed enemy to flattery, and was seldom known to praise or commend ; 
But 
The talents in which she principally excelled 
Were difference of opinion, and discovering flaws and 
Imperfections. 
She was an admirable economist, 
And, without prodigality, 
Dispensed plenty to every person in her family, 
But 
Would sacrifice their eyes to a farthing candle. 
She sometimes made her husband 
Happy with her good qualities, 

But 


Much more frequently miserable with her 
Many failings. 

Insomuch that in thirty years’ cohabitation, 
He often lamented that, 
Maugre all her virtues, 

He tad not on the whole enjoyed two years 
Of matrimonial comfort. 

At length 
Finding she had lost the affection of her husband, as well as the regard of her neigh- 
bors, family disputes having been divulged by servants, 
She died of vexation, July 20, 1768, 
Aged 48 years. 
Her wornout husband survived her four months and two days, and departed this life 
November 28, 1768, 
In the 54 year of his age. 
William Bond, brother to the deceased, 

Erected this stone as a 

Weekly monitor to the wives of this parish, 

That they may avoid the infamy of having 

Their memories handed down to posterity 
With a patchwork character. 
214 


BOOK I.] SUICIDAL MANIA—-PSYCHOLOGICAL CHARACTER OF. [§ 207 


(7.) Suicidal Mania—(Morbid propensity to self-destruction. ) 


§ 206. “The most striking peculiarity of melancholia,’”’ says. Abercrombie, 
“is the prevailing propensity to suicide; and there are facts connected with 
this subject which remarkably illustrate what may be called the philosophy of 
insanity. When the melancholic hallucination has fully taken possession of 
the mind, it becomes the sole object of attention, without the power of varying 
the impression, or of directing the thoughts to any facts or considerations 
calculated to remove or palliate it. The evil seems overwhelming and irreme- 
diable ; admitting neither of palliation, consolation, or hope. For the process 
of mind calculated to diminish such an impression, or even to produce the hope 
of a palliation of the evil, is precisely that exercise of mind which, in this 
singular condition, is lost or suspended, namely, a power of changing the sub- 
ject of thought, of transferring the attention to other facts and considerations, 
and of comparing the mental impression with these, and with the actual state 
of external things. Under such a conviction of overwhelming and hopeless 
misery, the feeling naturally rises, of life being a burden, and this is succeeded 
by a determination to quit it. When such an association has once been formed, 
it also fixes itself upon the mind, and fails to be corrected by those considera- 
tions which ought to remove it. That it is in this manner the impression 
arises, and not from any process analogous to the determination of a sound 
mind, appears, among other circumstances, from the singular manner in which 
it is often dissipated ; namely, by the accidental production of some new im- 
pression, not calculated, in any degree, to influence the subject of thought, but 
simply to give a momentary direction of the mind to some other feeling. Thus 
a man, mentioned by Pinel, had left his house in the night, with the determined 
resolution of drowning himself, when he was attacked by robbers. He did his 
best to escape from them, and having done so, returned home, the resolution 
of suicide being entirely dissipated. A woman, mentioned, I believe, by Dr. 
Burrows, had her resolution changed in the same manner, by something falling 
on her head after she had gone out for a similar purpose.” 

§ 207. ‘A very singular modification occurs in some of these cases. With 
the earnest desire of death, there is combined an impression of the criminality 
of suicide; but this, instead of correcting the hallucination, only leads to 
another and most extraordinary mode of effecting the purpose; namely, by 
committing murder, and so dying by the hand of justice. Several instances 
are on record in which this remarkable mental process was distinctly traced 
and avowed; and in which there was no mixture of malice against the indi- 
viduals who were murdered. On the contrary, they were generally children ; 
and in one of the cases, the maniac distinctly avowed his resolution to commit 
murder, with the view of dying by a sentence of the law, and at the same time, 
his determination that his victim should be a child, as he should thus avoid 
the additional guilt of sending a person out of the world in a state of unre- 
pented sin. The mental process in such a case presents a most interesting 
subject of reflection. It appears to be purely a process of association, with- 
out the power of reasoning. I should suppose that there had been at a former 

215 


§ 207] SUICIDAL MANIA: [BOOK I. 


period, during a comparatively healthy state of the mental faculties, a repeated 
contemplation of suicide, which had always been checked by an immediate 
‘conviction of its dreadful criminality. In this manner, a strong connection 
had been formed, which, when the idea of- suicide afterward came into the 
mind during a state of insanity, led to the impression of its heinousness, not _ 
by a process of reasoning, but by simple association. The subsequent steps 
are the distorted reasonings of insanity, mixed with some previous impression 
of the safe condition of children dying in infancy. This explanation, I think, 
is strongly countenanced by the consideration, that had the idea of the crimi- 
nality of suicide been in any degree a process of reasoning, a corresponding 
conviction of the guilt of murder must have followed it. I find, however, one 
ease which is at variance with this hypothesis. The reasoning of that unfor- 
tunate individual was, that if he committed murder and died by the hand of 
justice, there would be time for making his peace with the Almighty, between 
the crime and his execution, which would not be the case if he should die by 
suicide. This was a species of reasoning—but it was purely the reasoning of 
insanity.’’(q) 


(q) Dr. Winslow, in his interesting work on Suicide, gives us the following remark- 
able cases: “The case now about to be recorded, presents some peculiarly interesting 
features. An English lady, moving in the first circles of society, went in company 
with her friends to the opera at Paris. In the next box sat a gentleman who appear- 
ed, from the notice he took of the lady, to be enamored of her. The lady expressed 
herself annoyed at the observation which she had attracted, and moved to another 
part of the box. The gentleman followed the carriage home, and insisted upon ad- 
dressing the lady, declaring that he had had the pleasure of meeting her elsewhere, 
and that one minute’s conversation would convince her of the fact, and do away with 
the unfavorable impression which his apparent rudeness might have made upon her 
mind. As his request did not appear at the moment unreasonable, she consented to 
see him a minute by himself. In that short space of time he made a fervent declara- 
tion of his affection; acknowledged that desperation had compelled him to have re- 
course to a ruse to obtain an interview, and that, unless she looked favorably on his 
pretensions, he would kill her, and then himself. The lady expressed her indignation 
at the deceit he had practised, and said, with considerable firmness, that he must quit 
the house. He did so, retired to his home, and with a lancet opened a vein in his 
arm. He collected a portion of blood in a cup, and with it wrote a note to the lady, 
telling her that his blood was flowing fast from his body, and it should continue to 
flow until she consented to listen to his proposals. The lady, on receipt of the note, 
sent her servant to see the gentleman, and found him, as he represented, actually 
bleeding to death. On the entreaty of the lady, the arm was bound up and his life 
saved. On writing to the lady, under the impression that she would now accept 
his addresses, he was amazed on receiving a cool refusal, and a request that he would 
not trouble her with any more letters. Again driven to desperation, he resolved 
effectually to kill himself. He accordingly loaded a pistol, and directed his steps to- 
wards the residence of his fair amorosa, when, knocking at the door, he gained admis- 
sion, and immediately blew out his brains. The intelligence was communicated to 
the lady, she became dreadfully excited, and a severe attack of nervous fever follow- 
ed. When the acute symptoms subsided, her mind was completely deranged. Her 
insanity took a peculiar turn. She fancied she heard a voice commanding her to 
commit suicide, and yet she appeared to be possessed of sufficient reason to know that 
she was desirous of doing what she ought to be restrained from accomplishing. Every 
now and then she would exclaim, ‘Take away the pistol! I won’t hang myself! I 
won’t take poison!’ Under the impression that she would kill herself, she was care- 
fully watched ; but notwithstanding the vigilance which was exercised, she had suffi- 
cient cunning to conceal a knife, with which, during the temporary absence of the 
attendant, she stabbed herself in the abdomen, and died in a few hours. It appears: 
that the idea that she had caused the death of another, and that she had it in her 
power to save his life by complying with his wishes, produced the derangement of 
mind under which she was laboring at the time of her death; and yet she did not 
manifest, and it was evident to everybody that she had not, the slightest affection for 


216 


BOOK I.] PSYCHOLOGICAL CHARACTER OF. [$ 208 


§ 208. As to whether the representatives of a suicide can recover against 
life insurers, on policies containing the usual provisos against felo de se, there 
has been great vacillation of judicial authority. The first English case in 
which the question was mooted was one decided in 1843, in the OC. B., and 
was an action brought by the executor of the insured, upon a policy containing 
a proviso, that in case the assured should die by his own hands, the policy 
should be void. The jury found that the deceased “voluntarily threw himself 
into the water, knowing at the time that he should thereby destroy his life, and 
intending to do so; but at the time of committing the act he was not capable 
of judging between right and wrong.”? A majority of the court (Tindal, C. J., 
dissenting) held that under the finding there could be no recovery. (qq) 

Shortly after this came an action on a policy which contained a proviso 
avoiding it if the assured should ‘‘commit suicide.”? The evidence was that 
the deceased died from the effects of sulphuric acid, taken when he was of 
unsound mind. Creswell, J., at Nisi Prius, told the jury that to bring the 
case within the exception, it must appear that the deceased, at the time he 
‘“‘committed suicide,’”? was a “responsible being,” capable of doing any act 
voluntarily. The jury found for the plaintiff.(r) Subsequently, however, the 
Court of Exchequer, by a vote of four to two, ordered a new trial, on the 
ground that the plaintiff was not, in law, entitled to recover.(77) 

In 1853, however, on an action on a policy which was to be void if the 
assured should ‘‘die by his own hand,”’ the New York Court of Appeals held 
that where the pleadings exhibited the mere facts that the deceased died from 
‘suicide by drowning himself, and so died by his own hand,” but that at the 
time ‘‘he was of unsound mind, and wholly unconscious of the act,” the 


the gentleman who professed so much to admire her. Possessing, naturally, a sensi- 
tive mind, it was easily excited. The peculiar circumstances connected with her 
mental derangement were sufficient to account for the delusions under which she 
labored.” (Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, pp. 59, 60, 61.) 

“ A young lady of considerable beauty was accosted in the street by a strange gen- 
tleman. She took no notice at first of the unwarrantable liberty; but on finding that 
he persisted in following her, she attempted, by quickening her pace, to escape. Be- 
ing extremely timid, and having naturally a nervous temperament, she was much 
excited. The person in the garb of a gentleman followed her for nearly a mile, and 
when he saw that she was home, he suddenly turned down a street and disappeared. 
The young lady expressed herself extremely ill soon after she entered the house. A 
physician was sent for, who declared his astonishment at her severe illness, from a 
cause so trifling. During the following night she manifested indications of mental 
derangement, with a disposition to commit suicide. A strait-waistcoat was procured, 
and all apprehension of her succeeding in gratifying the propensity of self-destruc- 
tion was removed. Some weeks elapsed before she recovered. To all appearance she 
was perfectly well. She had no recollection of what had transpired, and expressed 
herself amazed when she was told that she wished to kill herself. Two months after 
she left her bed, she was missed. Search was made in every direction, but in vain. 
After a lapse of two days, she was discovered floating in a pond of water several miles 
from her home. In her pocket was discovered a piece of paper, on which were written 
the following lines: ‘Oh, the misery and wretchedness I have experienced for the last 
month, no one but myself can tell. A demon haunts me—life is insupportable. A 
voice tells me that Iam destined to fall by my own hands. I leave this world for 
another, where I hope to enjoy more happiness. Adieu.’” (Winslow’s Anatomy of 
Suicide, pp. 75, 76. See a very interesting essay on the last sentiments of suicides, 
by Dr. A. Brierre de Boismont, translated in the Journal of Psychological Medicine, 
vol. iv. p. 243.) 

(qq) Borradale v. Hunter, 5 Man. & Gr. 639. 

(r) Schwabt v. Clift, 2 Car. & Kir. 134. 

(rr) Clift v. Schwabt, 3 Man. & Gr. 437. 


217 


$ 209] DEMONIAC POSSESSION : [BOOK I. 


insurers were responsible.(s) It was very justly said by Willard, J., that “it 
must occur to-every prudent man, seeking to make provision for his family by 
‘an insurance on his life, that insanity is one of the diseases which may termi- 
nate his being. It is said the defendants did not insure the continuance of the 
intestate’s reason. Nor did they, in terms, insure him against smallpox or 
scarlet fever; but had he died of either disease, no doubt that the defendants 
would have been liable. They insured the continuance of his life. What 
difference can it make to them, or to him, whether it is terminated by the 
ordinary course of the disease in his bed, or whether, in a fit of delirium, he 
ends it himself? In each case the death is occasioned by a means within the 
meaning of the policy, if the exception contemplates, as I think it does, the 
destruction of life by the intestate while a rational agent, responsible for his 
act. It is competent, no doubt, for the insurer so to frame his policy as to 
exclude him from liability for a death occasioned in a fit of insanity. The 
parties have not done so in the present case.”’? It is worthy of observation, 
however, that the force of this authority, like that of its predecessor, is broken 
by its having been decided by a divided court. (ss) 


(8.) Fanatico-Mania. 


(a.) Supernatural or pseudo-supernatural demoniacal possession. 
a’. A priori improbability of such possession. § 209. 
b'. Solvability of the instances of such possession by natural tests. © 
a*, Disease. § 210. 
5?. Morbid imitative sympathy. § 211. 
e*. Legerdemain and fraud. § 212. 
d*. Mistake of senses. § 213. 
e*. Guesswork. § 214. 
J*. Natural phenomena at present inexplicable. § 215. 
c'. Historical evidence of such possession. § 216. 
(b.) Religious insanity. 
a’. Christianity, taken in its practical sense, has no tendency to pro- 
duce insanity. § 217. 
b'. What is called religious insanity is produced— 
a. By a departure from practical Christianity. 
a’. Reliance on frames and emotions. § 218. 
b?. Appeal to unscriptural supernaturalism. § 219. 
ce’, Appeal to the selfish element. § 219, (a). 
b?. By constitutional idiosyncrasies. § 219, (0). 
(c.) Fanatico-mania as a defence. § 219, (c). 


§ 209. at. A priort improbability of supernatural possession.—There are 
periods in the development of society when we may naturally expect super- 
natural and miraculous communications. When a new economy is to be 


(s) Breasted v. Farmers’ Loan Co., 2 Am. Law Reg. 358. 

(ss) See Law Times, July 18, 1846, p. 342; Taylor’s Med. Jurisprudence, pp. 592, 
593. On the subject of verdicts of felo de se, see a very interesting article in the 
Journ. of Psychol. Med. vol. iii. p. 19. 

218 


BOOKR.] ' NOT NOW EXISTING. [$ 209 


announced, it is by miracles that we may look to see it authenticated. When 
that economy is inaugurated, we may look for a government by law. This 
position may be illustrated as follows :— 

There stands in the hall of an old-fashioned country-seat an eight-day clock. 
When the proper day has come, the master of the house opens the clock-door, 
and the creaking of the reluctant wheels is heard as the machinery takes a 
new start. The children of the family collect around him, and, careless of its 
intermediate movements, connect each future tick with the impulse received 
from their father’s hand. On the other hand, innumerable ephemeral insects 
crowd the mahogany case. ‘Their life runs not over sunset, and the memory 
of none with whom they converse goes back further than a day. ‘‘You say 
that this motion had a beginning,’’? we may imagine a sceptic among them to 
say; ‘‘why, the clock is self-moving, and governed by fixed, immutable laws.” 
On the other hand, those whose observation goes only to the epochs when the 
master-hand intervened, see in each beat only the original impulse. Both are 
in the right. The clock moves intermediately under second causes, but the 
machinery of which these causes consist is, from time to time, put in motion 
by an extrinsic power. And so it isin the world. The rocks unite with the 
scriptural record in bearing witness to certain grand windings up of the cosmi- 
cal machinery. Human observation, however, is confined to a mere parenthesis 
between two of these interpositions. And in this parenthesis we have, to the 
outer eye, in things objective, nothing before us but the regular march of 
second causes. 

Now, there is, a priori, a reason for all this. Were the world to be 
governed by direct miraculous interpositions alone, there would be no room 
for probation. Were it to be governed by second causes alone—in other 
words, were we to lose now the proof we have from geology and Scriptures 
of prior miraculous interventions—there would be no authentication of a 
revelation. For miracles are the sign-manual of the Omnipotent himself, by 
which, in the sight of creation, He attests His presence. What we object to 
in the naturalists, therefore, is, that by rejecting miracles they destroy the 
authentication of revelation. What we object to in the supernaturalists is, 
that by treating modern supernaturalism as miraculous they destroy faith in 
any revelation at all. 

With Christianity authoritative miraculous communications ceased. Holy 
Scriptures were given as containing all things necessary to salvation, and a 
woe was denounced on any one who should add to the volume of the book. 
The existence of a constant economy of progressive miraculous revelation, 
developing itself from moment to moment by new formulas and doctrines, is 
inconsistent not only with the analogy of God’s dealing in other respects, but 
is in opposition to the written word. 

Then as to the alleged supernatural powers of Satan.(a) Now the existence 
of Satan as a tempter is not denied; all that we deny is his absolute power 
as a coercer. The law of the land unites with Scripture in affirming the ex- 
istence of such a tempter. ‘‘ Moved and seduced by the instigation of the 


(a) On this point, see Whately’s Good and Evil Angels, Lecture IV. 
219 


§ 210] DEMONIAC POSSESSION : [BOOK I. 


devil,” is the allegation which the prosecution makes in every indictment for 
a heinous crime. “I was coerced to do so by supernatural agency,” is a de- 
fence, which, unless there be proof of insanity aliwnde, is never tolerated. 
This is one of the points in which the common law has adopted the divine word 
as part of itself. Scripture tells us of a spiritual enemy who goes about seek- 
ing whom he may devour, but it appeals to us as moral agents, capable of re- 
pelling him— it tells us that if we resist him, he will flee—and it points us as 
a model to onE from whom the tempter shrank away. ‘The Creator has en- 
dowed him (the evil spirit) with no active power over us; he cannot operate 
upon us except through the medium of our own will; but persons are often better 
pleased to throw the blame of that which is evil in their hearts upon the influ- 
ence of Satan, than upon their own indulgence of sinful compassion, and cor- 
rupt propensity ; as if the facility with which they fall into the snare of the 
devil, and were taken captive by him, did not equally prove that permanent 
tendency to wrong which showed that the heart was deceitful and desperately 
wicked. What iscommonly called (and very frequently is) temptation, is often 
ascribed to this especial agency, when it really consisted in the aptitude of the 
mind for certain evil modes of action, which are embraced when presented to 
it, because there exists a corresponding feeling, a principle from within, har- 
moniously continuing with every outward action of a similar character.”’() 

§ 210. bt. Solvability of this evidence by natural tests. 

a®, Disease.—The brain, independently of its positive functions, is the cen- 
tre of nervous sympathy, and ‘‘is intimately connected with many other vis- 
cera, whose functions cannot be carried on without the assistance derived from 
this organ, and whose infinitely varied disturbances are all propagated by a 
reflex action to this common centre.” Among the organs by which the brain 
is thus influenced, the stomach may be particularly mentioned. Observe, as 
an illustration of this, the way in which tea, coffee, alcohol, and opium, act 
on the brain. Headaches, hypochondriasis, melancholy, here find their 
origin.(c) Take the ordinary case of hallucination, in which a ghost is seen, 
or a prophecy heard. Here a morbid state of the stomach, induced, perhaps, 
by stimulants, perhaps by indigestion, is the direct cause of the phantasm of 
cases such as these. Dr. Ferrier thus speaks: ‘It is well known that in cer- 
tain diseases of the brain, such as delirium and insanity, spectral illusions take 
place even during the space of many days. But it has not been generally ob- 
served that a partial affection of the brain may exist, which renders the patient 
liable to such imaginary impressions, either of sight or sound, without disor- 
dering his judgment or memory. From this peculiar condition of the senso- 
rium, I conceive that the best-supported stories of apparitions may be completely 
accounted for.” 

‘When the brain is partially irritated, the patient fancies that he sees spi- 
ders crawling over his bedclothes or person, or beholds them covering the 
walls of his room. If the disease increases, he imagines that persons who are 
dead or absent, flit around his bed; that animals crowd into his apartment, 


(b) See a series of very interesting and judicious articles on Superstition in vol. 29 
of London Christian Observer, 


(c) See ante, §§ 81-83. 
220 


BOOK 1.] NOT NOW EXISTING. [$ 211 


and that all these apparitions speak to him. These impressions take place 
even while he is convinced of their fallacy. All this occurs sometimes without 
any degree of delirium.” 

This topic, in its psychological relations, has been more fully considered 
under a previous head.(d) 

§ 211. 6% Morbid imitative sympathy.—Emotions which would not affect 
us when alone, become overpowering when striking us in connection with 
others. Hysterical symptoms, when not promptly repressed in times of gene- 
ral religious interest, may in this way become epidemic. Dr. Davidson, in 
his history of the Presbyterian Church in Kentucky, gives us instances of this. 
Speaking of a period of wild excitement in East Tennessee, in which these 
manifestations were very injudiciously encouraged, he tells us that ‘the subject 
was instantaneously seized with spasms or convulsions in every muscle, nerve, 
and tendon. His head was jerked or thrown from side to side with such 
rapidity that it was impossible to distinguish his visage, and the most lively 
fears were entertained lest he should dislocate his neck, or dash out his brains. 
His body partook of the same impulse, and was hurried on by like jerks over 
every obstacle—fallen trunks of trees; or, in a church, over pews and benches, 
apparently to the most imminent danger of being bruised and mangled. It 
was useless to attempt to hold or restrain him, and the paroxysm was per- 
mitted gradually to exhaust itself. An additional motive for leaving him to 
himself was the superstitious notion that all attempt at restraint was resisting 
the Spirit of God.” 

Most of the supposed cases of supernatural possession fall under this head. 
Take, in addition to the above, the following, which occurred in Kentucky in 
the movements of 1810-15. A man who was undoubtedly deranged, and who 
had in early life been a bold and enthusiastic hunter in the wilderness of which 
Western Kentucky was composed, became deeply impressed with a religious 
enthusiasm which exhibited itself in the same way that all his other impulses 
exhibited themselves—through the mechanism of the hunting mania. He be- 
came a sort of fanatical Der Freyschutz. In order to resist the devil and make 
him flee, he contended that it was necessary to tree him, and to give him chase, 
just as we would a wolf whom we found prowling among our sheep. As the 
meetings he convoked were held in a grove, one of the congregation suddenly 
started in pursuit of the devil, an exercise in which a number of others equally 
excitable, immediately joined. This was called the “running exercise,’ and 
became the first stage in the series of movements by which the meetings were 
afterwards made memorable. Climbing a tree after the devil was the next 
movement, which was called the “ climbing exercise.’’ In the ecstasy of the 
moment, one individual was seized with a propensity to bark, a movement to 
which the rest were irresistibly impelled, though they used every effort to check 
the propensity. This exercise, which was called ‘“‘treeing the devil,” was ac- 
companied with such a scene of barking and jumping as to destroy any former 
little appearance of reason. ‘The epidemic spread to other fields than that of 
demon-hunting. On one occasion one individual was seized with an insane 


(d) Ante, § 83. 
221 


§ 211] DEMONIAC POSSESSION: [BOOK I. 


propensity to play marbles during divine service, when others involuntarily 
joined him. And so far did the mania extend, that a series of other juvenile 
games were introduced and followed with the same irresistible vehemence by 
the congregation. Absurd as this may appear, the epidemic lasted for some 
months, and its history has now passed into the records of our Western States 
as part of the materials on which the annals of Western immigration will 
rest. 

We, therefore, are not speaking without support from analogy and from 
direct observation, when we say that while the theory of Satanic or super- 
natural compulsion is without warrant, either in fact or principle, the facts 
on which the authenticated cases of spiritualism rest, so far as they can be re- 
duced to a system, may be reconciled with the ordinary phenomena which 
regulate the influence of man upon man, as well as with that feature in the 
Divine policy which places on the faculties of perception the barriers of time, 
space, and sense. 

In connection with this, let us observe the recognized effect of a mania of 
the imitative powers, as exhibited in the tarantula of Apulia, and the exer- 
cises of the Jumpers of Cornwall and the convulsionnaires of the Parisian 
miracles, 

“Tn 1556,” says Dr. Kellogg, ‘a number of children, brought up in the 
city of Amsterdam—girls as well as boys—to the number of sixty or seventy, 
were attacked with an extraordinary disease. They climbed like cats on the 
walls and roofs. Their aspect was alarming, they spoke foreign languages, 
said wonderful things, and even gave an account of all that was passing in 
the municipal council. They ran in groups of ten or twelve through the pub- 
lic squares, went to the rector, and reproached him with his most secret actions. 
It is also asserted that they discovered several plots against the Protestants; 
and the faculty of prophesying, foretelling the future, and speaking in foreign 
languages, appeared really to exist in this epidemic.”’ 

“With our present amount of knowledge,” says Dr. Winslow, speaking of 
imitative or epidemic suicide, “of the subtle principle of contagion, it is difficult 
to say whether an effluvium may not be generated in such cases, which, under 
certain conditions of the system, may communicate disease. We cannot possi- 
bly say that such is not the case,” says he, ‘though we are by no means 
willing to admit that the disposition to suicide may be propagated by conta- 
gion—using the term in its usual acceptation.” | 

‘A man once hung himself, on one of the doors of the corridor at the 
Hotel des Invalides. For two years previous no suicide had occurred, but in 
the succeeding fortnight five invalids hung themselves on the same cross-bar, 
and the passage had to be closed. In one of the Berlin hospitals, some fifty 
years since, a young woman, of robust frame, visited one of the patients. On 
entering the ward, she fell down in strong convulsions. Six female patients 
who saw her, became at once convulsed in the same way, and, by degrees, eight 
others passed into the same condition for four months, during which time four 
nurses followed their example. They were all between sixteen and twenty-five 
years of age. Some years since, in one of our popular boarding-schools for 
young ladies, a pupil became affected by chorea. Her contortions being per- 

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ceived by the school, this case was soon followed by another, and still another, 
until the disease became regularly epidemic. A judicious physician being called 
in, proposed that cauterization by a red-hot iron should be applied to the next 
case which occurred: this prescription becoming generally known through the 
school, no more cases occurred. In the olden time, the ladies of Miletus, in a 
fit of melancholy for the absence of their husbands and lovers, resolved to 
hang themselves, and, as in all fashionable amusements, vied with each other 
in the alacrity with which they carried on their work of self-destruction. 
Sydenham informs us that at Mansfield, in the month of June, suicide pre- 
vailed to an alarming degree, from causes wholly unknown. ‘The same thing 
happened at Rouen, in 1806, at Stuttgart, in 1811, and at a village of St. 
Pierre Montjean, in the year 1813. One of the most marked suicidal epi- 
demics was that which prevailed at Versailles, in the year 1793: in one year 
the number of suicides was thirteen hundred—a number entirely out of pro- 
portion to the population.”’ 

A suicidal epidemic prevailed at the New York State Lunatic Asylum, in 
July, 1851, and is alluded to by Dr. Benedict in his report for that year. “Out 
of four hundred and sixteen patients, at that time in the institution, the sui- 
cidal propensity existed in sixty-six. The first successful attempt was made 
on the 12th of July, by a female of the most intelligent class. Her melan- 
choly end became known to her companions, with whom she was a favorite, 
and on the following day two others in the same hall were overheard devising 
a plan for their own death. The large number of forty-four patients were 
admitted during the month of July, nineteen of whom were suicidal. Two 
patients, who had long been in the house, and never manifested suicidal pro- 
pensities, attempted it during this month, though they had no knowledge of 
what had occurred in another part of the building.’’(e) 

§ 212. c% Legerdemain and fraud.—Dr. Monsey, who was the medical 
adviser of Garrick, was called upon to pay a professional visit to that great 
actor. ‘‘Garrick,’”? as his biographer, Taylor, tells us, ‘‘ was announced for 
King Lear on that night, and when Monsey saw him in bed he expressed his 
surprise, and asked him if the play was to be changed. Garrick was dressed, 
but had his nightcap on, and the quilt was drawn over him to give him the 
appearance of being too ill to rise. Dr. M. expressed his surprise, as it was 
time for Garrick to be at the theatre to dress for King Lear. Garrick, in a 
languid and whining tone, told him that he was too much indisposed to per- 
form himself, but that there was an actor named Marr, so like him in figure, 
face, and voice, and so admirable a mimic, that he had ventured to trust the 
part to him, and was sure that the audience would not perceive the difference. 
Pretending that he began to feel worse, he requested Monsey to leave the room 
in order that he might get a little sleep, but desired him to attend the theatre 
and let him know the result. As soon as the doctor quitted the room, Gar- 
rick jumped ont of bed and hastened to the theatre. Monsey attended the 
performance. Having left Garrick in bed, he was bewildered by the scene 
before him, sometimes doubting, and sometimes being astonished at the resem- 


(e) Kellogg on Reciprocal Influence of Mind and Body. 
223 


e 
ik 


§ 212] *. DEMONIAC POSSESSION : [BOOK I. 


blance between Garrick and Marr. At length finding that the audience were 
convinced of Garrick’s identity, Monsey began to suspect a trick had been 
practised upon him, and instantly hurried to Garrick’s house at the end of the 
play ; but Garrick was too quick for him, and was found by Monsey in the 
same state of illness.” 

A writer in the London Christian Observer, for 1812, tells us that in the 
middle of the last century, a small club of convivial personages was assembled 
at supper in Manchester. A chair at the bottom of the table was left empty 
by the absence of a member, who was known to be at the time confined upon 
a dying-bed. The waiters had quitted the room, and the members were speak- 
ing of their dying friend, when on a sudden the door opened, and his appa- 
rition, as was supposed, entered, shrouded in white, and pale and ghastly as 
an inhabitant of the tomb. It stalked to the unoccupied chair, sat down, 
looked around upon the company, rose again, and with slow and solemn step 
quitted the room. Overcome with awe, ill-prepared by their habits of life to 
‘resist the terrors of superstition, no one followed him. When all was over, 
however, they sent to the house of the sick man, and learned from the nurse 
that he had died a few minutes before they had seen his apparition. Could a 
ghost-story be more strongly authenticated ; and could it be wondered at that 
this club should be dissolved, and that each member should thenceforward 
remain a firm believer in spectral appearances? Thus matters continued for 
nearly ten years; when the nurse, on her dying-bed, confessed to the clergy- 
man of the parish, that her fear of discredit for an act of negligence had led 
to this misapprehension of the facts of the case. She confessed that while 
the dying man was in a paroxysm of fever, she had quitted his chamber; that 
on her return, a few minutes after, she found that, with the strength not un- 
usually attendant upon the last moments of life, he had fled; but that after a 
few minutes he returned with his sheet wrapped around him, lay down in his 
bed and died. The fact seems to have been, that, by force of custom, he had 
thought of his club at the appointed day and hour, had crossed the street to 
the club-door, which joined the street, and thus terrified the society. 

Take also the following, given in the same journal. It was the object, 
some fifty odd years ago, of a certain party in the kingdom of Prussia, to 
separate the successor of Frederick the Great of Prussia from the interests of 
that wary and ambitious prince. Weary of the wars in which he engaged 
the country, these persons were desirous of robbing him not merely of his 
throne, but of his life. It chanced, however, that the young prince was not 
to be seduced, except by a peculiar process, to any such nefarious attempt. 
He was neither ambitious nor sanguinary; and, unless when stimulated by 
peculiar feelings, was of a cold and phlegmatic temperament. “When once, 
however, those feelings were roused, his ardor became very great. He was 
superstitious, credulous, and sensual. On these yielding points of his nature, 
then, the conspirators resolved to practise. Accordingly, jugglers of all sorts 
were set to work, and among others, an infamous fellow of the ffame of Gust- 
fragog. The ‘Ghost Seer’ of Schiller gives a pretty accurate picture of one 
of the scenes exhibited to the prince, and by which even a firmer mind than 
his might have been deeply affected. It is unnecessary to state the political 

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result of the plan. It is more to our present purpose to add, that the suc- 
cess of this man assisted to diffuse a taste for necromancy over the nation. 
“Tricks,” is the summary of this by the writer in the Christian Observer, 
“‘were devised and executed, which serve to illustrate and confirm the opinion, 
that in all ages, much of what has been referred to spectral appearances has 
far more connection with the living than the dead. Gustfragog, in the pre- 
sence of the narrator above mentioned, produced the shades of the dead, in- 

visible music, called out voices from the dead walls, in short, made matter 
loquacious, music philosophical, at his pleasure.” 

So also of a well-known and painful narration told by the late Washington 
Allston. A student at Cambridge dressed himself up in white as a ghost to 
frighten his companion, having first drawn the bullets from pistols which he 
kept at the head of his bed. As the apparition glided by his bed, the youth 
laughed and cried out; ‘“‘ Vanish, I fear you not.’”? The ghost did not obey 
him, and at length he reached a pistol and fired it, when, seeing the ghost im- 
movable, and invulnerable as he supposed, a belief in a spirit instantly came 
over his mind, and convulsions succeeding, his extreme terror was soon fol- 
lowed by death. 

Predictions, accompanied by ghostly horrors such as this, often bring about 
their own fulfilment. Dr. Rush told a story of a farmer, near Philadelphia, 
who took the yellow fever upon hearing from a party of medical students, 
who wanted to play a practical joke upon him, that he displayed the premoni- 
tory symptoms of that disease. Suppose the communications had been made 
to him under the mask of a simulated apparition, and suppose the imposition 
had remained undetected, would we not have had a ghost story equal in authen- 
tication to the strongest which modern supernaturalism can present ? 

§ 213. d?. Mistake of Senses.—Mr. Dendy, in his Philosophy of Mystery, 
tells us that a few days after the death of Marshal Ney, a servant, ushering the 
Mareschal Ainé into a.Parisian soirée, announced by mistake Mons. Le Mares- 
chal Ney. Instantaneously, says the narrator, the form of the Prince of 
Moskeva was before his eye. 

Now here was an apparition produced by mental association. No one ac- 
customed to the examination of testimony in courts of justice, but will recol- 
lect many similar cases. (/) 

Visual mistakes find their place here. Thus Lord Nelson’s sailors con- 
jured up the bloated corpse of the murdered Prince Caraccioli, as it floated 
erect towards their ship, as a ghost fraught with supernatural warning. 

A lady was some years back attending a sick husband in a little town on 
the Hudson River. The windows of the room they occupied looked directly 
down on the graveyard. Towards midnight, on Saturday, the disease of the 
sick man approached a crisis, and his wife was earnestly praying for his reco- 
very. Suddenly she saw in the graveyard a spectral figure in white robes, 
apparently waving its arms to her as if with a gesture of assent. She 
called to it tlHé attention of the nurse, who fainted. It seemed as if the sick 
man at onee began to recovér, but the wife was too much overawed to be 


(f) See ante, §§ 14-15; post, § 245. 
LS 225 


§ 213] DEMONIAC POSSESSION : [BOOK I. 


willing to remain in a neighborhood open to such apparitions. She was about 
to remove, when the difficulty was solved by the following account given to 
her by her washerwoman: ‘‘I am obliged to move also, for I have no place 
to dry my clothes. Last week we were forced to hang them in the churchyard, 
and then I forgot them, and had to run in towards midnight to catch them up 
in my arms, so as to keep them from being seen on Sunday morning.”’ 

Mr. Dendy tells us of a farmer of Teviotdale, who in the gloom of evening 
saw on the wall of a cemetery a pale form throwing about her arms and moy- 
ing and chattering to the moon. With not a little terror, he spurred his 
horse, but as he passed the phantom it dropped from its perch, and fixing 
itself on the croup, clasped him tightly round the waist. He arrived at home; 
with a thrill of horror exclaimed, ‘‘Tak aff the ghaist !’’? and was carried 
shivering to bed. And what was the phantom? A maniac widow on her dis- 
tracted pilgrimage to the grave of her husband, for whom she had mistaken 
the ill-fated farmer. 

The supernatural scenery which once surrounded Lake Superior, may fall 
under this head. Spectre ships, propelled by giant sailors, were seen on its 
shores. Bluffs, almost mountain high, lifted their brows covered with trees 
of mammoth height. But the ships were Indian canoes, and the bluffs low 
ridges of sand covered with scrubby pines. The exaggerated size was pro- 
duced by a peculiar refractive power of the atmosphere. 

Observe, also, the solution of the Giant of the Brocken, as given by M. 
Haue. | 

“After having been here for the thirtieth time, and, besides other objects of 
my attention, having procured information respecting the above-mentioned 
atmospheric phenomenon, I was at length so fortunate as to have the pleasure 
of seeing it; and perhaps my description may afford satisfaction to others who 
visit Broken through curiosity. The sun rose about four o’clock, and the 
atmosphere being quite serene towards the east, his rays could pass without 
any obstruction over the Heinrichshéhe. In the southwest, however, towards 
the Achtermannshohe, a brisk west wind carried before it their transparent 
vapors, which were not yet condensed into thick, heavy clouds. About a 
quarter past four I went towards the inn, and looked around to see if the 
atmosphere would permit me to have a free prospect to the southwest; when 
I observed, at a very great distance towards the Achtermannshohe, a human 
figure of a monstrous size. <A violent gust of wind having almost carried 
away my hat, I clapped my hand to it, by moving my arm towards my head, 
and the colossal figure did the same. The pleasure I felt on this discovery 
can hardly be described; for I had already walked many a weary step in the 
hope of seeing this shadowy image, without being able to satisfy my curiosity. 
I immediately made another movement by bending my body, and the colossal 
figure before me repeated it. I was desirous of doing the same thing once 
more, but my colossus had vanished. I remained in the same position, waiting 
to see whether it would return, and in a few minutes it again made its appear- 
ance in the Achtermannshéhe. I paid my respects to it a second time, and it 
did the same to me. I then called the landlord of the Brocken; and having 
both taken the same position which I had taken alone, we looked towards the 

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Achtermannshohe, but saw nothing. We had not, however, stood long when 
two such colossal figures were formed over the above eminence, which repeated 
our compliments by bending their bodies as we did; after which they vanished. 
We retained our position, kept our eyes fixed upon the same spot, and in a 
little while the two figures again stood before us. Every movement that we 
made by bending our bodies these figures imitated, but with this difference, 
that the phenomenon was sometimes weak and faint, sometimes strong and 
well defined. Having thus had an opportunity of discovering the whole secret 
of this phenomenon, I can give the following information to such of my 
readers as may be desirous of seeing it themselves. When the rising sun 
throws his rays over the Brocken upon the body of a man standing opposite 
to fine light clouds floating around or hovering past him, he needs only fix his 
eye steadfastly upon them, and in all probability he will see the singular spec- 
tacle of his own shadow extending to the length of five or six hundred feet, at 
the distance of about two miles from him. This is one of the most agreeable 
phenomena I ever had an opportunity of remarking on the oreat observations 
of Germany.”’ 

A throng of persons collecting at a given spot, and gazing intently at any 
specific object, will readily be affected by a delusion concerning it. Mr. Dendy 
tells us that some time since a very large assemblage was watching with intense 
interest the stone lion of the Percies at Northumberland House. They were 
unanimous in the conviction that he was swinging his tail to and fro; a false 
impression, of course, which had gradually accumulated from this solitary 
exclamation of a passenger: ‘‘By heaven, he wags his tail!’ Of this sort of 
illusion we are given the following additional instance. Beneath the western 
portico of St. Paul’s a crowd of gazers were some time since bending their 
eyes on the image of a saint, who was nodding at them with a very gracious 
affability. Curiosity had risen to the pitch of wonder at a miracle, when sud- 
denly a sparrow-hawk flew from the ringlets of the saint, and the illusion 
vanished. , 

§ 214. & Guesswork.—First, as to dreams. Now, in the millions of dreams 
that each night brings to pass, it is much more likely that some should come 
true, than that none should. But there are other considerations tending to 
verify such predictions. 

“Tf you do so and so, you will rue it.”” So speaks superior sagacity or 
superior caution; but does the fulfilment prove the foreknowledge? Colum- 
bus predicted to the Indians an eclipse. In this case the prediction was the 
result of a higher degree of knowledge on his part. An Earl of Caithness, 
we are told, was desirous of ascertaining the distance of a vessel laden with 
wine for his cellars. He went to a seer, and received the answer, “At the 
distance of four hours’ sail.”” The prophet, to prove the truth of his state- 
ment, laid before the earl the cap of a seaman in the ship. Soon the ship 
turned the point, and a seaman claimed the cap, saying that shortly before it 
had been blown from his head in a gale. 

Sometimes, however, the prediction is one of a series of mere fishing ad- 
ventures. It is a conjecture, more or less sagacious, of one of a number of 
probabilities. So it was when Napoleon, when marching to Acre, had a Nile 

227 


§ 214] DEMONIAC POSSESSION : [BOOK I. 


boat named L’Jialie destroyed. ‘Italy is lost to France,’’ he declared; and 
the remark, when the result was found to have taken place, was treasured up, 
though it turngd out to be only parenthetically true. So it was with the 
warning given by Lord Falkland and Archbishop Williams of the fate of 
Charles I. So it was with the famous prophecies of Cazotte, of the decapi- 
tation of himself and his friends. In each case the prophecy was a conjecture, 
and the event at the time probable. 

Then come the mere dodging oracles, which are so framed as to read both 
ways. 

“The power is here which Cesar will overcome;” leaving the question 
whether it is Cxesar or the power which is to be triumphant to be determined 
by the result. 

Then take the following given to Pyrrhus on his way to attack Rome:— 

“Ajo te Alacida Romanos te vincere posse;’”’ meaning either that Rome 
was to conquer him, or he conquer Rome. 

Alexander the Great, in the first gush of his youthful vigor, visited the 
Delphic pythoness in order to obtain a favorable omen for his eastern cam- 
paign. The priestess shrank from an interview with a prince at once so 
capricious and so powerful. Alexander, however, would take no refusal, and, 
seizing her, forced her down upon the tripod from which her prophetic strains 
usually emanated. An operation like this, when we keep in mind the age of 
the prophetess, and the sharp, jutting points of the tripod on which she was 
thus trussed, was anything but agreeable to her, and she cried out testily, 
“O son! who can withstand thee?”? Alexander inquired no further, for this 
pettish cry was seized by him as a divine announcement of his future invinci- 
bility. 

To this may be added those instances in which an apparently supernatural 
presentiment is produced by the resuscitation of a dead recollection. Let us 
take the following, from Moreton’s H'ssay on Apparitions: ‘The Reverend 
Dr. Scott, of Broad street, was sitting‘alone in his study. On a sudden, the 
phantom of an old gentleman, dressed in a black velvet gown, and full-bottom 
wig, entered, and sat himself down in a chair opposite to the Doctor. The 
visitor informed him of a dilemma in which his grandson, who lived in the 
west country, was placed, by the suit of his nephew for the recovery of an 
estate. This suit would be successful, unless a deed of conveyance was found, 
which had been hidden in an old chest in the loft of the house. On his arrival 
at this house, he learned that his grandson had dreamed of this visit, and that 
his grandfather was coming to aid him in the search. The deed was found in 
the false bottom of the old chest, as the vision had promised.”’ 

Now, the solution no doubt is, that the dreamer heard of the place of de- 
posit when a boy, and had the circumstances recalled to him by the fact of 
the pending trial. 

The same explanation applies to the following cases :— 

After the death of Dante, as we are told by the same author, it was dis- 
covered that the thirteenth canto of the Paradise was missing. Great search 
was made for it, but in vain; and to the regret of every body concerned, it was 
at length concluded that it had either never been written, or had been destroyed. 

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The quest was therefore given up, and some months had elapsed, when Pietro 
Allighierif his son, dreamed that his father had appeared to him and told him 
that if he removed a certain panel near the window of the room in which he 
had been accustomed to write, the thirteenth canto would be found. Pietro 
told his dream, and was laughed at, of course. However, as the canto did 
not turn up, it was thought as well to examine the spot indicated in the dream. 
The panel was removed, and there lay the missing canto behind it, much mil- 
dewed, but fortunately still legible. 

A gentleman in this country received a promissory note to a large amount, 
which he placed in a book. After the note became due, he was unable to 
recollect where he had placed it, and the debt was in danger of being lost, and 
his character seriously injured, as one who was ready to press a claim for which 
he had no evidence. The fact caused him great anxiety, but his efforts to 
recollect the place of deposit were fruitless. Some time afterwards he was 
almost drowned, and became apparently insensible. When in this state, all 
the circumstances of the deposit flashed upon his mind, and the spot where he 
had placed the note was recalled. When he was able to speak, he sent for 
the book, and there the note was found. 

Sir Evan Nepean, being at the time Secretary of the Admiralty, found 
himself one night unable to sleep, and was urged by an indefinable feeling that 
he must rise, though it was then only two o’clock. He accordingly did so, and 
went into the park, and from that to the Home Office, which he entered by a 
private door, of which he had the key. He had no object in doing this; and 
to pass the time, he took up a newspaper that was lying on the table, and 
there read a paragraph to the effect that a reprieve had been dispatched to 
York, for the men condemned for coining. The question occurred to him, was 
it indeed dispatched ? He examined the books and found it was not; and it 
was only by the most energetic proceedings that the thing was carried through, 
and reached York in time to save the men. 

Mrs. Crowe, in her Night Side of Nature, tells us of a case that occurred 
not many years since, where a murder having been committed, a man came 
forward, saying that he had dreamed that the pack of the murdered peddler was 
hidden in a certain spot; where, on a search being made, it was actually found. 
They at first concluded he was himself the assassin, but the real criminal was 
afterwards discovered ; and it being asserted that the two men had passed some 
time together since the murder, in a state of intoxication, the conclusion was 
generally reached that the crime and the place of concealment had been com- 
municated to the pretended dreamer in such a way, in consequence of his then 
drunkenness, as to leave a vague impression on his mind, without enabling him 
to understand how that impression came. 

Now here we have in each case a solution perfectly in accordance with well- 
known psychological laws. The soul, of which memory is an attribute, is 
independent of corporeal conditious, and is unshackled by those bonds which 
confine even the will. It is this, we may remark incidentally, which invests 
the memory with such tremendous future retributive powers. 

§ 215. f?. Natural Phenomena at present inexplicable.—Under this head 
we may place the alleged ‘ odylic force” of the animal magnetists and spirit 

229 


§ 215] DEMONIAC POSSESSION : [BOOK I. 


rappers. The phenomena of spiritualism may be thus explained in accordance 
with well-known natural analogies. They differ in no respect from a series of 
other phenomena equally inexplicable, but for which it has never been thought 
necessary to suppose direct Satanic or spiritual coercion. The strongest 
way of stating the magnetic theory is, that one human being is able, under 
certain circumstances, to so impress his idiosyncrasies upon another as to pro- 
duce in that other their counterparts. Suppose, instead of this, it should be 
stated that a dog is able to so act upon a human being as after a certain period 
of time to impress Azs idiosyncrasies upon the man, to cause him to bark like 
a dog, to believe himself a dog, in fact, to respond to the dog’s nature. And 
yet this horrible and mysterious transformation we witness in the phenomenon 
of hydrophobia, and what is more, we rest satisfied with the fact without 
attempting to explain it supernaturally, though the process by which this 
extraordinary infusion of one nature into another is effected, is utterly inex- 
plicable. And again, we see that the sun, itself an unintelligent agent, is able 
‘so to act upon a silver plate as to stamp in a flash the portrait of an inter- 
mediate object—say a human face—upon the inanimate metal. Is this more 
strange than that the passionate and flexible spirit of man, impregnated as it 
is with so many wonderful energies which we have never been able to test, 
should project on the soul of its fellow at least some sort of portrait of itself ? 
Do we not see this constantly in social life, at least to some modified extent ? 
Have we been able as yet to systematize and define the transforming influences 
of human affection or fear? Observe, also, that the most cautious psycholo- 
gists maintain that phenomena such as these, or similar to these, are expli- 
cable on natural grounds. Thus, in Sir William Hamilton’s edition of Reid, 
we find the following passage :— 

‘‘No man can show it to be impossible to the Supreme Being to have given 
us the power of perceiving external objects, without any such organs ;’’ that 
is, our organs of sense. ‘‘ We have reason to believe that when we put off 
these bodies, and all the organs belonging to them, our perceptive powers 
shall rather be improved than destroyed or impaired. We have reason to 
believe that the Supreme Being perceives everything in a more perfect manner 
than we do, without bodily organs. We have reason to believe that there are 
other created beings endowed with powers of perception more perfect and 
more extensive than ours, without any such organs as we find necessary.” 

To this Sir William Hamilton adds the following note: ‘“‘ However as- 
tonishing, it is now proved beyond all rational doubt, that in certain abnormal 
states of the nervous organism, perceptions are possible through other than 
the ordinary channels of the sense.” 

But let us go further and see whether phenomena apparently equally inex- 
plicable are not susceptible of a satisfactory solution. Take, in this view, the 
following passage from Mrs. Crowe’s Night Side of Nature :— 

‘Tt is the opinion of these psychologists, however, that in the normal and 
healthy condition of man, the union of body, soul, and spirit is most complete, 
and that all the degrees of disunion in the waking state are degrees of morbid 
derangement. Hence it is, that somnambulists and clairvoyants are chiefly to 

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BOOK 1.] NOT NOW EXISTING. [$ 215 


be found among sickly women. There have been persons who have appeared 
to possess a power which they could exert at will, whereby they withdrew 
from their bodies, these remaining during the absence of the spirit in a state 
of catalepsy, scarcely if at all to be distinguished from death. 

“Tsay, withdraw from their bodies, assuming that to be the explanation 
of the mystery; for, of course, it is but an assumption. Epimenides is re- 
corded to have possessed this faculty; and Hermotinus, of Clazomeres, is said 
to have wandered, in spirit, over the world, while his body lay apparently 
dead. At length his wife taking advantage of this absence of his soul, burned 
his body, and thus intercepted its return ; so say Lucien and Pliny the elder ; 
and Varro relates, that the eldest of two brothers, named Corfidius, being sup- 
posed to die, his will was opened, and preparations were made for his funeral 
by the other brother, who was declared his heir. In the mean time, however, 
Corfidus revived, and told the astonished attendants, whom he summoned by 
clapping his hands, that he had just come from his younger brother, who had 
committed his daughter to his care, and informed him where he had buried 
some gold, requesting that the funeral preparations he had made might be 
converted to his own use. Immediately afterwards, the news arrived that the 
younger brother was unexpectedly deceased, and the gold was found at the 
place indicated. The last appears to have been a case of natural trance; but 
the two most remarkable instances of voluntary trance I have met with in 
modern times, are those of Colonel Townshend, and the dervish who allowed 
himself to be buried. With regard to the former, he could, to all appearance, 
die whenever he pleased; his heart ceased to beat ;. there was no perceptible 
respiration ; and his whole frame became cold and rigid as death itself; the 
features being shrunk and colorless, and the eyes glazed and ghastly. He 
would continue in this state for several hours, and then gradually revive; but 
the revival does not appear to have been an effort of will—or rather, we 
are not informed whether it was or not. Neither are we told whether he 
brought any recollections back with him, nor how this strange faculty was 
first developed or discovered—all very important points, and well worthy of 
investigation. 

“With respect to the dervish, or fakeer, an account of his singular faculty 
was, I believe, first presented to the public in the Calcutta papers, about nine 
or ten years ago. He had then frequently exhibited it for the satisfaction of 
the natives; but subsequently he was put to the proof by some of the Huro- 
pean officers and residents. Captain Wade, Political Agent at Loodiana, was 
present when he was disinterred, ten months after he had been buried by Gene- 
ral Ventura, in presence of the Maharajah and many of his principal Sirdars. 

‘“‘Tt appears that the man previously prepared himself by some processes 
which, he says, temporally annihilate the powers of digestion, so that milk 
received into the stomach undergoes no change. He next forces all the breath 
in his body into his brain, which becomes very hot, upon which the lungs col- 
lapse, and the heart ceases to beat. He then stops up, with wax, every aper- 
ture of the body through which the air could enter, except the mouth, but the 
tongue is so turned back-as to close the gullet, upon which a state of insensi- 

231 


§ 215] DEMONIAC POSSESSION : [BOOK I. 


bility ensues. He is then stripped and put into a linen bag; and, on the 
occasion in question, this bag was sealed with Runjeet Sing’s own seal. It 
was then placed in a deal box, which was also locked and sealed, and the box 
being buried in a vault, the earth was thrown over it and trod down, after 
which a crop of barley was sown on the spot, and sentinels placed to watch it. 
The Maharajah, however, was so skeptical, that, in spite of all these precau- 
tions, he had him, twice in the course of ten months, dug up and examined, 
and each time he was found to be exactly in the same state as when they had 
shut him up. 

‘When he is disinterred, the first step towards his recovery is to turn back 
his tongue, which is found quite stiff, and requires for some time to be retained 
in its proper position by the finger; warm water is poured upon him, and his 
lips and eyes moistened with ghee or oil. His recovery is much more rapid 
than might be expected, and he is soon able to recognize the by-standers, and 
converse. He says that, during his state of trance, his dreams are ravishing, 
and that it is very painful to be awakened; but I do not know that he has 
ever disclosed any of his experiences. His only apprehension seems to be, lest 
he should be attacked by insects, to avoid which accident the box is slung to 
the ceiling. The interval seems to be passed in a complete state of hibernation ; 
and when he is taken up no pulse is perceptible, and his eyes are glazed like 
those of a corpse.”’ 

So with regard to the alleged supernatural celestial appearances. The 
Parhelia, or mock suns, we are told by the authority last quoted, are produced 
by the reflection of the sun’s light on a frozen cloud. How readily these 
phenomena are magnified, we may learn from the ancient and modern records. 
In 12238, four suns were seen, of crimson, inclosed in a wide circle of crystal 
color. In the same year two giant dragons were seen in the air, flapping their 
monstrous wings and engaging in single combat, until they both fell into the 
sea and were drowned! ‘Then, in 1104, there were seen four white circles 
rolled round the sun; and in 1688, two suns and a reversed rainbow appeared 
at Bishop’s Lavington, in Wiltshire; and in February, 1647, there is an ac- 
count and sketch of three suns and an inverted rainbow, which Baxter terms, 
“Binorum Pareliorum gawouevoy.”? And because there were two lunar and 
one solar eclipses in 1652, it was called, as Lilly records, ‘“‘ Annus tenebrarum,’’ 
or the dark year. 

Among the wonders seen by the great traveller, Pietro della Valla, we are 
reminded by Mr. Dendy, was the bleeding cypress tree, which shadows the 
tomb of Cyrus, in Italy. Under the hollow of its boughs, in his day, it was 
lighted with lamps, and consecrated as an oratory. To this shrine resorted 
many a devout pilgrim, impressed with a holy belief in the mzracle. And 
what was this but a glutinous crimson fluid exuding from the diseased alburn- 
um of a tree, which the woodmen, indeed, term bleeding, but which the ancient 
Turks affirmed or believed to be converted on every Friday into drops of real 
blood ? | 

The red snow, which is not uncommon in the Arctic regions, is thus tinted 
by very minute cryptogamic plants, and the fairy ring is but a circle of herb- 
age poisoned by a fungus. 

232 


BOOK I.] NOT NOW EXISTING. 7 [$ 216 


§ 216. ct. Historical Evidence of such Possession.—We come next to the 
question whether we have evidence from history that there has ever been such 
a systematic deviation from the Divine policy as is implied by the entrance of 
specific evil spirits into specific human bodies, followed by a supernatural sub- 
jection of the will if not by a merging of the individuality of the latter in the 
former. ‘There is little doubt that this was taught by the ancient philoso- 
phers. Plato begins by expressly asserting the existence of demons, who, on his 
theory, are the sole supernatural agencies by which the Divine will operates on 
the human heart. Iav 7d Sacmoveov perasd gore Osov ve xav Oyvnrov. And again 
’"Epunvevov xov SeanopOwervov Osorg ra map’ avOportar,, xav avOponors TH mapa Hear, 
Tov wey Tas Oenoers xal Ovotas, Tav 8 tag enirdkers ve xat AmorBas ror vor. (t) 
He tells us that demoniacs do not use their own dialect or tongue, but that of 
the demons who have entered into them.(w) Lucian declares “the patient is 
silent: the demon returns the answer to the question asked.’? And yet at the 
same time it would seem that the possibility of the cure of the demoniacs by 
medicine was recognized, which would scarcely be the case if the malady was 
regarded as exclusively supernatural. Thus we are told, ‘ Helleboro quoque 
purgatur lymphaticus error.’’(v) And Josephus and the Jewish physicians 
speak of medicines composed of stones, roots, and herbs, being useful to de- 
moniacs. (w) 

With regard to the New Testament history, two views have been taken, 
each of which has the sanction of authorities distinguished both for learn- 
ing and for loyalty to the Christian cause. On the one hand, it is urged 
that the language of the Gospel writers is express to the very point; on the 
other, it is maintained that the accounts given by them may all be understood 
as exhibiting no more than the phenomena of certain diseases, particularly 
hypochondria, mania, and epilepsy; that the popular terms were used to de- 
scribe these diseases, just in the same way that ‘ Possession’? (Besessenheit) 
is now used by some of the most technical German psychologists to describe 
the same thing; and that the sacred penman meant to convey no more than 
that the patients were affected with the complaints which those phrases de- 
scribed. (a) 

It may not be considered out of place, however, to observe that the exces- 
sive theological liberality which, in order to accommodate the sacred text to 
the supposed requirements of science, resolves statements of facts into meta- 


(t) Plato, Sympos. p. 202, 203. Lipsiz, 1829, p. 252. See also Plutarch, De Defect. 
Orac. Farmer’ s Essay on the Demoniacs. 

(u) Plato, apud Clem. Alex. Strom. I. 405, Oxon. 

(v) Seren. Sammon, c. 27, v. 507. (w) Gittei, f. 67. 

(c) The student is referred to a very comprehensive article on this point, by the 
Rev. J. F. Denham, of St. John’s College, Cambridge, in Kitto’s Bib. Cyc., tit. Demon- 
iacs, in which the arguments on both sides are very fairly exhibited; to Farmer’s 
Essay on the Demoniacs; to Jahn’s Biblisches Archaologie; to Archbishop Whateley’s 
Lectures on Good and Evil Angels; to Winer’s Biblisches Real Wortenbuch, art 
““ Besessene ;’”’? to Moses Stuart’s sketches of Angelogy, in Bibliotheca Sacra, 1843; to 
Bishop Burgess’ sermon on Demonology, in the Phil. course of Lectures on Evidences, 
Phil. 1854; to President Appleton’s discourse on the same; and toa very brilliant 
though eccentric treatise, recently published, under the title of “the Apocatastasis 
Progress Backwards.”? Burlington, 1854. See also, the Rev. Chas. Beecher’s “ Review 
of the Spiritual Manifestations,” N. Y., 1853. 

233 


§ 216] DEMONIAC POSSESSION——-NOT NOW EXISTING. [BOOK I. 


phors and narratives into parables, is in this, as in most other respects, insuf- 
ficient to reconcile the captious, and is unnecessary for the purpose of relieving 
’ the sincere inquirer. Those who have gone such great lengths in thus adapt- 
ing the statements of our Lord’s treatment of the demoniacs to the supposed 
standard of modern medical experience, would do well to observe how un- 
necessary their labors appear to one of the most eminent and experienced of 
modern physicians. ‘Those who admit the authority of Scripture,” says Dr. 
Cheyne, “are not permitted to doubt that when our Lord cured the demoniacs, 
he actually dispossessed them. It could not have been, as some have alleged, 
that he merely removed epilepsy or insanity. Without entering into all the 
particulars of the discussion, any Christian who will read with attention the 
fourth and eighth chapters of St. Matthew’s Gospel, must reject the hypothesis 
of Mede, that the demoniacs mentioned in the gospels labored under natural 
diseases. In the fourth chapter it is expressly specified that our Lord ‘healed 
all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments,’ including 
epilepsy, we may fairly infer, ‘and those which were possessed with devils,’ 
a separate class, ‘and those which were lunatic,’ or of unsound mind. In the 
eighth chapter, the same distinction is observable between casting out devils 
and curing diseases: sixteenth verse, ‘and he cast out the spirits with his 
word, and healed all that were sick.’ But the relation which decides the 
question is that of the miracle performed in the country of the Gergesenes. (y) 
Before we can believe that the two men who came out of the tombs were 
maniacs or epileptics, it must be proved that disease is not merely a mode of 
animal life, but something substantive and transferable from one class of 
beings to another—from man to the lower animals.’’(z) 

Without, therefore, any further attempt to determine the question whether 
demoniac possession is taught as a fact by history, either sacred or profane, 
we revert to the inquiry as to whether it exists at the present day. And 
the analysis we have just given of the phenomena on which such posses- 
sion now rests, justifies us in saying, that in a lego-psychological view, we 
have no evidence of any such present existence. All modern phenomena can 
be satisfied by the recognition of the independent existence of that species of 
mania which causes an insane belief in the patient that he is possessed with a 
demon.(@) 


(y) Matt. viii. 28. 

(z) Essays on Derangement in connection with Religion, by John Cheyne, M. D., 
F. R. 8. E., M. R. I. A., Physician General to His Majesty’s Forces in Ireland. Dublin, 
1843, p. 68, &c. On the subject of demoniacs generally, Whateley’s Good and Evil 
Angels, Lecture VI. 

(a) Schtirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 550. For a case of supposed Demoniacal Posses- 
sion, see Journal of Psychological Medicine, vol. iii. p. 262; Metzger’s verm. Schrift. 
Bd. 3, s. 217; Ces. Ruggieri’s history of the self-crucifixion of M. Lovati at Venice, 
translated by Schlegel, Rudolst, 1807. (In the latter case, the patient first cut off his 
own private members, and then crucified himself.) Henke’s Zeitsch. E-H., 11 s. 291 
—(Two Swiss girls, who immolated themselves.) Henke’s Zeitschr. Bd. 47, p. 447. 
Pyl’s essay, 6 Samml. p. 214. (Infanticide by a demoniac.) Henke’s Zeitschr. 27 
Bd. p. 330—(Periodical Demonio-mania.) Demoniacal possession, as Siebold (Gericht. . 
Med. § 210) very justly remarks, was much more common in former days than the 
present, and of this to say nothing of the New Testament period, illustrations may be 
found in the many cases of witches, seers and soothsayers, of the middle ages.—The 
Convulsions, &c., of St Medard fall under this head. See Hecker on the Dancing 
Mania, Berl. 1832. Published also by the Sydenham Society. See also case, ante, § 

234 


BOOK I.] RELIGIOUS INSANITY—ITS REAL CHARACTER. [$ 217 


§ 217. b. Religious Insanity. 

a’. Christianity, taken in vis practical sense, has no tendency to produce 
insanity.— To tell a man he cannot save himself, but that if he trust in God, 
God will save him’’—we paraphrase a passage from Coleridge—“ is the lamb 
in wolf’s clothing; to tell him that he can save himself without help, is the 
wolf in lamb’s clothing.”’? The first is mercy in a dress of severity; the second 
cruelty in a dress of mercy. ‘ Only try,” says the philosopher, “trust in your- 
self, and you will conquer this evil habit.”” ‘“ But I have tried—I have trusted 
in myself—I have failed, and I know that if ] am to be judged by my works, 
I will be condemned.”’ “Only try,’’ says Christianity, “throw yourself for 
mercy on Christ—He will supply all your wants, will make up all your defi- 
ciencies, and will save you in the end, if you but give a childlike faith to Him.” 
Now, which of these two doctrines is the least likely to agitate the mind— 
that which thus offers immediate pardon and future peace on the sole condition 
of present repentance, and trust, or that which makes salvation dependent on 
a calculation of the sins and the good deeds of the past—which makes it ne- 
cessary, before a sure conclusion be reached, that the most secret recesses of 
memory be searched—and which after all leaves the inquirer with a crushing 
consciousness of an evil nature which infuses sin into his very thoughts, and 
for which there is neither atonement nor cure ? 

The first is, in fact, the practical working of the doctrine of justification by 
faith, a doctrine which in its moral relations is thus admirably stated by Sir 
James Macintosh. ‘The enormities of Tetzel found Luther busied in the 
contemplation of the principle which is the basis of all ethical judgment, and 
by the power of which he struck a mortal blow at superstition. Men are not 
made righteous by performing certain actions which are externally good; but 
men must have righteous principles in the first place, and then they will not 
fail to perform virtuous actions.”’ ‘‘The general terms he used, enunciate a 
proposition equally certain and sublime, the basis of all pure ethics ; the cement 
of the eternal alliance between morality and religion, and the badge of the in- 
dependence of both on the low notions and dim insight of human laws.’’(@) 


584, note (z). And alsoa series of very curious and valuable articles on Pythonic 
and Demoniac Possession in Dublin Univ. Mag. for Sept. and Oct., 1848, for March 
and Dec., 1849, and for January, 1850. 

(a) I particularly call attention to the following remarks of Dr. Chalmers, as sus- 
taining the position in the text :— 

“And perhaps the most plain and direct vindication of the evangelical system, as 
being altogether on the side of morality, is that morality forms the very atmosphere 
both of the happiness which it offers here, and of the heaven to which it points here- 
after. In the service of an earthly superior, the reward is distinct from the work that 
is done for it. In the service of God, the main reward lies in the very pleasure of the 
service itself. The work and the wages are the same. It is not after the keeping of 
the commandments, but in the keeping of the commandments, that there is great 
reward. Even from the little that is made known to us of the upper paradise, it is 
evident that its essential blessedness lies not in its splendor, and not in its melody, and 
not in the ravishment of any sensible delights or glories, but simply in the possession 
and pay of a moral nature in unison with all that is right, and in the rejoicing con- 
templation of that Being from whose countenance there beams and is impressed upon 
all the individuals of His surrounding family the moral excellence which belongs to 
Him. The gate of reconciliation through the blood of Christ is not merely the gate of 
escape from a region of wrath, it is the gate of introduction to a field of progressive and 
aspiring virtue; and it is the growth of this virtue upon earth that constitutes its full 
and its finished beatitude. The land to which every honest believer is bending his foot- 

235 


§ 217] RELIGIOUS INSANITY : [BOOK I. 


“But Predestination?’? There is no doubt that if the doctrine of predes- 
tination be unduly dwelt upon, it may injuriously affect the brain; but this is 


steps is a land of uprightness, where the happiness simply consists in a well-attempered 
soul rescued from the tyranny of evil, and restored to the proper balance of principles 
and affections which had gone into derangement. It is the happiness of a living being 
doing as he ought, and living as he ought. It were a contradiction of terms to aver 
of such a system that it is unfavorable to the interests of virtue. The doctrine of 
justification by faith is not the absorbent of all human activity, but the primary 
stimulant of that busy and prosperous career in which the soul, emancipated alike 
from fear and earthly affection, rejoices in the acquirement of a kindred character to 
God, and finds the work of obedience to be its congenial and best-loved employment. 
This is the real process of effort and mental discipline that is undergone by every 
honest believer, though hidden from the general eye under the guise of a phraseology 
that is derided and unknown by the world. He is diligent, that he may be found 
without spot and blameless on the great day of examination. It is the business of his 
whole life to perfect holiness in the fear of God. 

“And for effecting this moral transformation on the character of its disciples does 
this system of truth provide the most abundant guarantees. It holds forth the most 
express announcement that without such a transformation there will be no admittance 
into the kingdom of God. And it reveals an influence for achieving it which is ever 
in readiness to descend on the prayers of those who aspire after the affections and the 
habits of righteousness. And, along with the call of faith, does it lift the contempo- 
raneous call of repentance. And it marks out a path of obedience, by the urgency 
and guidance of precepts innumerable. And, so far from lulling into inaction by its 
free offer of forgiveness, does it only thereby release its disciples from the inactivity 
of paralyzing terror, and furnish them with the most generous excitements to the ser- 
vice of God, in the love, and the gratitude, and the joy of their confident reconciliation. 
And, finally, as if to shut out all possibility of escape from the toils and the employ- 
ments of virtue, does it make known a day of judgment, wherein man shall be reck- 
oned with, not for his dogmata, but for his doings ; and when there will be no other 
estimate of his principles than the impulse which they gave to his practical history 
in the world—they who have done good being called forth to the resurrection of the 
just, and they who have done evil to the resurrection of damnation. 

“ Now, all this truth has full recognition and occupancy among the articles of the 
- evangelical creed; and the doctrine of justification by faith alone, so far from laying 
any arrest on the practical influence of it, is felt by every genuine believer to give all 
its spirit and all its scope to the new obedience of the Gospel. Without this doctrine, 
in fact, there can be no agreement between God and man, but by a degrading compro- 
mise between the purity of the one and the imperfection of the other; and the point 
at which this compromise should be struck is left undetermined, and at the discretion 
of each individual, who will, of course, accommodate the matter to the standard of 
his own performances ; and thus, under all the varieties of moral turpitude, as well as 
moral accomplishment, will there be a fatal tranquillity of conscience, in a world where 
each may live as he lists ; and heaven’s law, once brought down to suit the convenience 
of our fallen nature, may at length offer no disturbance to any degree either of ungod- 
liness or unrighteousness in our species. But with the doctrine of justification by 
faith there is no such compromise. 

“The rewards of the divine government are still granted in consideration of a right- 
eousness that is altogether worthy of them. The claims of the Godhead to the perfect 
reverence, as well as the perfect love, of His creatures are kept unbroken; and when 
He proclaims His will to be our sanctification, the disciple, as he feels himself released 
from the vengeance of an unbending law, also feels himself to be placed in a career 
of exertion that is quite indefinite; where he will stop short at no degree of moral 
excellence—where he can be satisfied with no assignable fulfilment whatever—where 
his whole desire and delight, in fact, will be in progress; and he will never cease 
aspiring and pressing forward till he has reached his prize, and stands upon the sum- 
mit of perfection. It is only under the impulse of such principles as these that the 
mighty host of a country’s population can be trained either to the virtues of society 
or to the virtues of the sanctuary. .The former may, to a certain extent, flourish in 
themselves among the children of this world’s prosperity. But, saving in conjunction 
with, and as emanating from the latter, they never can be upheld amid the workshops 
and the habitations of industry. It is a frequent delusion that the evangelical system 
bears no regard to the social virtues, because in the mind of an evangelical Christian 
they are of no religious estimation whatever, but as they stand connected with the 
authority of God. But he cannot miss to observe that the sanctions of this authority 
are brought, in every page of the Bible, most directly and abundantly to bear upon 


236 


BOOK I.] ITS REAL CHARACTER. [$ 217 


not a religious difficulty. Predestination operates as effectively on things 
temporal as on things spiritual. The loss of a friend, the purchase of a 
house, my going on a journey to-morrow, my taking a book this next moment 
from the library by my side, are as much the matters of foreordination as are 
the great conditions of the future. If religion be abandoned because it in- 
volves such speculations, so must all human thought whatever. These ques- 
tions are as much matters of philosophy as of religion. 

Reducing the controversy within its proper limits, the contending views 
may be thus stated: Philosophical necessity consists of the divine sovereignty, 
incorporating within itself, and recognizing as an independent power, free 
agency; libertarianism, of free agency, capable, within its own range of action, 
of voluntary choice, but dependent for self-renovation on divine grace. In 
other words, each system consists of the same two great truths, apparently hos- 
tile, yet ever consistent in human consciousness. GOD IS SOVEREIGN ; THE WILL 
IS FREE. If, in respect to the question of the primacy of these truths, there should 
be great diversity of opinion—if by one class of thinkers the one is placed first, 
and gazed at with peculiar reverence, if by another the other—this is no 
more than we find in civil society, where the two parallel elements of individual 
liberty and governmental authority are subject to the same treatment. The 
question is one of temperament. In sociology we find, on the one side, those 
who look up with peculiar reverence to the conservative power of government, 
who distrust the capacity of bodies of men for self-government, who turn 
fondly to the past and sadly to the future; on the other side, those who, hold- 
ing that true conservatism requires constant change in order to withstand the 
dilapidations of time, have an a priori tendency to reforms, and look upon 
the past mainly as a platform on which to raise the achievements of the future. 
To the struggles of these two classes of opinion—the conservative and the 
reforming—we owe a great part of the healthy action of society. No man 
would now affirm that either class possesses the right solely, or that the appa- 
rently hostile truths of human independence and of human subordination are 
not concurrently recognized in political economy. Among those engaged in 
marshalling the two cardinal propositions of metaphysical theology we may 
call for the same charity.(b) 

As is remarked by Dr. Rush, in Christvan countries departures from the 
Christian faith (e. g. infidelity and atheism) are “frequent causes’? of in- 
sanity.(c) And the same is equally true of departures in the direction of 


them; and thus, in his eyes, do they instantly reappear, strengthened by all the obli- 
gations, and invested with a full character of deepest sacredness. The integrity of 
such a creed as he professes is the best guarantee for the integrity of his relative and 
social conduct. And it is only in proportion to the presence of this derided orthodoxy 
that the honesties and sobrieties of life will spread in healthful diffusion over the face 
of the country.’”’—Chalmers’s Christian and Economic Polity, vol. i. p. 204. 

(b) Wharton on Theism, § 128. 

(c) Dr. Winslow, in his late interesting work on suicide, gives us the following 
instances of this: “It may be mentioned, as a fact corroborating the opinion, that 
productions of an infidel character have a tendency to originate a disposition to sui- 
cide, by weakening the moral principles ; that when the celebrated and notorious Tom 
Paine’s Age of Reason was first published, the papers of the day recorded many cases 
of self-murder, committed by persons who avowed that the idea never entered their 
heads until they had become familiar with the above-mentioned writer. An indivi- 


237 


§ 217] RELIGIOUS INSANITY : [BOOK I. 


ignorant and fanatical superstition. The former position is readily explained. 
The soul, as well as the body, to enable it to stand steadily, requires that the 
eye shall be fixed upon some distant and external point. No man, for instance, 
can succeed in standing on one foot if he fixes his eye on his own person; and 
he succeeds in maintaining his upright position precisely to the extent he is 
able to fix his eye firmly on a point in the distance. And in a psychological 
view this is readily explicable. It is only by the recognition of a future state 
that the soul can be effectually steadied in ¢his. And it is precisely such a 
system as the Christian religion describes—one which affords a positive assur- 
ance of immortal peace to those who seize upon it for their portion—which, 
while it recognizes that innate depravity, which the heart is but too ready to 
testify to from its own experience, promises divine aid in the struggle—which 
announces the pardon of past sin by a vicarious atonement, while it affords to 
the creature the aid and succour in all his troubles, of a divine friend and yet 
of a human example. . 

“T envy no qualities of the mind or intellect in others, nor genius, nor power, 


dual, zealous in the diffusion of Paine’s principles, purchased several hundred copies 
of his work, which he most industriously circulated, gratuitously, in quarters where 
he knew the doctrines of Christianity had already obtained a footing. A copy of the 
Age of Reason, elegantly bound, was received by a young lady who was acting in the 
capacity of governess in the family of a gentleman of great respectability. The lady 
had no conception from whom the present came, and having heard of the book she 
felt a curiosity to become acquainted with the doctrines which it inculcated. The 
circumstance of her having received the book was not mentioned to any member of 
the family with whom she resided, and in the evening when she retired to her own 
room, she read it with great attention. The family noticed, in a few weeks, a per- 
.ceptible alteration in the appearance of the young lady. She became exceedingly 
thoughtful and contemplative. Her health also appeared sensibly affected. The 
mother of the children whom she was instructing took advantage of the first oppor- 
tunity of speaking to her on the subject. She expressed herself very unhappy in her 
mind, but refused to disclose the cause of her mental uneasiness. It was thought she 
had formed an attachment, and was suffering from the effects of disappointed affec- 
tion. She was questioned on these points, but persisted in concealing the circum- 
stances which had been operating so injuriously on her mind. The mental dejection 
increased, and the result was an alarming attack of nervous fever, of which she was 
cured by an able physician with much difficulty. When convalescent she was noticed 
one day busily employed in writing, and when interrupted showed great anxiety to 
secrete the piece of paper on which she had been transcribing her thoughts. In the 
course of the evening of the same day, a deep groan was heard to issue from her room. 
The servant immediately entered, when, to her great horror, she saw the governess on 
the floor with a terrible gash in her throat. Assistance was directly obtained ; but, 
alas! not in time to save the life of the poor unfortunate girl. On searching her desk, 
a Sheet of paper was discovered, on which she had disclosed her reasons for the rash 
act. She said, that from the moment she read the Age of Reason, her mind became 
unsettled. Her previous religious impressions were undermined ; in proportion as she 
was induced to imbibe the doctrines of Tom Paine, so she became miserable and 
wretched. From one error she fell into another, until she actually believed that death 
was annihilation ; and although she appeared firmly rooted in this belief, she expressed 
herself horrified beyond all expression at the bare idea of dissolution. For some time 
prior to her illness, she had felt an impulse to sacrifice her life, but had not the courage 
to perform the act. After her recovery, she felt the impulse renewed with increased 
strength, until, with a hope of escaping from an accumulation of misery which was 
weighing her to the earth, she determined to commit suicide. She also, in the docu- 
ment referred to, asked her friends to forgive her, and to take warning from her fate.” 
—Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, pp. 87-89. It has been asserted, and remains un- 
contradicted, that Mr. Hume lent his Essay on Suicide to a friend, who, on returning 
it, told him it was a most excellent performance, and pleased him better than anything 
he had read for a long time. In order to give Hume a practical exhibition of the 
effect of his defence of suicide, his friend shot himself the day after returning him the 
essay.— Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, pp. 31, 32. 
238 


BOOK I.] ITS REAL CHARACTER. [$ 217 


wit or fancy,” says Sir H. Davy: “but if I could choose what would be most 
delightful, and, I believe, most useful to me, I should prefer a firm religious 
belief to every other blessing: for it makes life a discipline of goodness ; 
creates new hopes when all earthly hopes vanish ; and throws over the decay, 
the destruction of existence, the most gorgeous of all lights; awakens life in 
death, and calls out from corruption and decay, beauty and everlasting glory.” 

The habitual practical recognition and adoption of such a system as this 
must necessarily generate a sobriety of temper, which will of all others be the 
most distant from derangement. That the reception of Christianity, whether 
real or nominal, should cwre insanity, is no more to be expected than that it 
should cure the smallpox. If it did—if a special miracle was wrought for the 
purpose of destroying the original characteristics of each individual, it would 
not only destroy moral agency and hence break up probation, but would pro- 
duce an almost entire derangement of human affairs by obliterating the marks 
of individuality, to say nothing of identity. 

To the same effect are the following just observations of Dr. Copland: ‘It 
must not be supposed, from what I have advanced, that the Christian religion 
is truly chargeable with causing insanity; it actually has an opposite tendency. 
Mistaken views, excessive fervor, unfounded fears, and various feelings arising 
from these sources, are the only causes of insanity in connection with religion. 
Among those who entertain just and sober opinions on religious topics—who 
make Christian doctrines the basis of,their morals, the governors of their pas- 
sions, the soothers of their cares and their hopes of futurity—insanity rarely 
occurs. The moral causes of derangement which would not fail of producing 
injurious effects on others, prove innocuous in them, for these causes would be 
met by controlling and calming considerations and sentiments, such as would 
deprive them of intensity or neutralize their effects. Truly religious sentiments 
and obligations soothe the more turbulent emotions, furnish consolations in 
affliction, heal the wounded feelings, administer hopes to the desponding, and 
arrest the hands of violence and despair.’’(d) 

And the testimony of Dr. Cheyne, who stood for many years at the head of 
the medical profession in Ireland, occupying the responsible post in that king- 
dom of physician-general to the forces, is equally emphatic: ‘Our experience 
of, and inquiries into the nature of insanity, during a period of forty years,’ 
he says, ‘‘enable us to say that such cases as that which we have just related” 
(those of insanity from morbidity of the religious affections), ‘“‘are not in the 
proportion of one in a thousand to the instances of insanity which arise from 
wounded pride or disappointed ambition.”’(e) ‘True religion,” he tells us in 
another place,(f) ‘is a preservative, although not a complete preservative 
against derangement of the mind. We have no intention of concealing that 
we have known many instances of insanity among believers, but it was not 
caused by their creed. "We have also known instances in which all sense of 
religion has been permanently destroyed by insanity. Of such cases we would 
remark, that the believer has no right to expect for his believing friend exemp- 


(d) Copland, Med. Dict., art. “Insanity.” 
(e) Cheyne on Derangement in connection with Religion, pp. 178, 179. 
(f) Ibid. p. 146. 


239 


§ 218] RELIGIOUS INSANITY: [BOOK I. 


tion from evils arising from the state of the body, on which insanity always 
depends. Let him moreover recollect, that as total insanity puts an end to 
moral accountability, nothing which may take place during a paroxysm of the 
disorder, can affect the future happiness of his friend.” 

“When fairly examined,’”’ says Dr. Combe, ‘the danger is seen to arise 
solely from an abuse of religion, and the best safeguard is found to consist in 
a right understanding of its principles and submission to its precepts. For if 
the best Christian be he, who in meekness, humility, and sincerity, places his 
trust in God, and seeks to fulfil all his commandments, then he who exhausts 
his soul in devotion, and at the same time finds no leisure or no inclination 
for attending to the common duties of his station, and who so far from arriv- 
ing at happiness or peace of mind, becomes every day the more estranged from 
them, and finds himself at last involved in disease and despair, cannot be held 
as a follower of Christ, but must rather be held as a follower of a phantom 
assuming the aspect of religion. When insanity attacks the latter, it is ob- 
viously not religion that is its cause; it is only the absence of certain feelings, 
the regulated activity of which is necessary to the right exercise of religion ; 
and against such abuse a sense of religion would, in fact, have been the most 
powerful protection. And the great benefit of knowing this is, that whenever 
we shall meet with such a blind and misdirected excess of our best feelings in 
a constitutionally—nervous or hereditarily—predisposed subject, instead of 
encouraging its exuberance, we should use every effort to temper the excess, to 
inculcate sounder views, and to point out the inseparable connection which 
the Creator has established between the true dictates of religion and the prac- 
tical duties of life, which it is a part of his purpose in sending us here to fulfil.”’ 

These views are not uncorroborated by practical observation. It is not 
necessary to record the cases where mania, particularly that of the suicidal 
cast, has been generated by an undue estimate of the importance of this life’s 
incidents as compared with those of the next.(g) On the other hand we may 
find a pregnant illustration of the converse process in the fact mentioned in 
the thirteenth report of the Hartford Retreat, that two hundred and eight 
farmers, fifty-eight merchants, and thirty-four day-laborers have been admitted 
into that institution to four clergymen.(h) So in the latest report we now 


(g) Dr. Rush, after noticing the fact that 150 suicides having taken place in Paris 
in the year 1782, and but 32 in London, says, “It is probable the greater portion of 
infidels in the former than in the latter city, at that time, may have occasioned a differ- 
ence in the number of deaths in the two places, for suicide will naturally follow small 
degrees of insanity, where there are no habits of moral order from religion, and no 
belief in a future state.”—Rush on the Mind, p. 69. 

(h) The chaplain in the same report states: ‘“‘The usual week-day services in the 
chapel of the institution, singing, reading the Scriptures, and prayer, have been per- 
formed during the year. On the afternoon of the Sabbath, there have been religious 
exercises similar to those in other Christian congregations. ‘The singing is still con- 
ducted by a choir composed of the attendants and patients, and adds much to the in- 
terest and value of the services. In these various exercises the patients have engaged 
with gratifying decorum, and solemnity. Strangers who for the first time are present 
at our worship in the chapel, often express surprise at their apparent devotion, and 
the stillness and steady attention with which they listen to divine truth. Indeed, it 
is believed that few congregations of the sane, in an ordinary state of feeling, exceed 
them in these respects, 

‘A sense of need opens a way for the gospel to the hearts of these sufferers. The 
service checks, for a few months, at least, the dark current of sorrow, calls the wan- 


240 


BOOK I.] ITS REAL CHARACTER. [$ 218 


have before us, that of the New York State Lunatic Asylum. This report, 
which was transmitted to the legislature on February 7, 1860, and which 
therefore covers a period of uncommon religious interest, out of 312 cases 
gives only six which are attributed to ‘religious excitement.’? The cases at- 
tributable to causes religion could have corrected, are ten times that number. 
Dr. Ray, in a late report of the Butler Hospital for the insane, says: ‘I 
believe—and it is in some measure the result of considerable observation of 
various psychological states—that in this age of fast living nothing can be 
relied upon more surely for preserving the healthy balance of the mental facul- 
ties, than an earnest practical conviction of the great truths of Christianity.” 
§ 218. b1. What ts called religious insanity is produced: a®. By a 
departure from practical Christianity; a’. Reliance on frames and emo- 
tions.—Mr. Brownlow North, one of the most eminent evangelists of the 
present day, and one who may be fairly taken as the representative of the most 
active phase of home religious activity, thus speaks on this point: ‘‘ Many 
imagine, unless they are at all times in a glow of fervor, an ecstatic frame of 


dering mind away from its delusions, and aids in forming a healthful self-control. 
A sense of propriety, the strong associations connected with such scenes in happier 
days, and the quiet of fellow worshippers, combine to restrain outbursts of feeling 
which they are often unable to resist in their own rooms. And aside from these in- 
fluences of religious worship, who shall set limits to the great Physician of both soul 
and body, in making the gospel a means of moral renovation to the deranged mind. 

“Increasing experience strengthens my conviction that the distinguishing prin- 
ciples of the gospel are no less adapted to the mind when disordered, than when in 
its normal state. In the former case, indeed, more care and a different mode of ex- 
hibition are demanded ; but these principles unfolded calmly and clearly, in the sober 
manner of the Bible, will find as ready and intelligent and cordial a response in a 
congregation of the insane as in most others. 

“The full value of the gospel in relation to mental derangement, both as a pre- 
ventive and a remedy, is not, it is believed, fully appreciated. Official reports show 
that cases of insanity, in great numbers, result from causes against which the con- 
trolling daily influence of religious principle would guard the mind. By checking 
vices which prey on the body and mental feelings, such as envy, jealousy, inordinate 
grief, which wastes its energies, the gospel prevents diseases that result in insanity.” 

The fact that sound religious discipline exercises a salutary influence in assuaging 
the malady, does not, of course, go to refute the position that unsound religious excite- 
ment may not have produced it; but it does show that a judicious presentation of the 
sanctions of religion—even involving their most solemn features—is a conservative 
and not a distracting influence. The reports of Dr. Kirkbride and Dr. Woodward are 
strong to this point; and we cannot refrain from adding to them the following testi- 
mony from Miss Dix :— 

“That among the hundreds of crazy people with whom her sacred missions have 
brought her into companionship, she has not found one individual, however fierce and 
turbulent, that could not be calmed by Scripture and prayer, uttered in low and gentle 
tones. The power of religious sentiments over those shattered souls seems miraculous. 
The worship of a quiet, loving heart, affects them like a voice from heaven. Tearing 
and rending, yelling and stamping, singing and groaning, gradually subside into 
silence, and they fall on their knees, or gaze upwards with clasped hands, as if they 
saw through the opening darkness a golden gleam from their Father’s throne of love.” 

Armed with this gentle influence, we are told by an observer, she does not fear the 
violence of the madman. Well do we remember an instance that we heard from her 
own lips, in which she entered the cell of a maniac, against the remonstrances of the 
terrified keeper. As she persisted in entering, the door was instantly closed behind 
her to prevent escape. Alone she stood face to face with that wild man. He raised 
himself in a threatening attitude, and glared upon her with his fierce eye. She opened 
the Bible, and read the words of a Psalm. After a few lines, he bent his head to 
listen. The look of rage and terror passed from his countenance. His eye grew less 
wild, and sent forth sweet, blessed tears, until the madman sank down at that helpless 
woman’s feet. And as she finished, he said, ‘‘ Will you read those words again ?” 


16 241 


§ 219] RELIGIOUS INSANITY: [BOOK I. 


feeling, all must be wrong with them. But there is nothing more dangerous 
or deceptive than a life of mere feeling; and-its most dangerous phase is a 
life of religious emotional excitement. It is, in the last degree, erroneous to 
consider all this glowing ecstasy of frame a necessary condition of healthful 
spiritual life.” 

John Newton was the religious adviser of Cowper, and has been charged 
by Hayley, if not by Southey, with having aggravated by his emotional the- 
ology, Cowper’s insanity. By both parties in this, as well as in the other 
theological controversies in which John Newton was engaged, he was regarded 
as a fair and square exponent of the evangelical theology of the day, a the- 
ology which has been peculiarly charged with this reliance on frames and feel- 
ings. Yet how unjust this is, Newton’s earnest and repeated appeals show. 
‘He who wants to tell experiences,’’ said he at one time, ‘will soon be creat- 
ing experiences to tell.”” ‘A humble, dependent frame of spirit, perseverance 
in the appointed means, care to avoid all occasions of sin, a sincere endeavor 
to glorify God, an eye to Jesus Christ as our all in all, are sure indications 
that the soul is thriving, whether sensible consolation abound or not. Neither 
high or low frames will do for a standard of faith; self may be strong in 
both.’”’(z) Could there be wiser advice than this for the purpose of steadying 
the mind? And is not the certain faith on an extrinsic Providence far more 
likely to conduce to mental peace and rest, than that flurried and fluctuating 
introspection which makes salvation depend upon one’s present impression. of 
self ? 

§ 219. 0%. Appeal to unscriptural supernaturalism.—Two cases of al- 
leged fanatico-mania have recently (1858) occurred, one in Germany and one 
in New Haven, which, from their striking similarity, as well as from the pecu- 
liar religious-psychological phenomena by which they have been attended, 
should receive the thoughtful attention of all in anywise concerned in the care 
of the mind. In both instances, the scene was the bosom of a religious society, 
whose leaders pretended to have received special internal revelations from God. 
In each case, the “‘ prophets,” as those who claimed such revelations called 
themselves, asserted the right to suspend human laws and even divine precepts 
in obedience to the mandates which they maintained were revealed in the 
chambers of their own souls. It is difficult to deny that they were in one 
sense sincere. However much the delirium in which these visions were heard, 
was originally of their own creation, it had become, as delirium tremens is 
to the man who at first made himself voluntarily drunk, so wrought into their 
system as to be convulsive, if not irresistible. In the New Haven case, though 
the investigation was not conducted by men of the highest skill or most ma- 
ture experience, this opinion was sanctioned by the verdict of a jury. In the 
German case, the most experienced psychological physicians united in the 
position that the delusion, whatever might have been its origin, had finally 
become involuntary. In the latter case, the parties had joined a sect called 
the “ Apostolic Baptismal Community,” which is a sort of composition be- 


(7) Cited in “Man, Moral and Physical,” by Rev. J. H. Jones, a work of great in- 
terest in reference to religious insanity and melancholy. 


242 


BOOK I.] ITS REAL CHARACTER, [$ 219 


tween the German Anabaptists (Wiedertaufen) and the Irvingites. Their 
ministry is divided into apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds (Hirten), 
and deacons; all distinguished by a special costume. They pretend to special 
and miraculous communication of the Divine will, which communications are 
attended on the part of the recipient by convulsions, which, however they may 
have been originally feigned, have in many cases assumed the indisputable type 
of cataleptic ecstasies. In these the patients speak with what are called un- 
known tongues and prophesy. It so happened that at one of their meetings 
two of the ministers received, as they declared, a direct supernatural command 
to kill one of their associates and then to bring him to life again. The first 
injunction they executed, but failed in the second. The question of their 
responsibility being submitted to medical examination, Dr. Franz, a very dis- 
tinguished psychologist, came to the conclusion that their moral sense had 
become so utterly corroded, as to make perpetual confinement in a madhouse 
the only discipline to which they could properly be subjected. 

Now, to what are these phenomena to be traced? To Christianity, as one 
class of thinkers is but too ready to say. We apprehend not, for Christianity 
is emphatically a religion with a written and positive, as distinguished from 
-an emotional and flexible, creed. Is it not rather in the departure from the 
scriptural rule that we may find the origin of these melancholy excesses ? 
Let us trace them, for instance, to their source by those stepping-stones which 
so often enable us to follow the progress of an error from its inception to its 
close. Take, for instance, such a case as that of the Rev. David Austen, 
whose sad history is so touchingly told by Dr. Sprague in his history of the 
American pulpit. Mr. Austen began as a Presbyterian clergyman, and was 
marked, not only by his purity of life and his talents, but by his great effi- 
ciency as a pastor and influence as a preacher. Gradually, however, the ob- 
jective side of revelation began to sink in his estimation, and the subjective to 
become exaggerated. He had visions which overrode the written word. ‘The 
Lord has been pleased, he said, to deposit in his breast the secret of His 
coming. This and other revelations Mr. Austen began soon to proclaim with 
serene confidence and with startling effect. He fixed an actual day, in which 
he said the event was to take place. Crowds attended, and an excitement fol- 
lowed, which, if it did not cost others their reason, at least cost him his. 
The fact that the sun set calmly on the predicted day, did not shake his con- 
fidence. ‘The hour on the dial-plate,’”’ he said, ‘‘may have been mistaken ;”’ 
but it was none the less true that the sun of the Divine Omniscience poured 
its infallible light on the disk of his soul, opening to it those mysteries which 
the sublime imagery of the Apocalypse conceals. The Jews were to form an 
important element in the approaching catastrophe. They were to collect, he 
was assured, at New Haven preparatory to their migration to the Holy Land. 
He proceeded there to buy wharves as a depot for their embarkation. Being 
a man of considerable property, he obtained credit and bought four times as 
much land as he could pay for. Then came a crash, which ended with his 
arrest and imprisonment. When he at last emerged, it was only as a broken- 
hearted, as well as a deranged, man, whose melancholy office it was to hover, 

243 


§ 219] RELIGIOUS INSANITY: [BOOK I. 


during the remainder of his sad and long life, as a ghost over the grave of 
his dead usefulness. 

Now, is it saying too much for us to attribute these and similar cases of 
supposed supernatural inspiration to that introversion of the spiritual and 
intellectual powers which makes personal emotions and experience the subject 
first of tender nursing and then of fatuous idolatry? ‘Come, let us look at 
this sensibility of mine!’ cries the enthusiast, as he lifts it up in the air and 
ponders over it admiringly. The consequence is, that his perception of his 
emotions, as all introverted perceptions are, becomes exaggerated and confused. 
Weaill have familiar illustrations of this in the way in which when we turn the 
perceptive powers inward on a lost memory—e. g., the spelling of a forgotten 
word—the more we think about it, the further off we get. The very fact of 
introversion seems to paralyze our powers. Suppose, for instance, the public 
speaker, while in the flow of earnest thought, finds his consciousness suddenly 
turned in upon himself. The moment he thinks of himself, he loses his 
balance. This is very forcibly expressed by the Rev. C. H. Townsend, late of 
Trinity Hall, Cambridge, in his very curious work on Mesmerism.(j) 

“ Any admixture of the introspective consciousness detracts from the per- 
fection of one’s acquired and habitual motions as much as it spoils the free- 
dom and bold expansion of our thoughts. Of this we may soon convince 
ourselves. Though generally insensible of the act of breathing, we may, by 
attention, become aware of the process. What follows? An immediate sense 
of uneasiness and interruption of that regular motion which seems to go on 
so well of itself. Again, that winking of the eye, whereby the organ is 
healthily preserved, becomes a torment if we think about it. Again, too, every 
musician must have felt that when he has learned to play a piece of music by 
heart, if he thinks upon the direction of his fingers, he plays false. Let him 
trust to the simple memorial consciousness of his physical being, and he does 
not err.” 

It is here that the supernaturalist differs from the Christian. The latter 
-subjects the internal emotion to Scripture; the former subjects Scripture to 
the internal emotion. The heart is, at best, a dangerous prison-house, whose 
inmates the former visits to worship, the latter to scourge. The supernatu- 
ralist’s religion is the product of a morbid self-inspection, which in its turn 
generates a fanaticism, of which, as a kind of psychical hic-cups, he cannot 
be cured until he loses his self-consciousness. . It is not then in Christianity, 
which is the religion of a written code, but in a scheme which postpones the 
written code to theories of human invention, that we are to find the origin 
of such excesses. 

The true test, we apprehend, is to be found in the nature of the conscious- 
ness on which the claim to a Divine influence rests. If this consciousness be 
of the action of God’s spirit in producing specific graces, it is in harmony 
with God’s word. If, on the other hand, it amount merely to a vague but 
arbitrary idea of the presence of God’s Spirit without such signs, it is open to 
grave question. Coleridge strikes at this when he tells us that one of the pheno- 


iby (7) London, 1844, p. 20. 


BOOK I.] ITS REAL CHARACTER. [$ 219 


mena attending the possessors of fanatical delusions is, “ that it is not enough 
that you grant them a consciousness of the gifts and graces infused, or an as- 
surance of the spiritual origin of the same, grounded on their correspondence 
with the Scripture promises, and their conformity with the idea of the Divine 
Giver. No! they all alike, it will be found, lay claim, or at least look for- 
ward to, an inward perception of the Spirit itself and of its operating.”’ 

Let us reduce this test to practice. Take, for instance, the inspiration of 
Brigham Young. “It is the Spirit working within me’ to do, not this or 
that specific work of grace, but whatever work, no matter what may be its 
nature, in which I may happen to be engaged. So it was with the Anabap- 
tist fanatics at Munster. The human will is not subjected to the Divine 
Spirit, but the Divine Spirit to the human will. The man is not judged by 
his conformity to the Spirit, but the Spirit by its utterance through the man. 
What Brigham Young claims is not to act in the Spirit, for if so, his claims 
could be tested by the written Word, and by the natural law of conscience. 
But he claims to be the Spirit’s organ, and thus to clothe with divine power 
his human utterances. So it is with the maniac who murders his wife and 
children under an alleged religious impulse. He bases his claims to the in- 
spiration of the Spirit, not on the gracious affections wrought in his soul, 
‘but in the arbitrary pretence of a Divine presence incorporating itself in, and 
manifesting itself through his own will. Such claims are not in accordance 
with the Divine word. Spiritual pretensions of this kind, so far from being 
recognized by Christianity, are a departure from it. 

An additional illustration of the truth of these positions is to. be found in 
the late developments of Spirit-Rapping. Precisely to the degree in which the 
alleged Spiritual developments depart from the dogmas of Christian Revela- 
tion, are they associated with mental derangement. As long as the “media” 
profess to be orthodox, so long do they keep within the bounds of right reason. 
With them, however, as with the Mormons, deviations from the moral law 
keep pace with deviations from the divine. Thus the cases of ‘ spiritual mar- 
riages,’’ of which we have lately heard, have been preceded by alleged superna- 
tural communications, vacating the Scriptural precepts. And a careful exami-’ 
nation of the cases of insanity produced by Spiritualism shows that in each 
instance, infidelity became a concomitant. (k) . 

The history of religious insanity in this country goes a great way to fortify 
the position that it is to a departure from the gospel system that most cases 
of what may be called Demonio-mania may be traced. On this point a 
late writer, whose attention has been particularly given to this topic, thus 
speaks :—(kk) 

“Passing over the many instances of such erratic and fanatical extrava- 
gances which history records, and to some of which the review before us alludes, 
we will glance at two recent and notable ones, occurring among ourselves, that 
- we may the better judge whether religion makes men insane, or whether it 


(k) See on this topic a most able but, in some respects, eccentric volume, under 
the title, “The Apocatastasis, or progress backwards, a ‘new tract for the times,’ Bur- 
lington, Chauncey Goodrich, 1854,” to which the reader is referred for a very effective 
exhibition of the absurdity of the whole spirit-rapping system. 

(kk) Relations of Religion to Diseases of the Mind. Phila.: J. W. apiuaes nn 


§ 219] | RELIGIOUS INSANITY: [BOOK I. 


merely fails, in many cases, to bring them to their right mind; so that it may 
be said that they continue insane in spite of all that religion can do for them. 

“A clergyman, in infirm health, sought to amuse his listless hours by framing 
a puerile romance, after the manner of eastern fabulists, with names, dates, and 
localities, bearing no relation to sober history. These writings, in some way, 
without the author’s privity, came into the hands of strangers. In 1826, one 
Joseph Smith professed to have found, in the town of Palmyra, N. Y., some 
brass plates inclosed in a box, such as is used for packing window-glass. Of 
these plates he pretended to be the interpreter. With a stone in his hat, and 
his hat over his eyes, he dictated what a man, named Harris, wrote. In con- 
sequence of some dispute, Harris departed before the interpretation was ended, 
and one Cowdrey took his place, and completed the ‘Book of Mormon.’ Smith 
then avowed himself a prophet, and the founder of a new dispensation, and 
gathered many disciples, who accompanied him to the State of Missouri, 
where they established a city and built a temple. We need not pursue their 
adventures. 

“The contents of the Book of Mormon, or the Mormon Bible, were neither 
more nor less than the selfsame tales of romance which the invalid clergyman 
amused himself with writing. A large number of persons, however, embraced 
the delusion; many abandoned a profitable business, some sacrificed large pro- 
perty, and not a few were ruined in soul, body, and estate, by putting their 
trust in this barefaced imposture. 

“Tt is perfectly obvious, we think, that a mind well informed and established 
in the received doctrines of the Christian faith, and endued with but very 
ordinary discernment, would be proof against so bold an imposture. If any 
intelligent and respectable persons joined the Mormon ranks, that, of itself, 
shows either a predisposition to insanity, which this fanciful revelation was 
fitted to develop, but with which religion has no connection whatever; or that 
there is a deficiency of discernment, or a neglect or abuse of the reasoning 
powers, or a morbid love of distinction and notoriety, to gratify which they 
are willing to sacrifice all other interests. If a judicious, faithful parent or 
Sunday-school teacher had given direction to their inquiries, and furnished 
their minds with just and systematic, though exceedingly simple, views of the 
doctrines of revelation, they would have had balances wherewith to weigh the 
pretensions of the new prophet, and by means of these vanity and falsehood 
would have been made manifest. 

“At a somewhat later period, a man named Miller (a Baptist minister, as 
it is said) professed to have had a revelation of the precise day on which the 
second advent of Christ would occur, and when his people would be called to 
rise and meet him in the air! He and his deluded apostles, or agents, went 
from town to town and from house to house, ‘leading captive silly women,’ 
and imposing upon the credulity of the ignorant. So settled was the convic- 
tion of many minds of the truth of his predictions, that they arranged their 
worldly affairs in reference to it, as an ascertained event, and made no contracts 
extending beyond the designated day. Prosperous citizens sold their estates, 
and declined the ordinary avocations of life, that they might give themselves 
wholly to the business of preparation; and, as the eventful period drew nigh, 

246 


BOOK I.] ITS REAL CHARACTER. [§ 219 


many evinced the sincerity of their convictions by providing what they regarded 
as suitable apparel for an aerial flight, and some actually assembled in groups 
upon summits which might be supposed most favorable to an early and easy 
ascension! The dupes of the false prophet were counted by thousands. Scores 
were committed to insane asylums, who were crazed with excitement, or with 
disappointment; and many within and without the charmed circle were doubt- 
less left to believe that all revelations are as idle and delusive as Millerism.(/) 

“We need not. say how the plainest Scriptures must have been, wrested from 
their true intent and meaning, nor how deaf an ear must have been turned to 
the voice of reason and common sense, before the mind could have surrendered 
itself to such a fancy. There is not a trace of insanity, however, in any stage 
of the process. It is a simple, voluntary subjection of reason to the influence 
of imagination or superstition, instead of a childlike submission of all the 
powers and faculties of body and mind to the revealed will of God. And 
although we may admit that such delusions have in many instances been the 
ostensible cause of insanity, as our hospital returns allege, “revealed religion’’ 
is no more responsible for them than for paroxysms of mania-d-potu. It is 
because the plain truths of revealed religion were misapprehended, perverted, 
or rejected, that the imposture succeeded, and the mind was led captive by 
Satan at his will. It is not strange that a vessel Jeft to itself on a stormy 
sea should, sooner or later, go to the bottom, or fall into the hands of wreck- 
ers.’’(7) 

§ 219 (a). c% Appeal to the selfish element.—This topic, which has already 
been collaterally noticed, opens a very sad view of the human character. In 
all periods of mental excitement, there is a tendency to claim sympathy from 
outside. Let us take an illustration of this. A person is struck down by 
real grief. When in this state the sympathy of friends is attracted by peculiar 
demonstrations of broken-heartedness. These demonstrations are at first real, 
but in consequence of the commiseration they receive, are permitted to con- 
tinue without restraint, and then become at least partially affected. ‘The 
pleasure of receiving unwonted sympathy,’ to recur to a passage from Dr. 
Carter, already cited, ‘‘once tasted, excites a desire for it which knows no 
bounds; and when the fits have become familiar occurrences, and cease to ex- 
cite attention, their effect is heightened by the designed imitation of some 
other disease.’’ There is a strange union in such cases of the voluntary with 
the involuntary, which partly subjects craft to convulsion, and partly convul- 
sion to craft. But after a while, particularly if the petting system on the part 
of friends continues, the disease becomes chronic, and degenerates into hys- 
teria. Even then there is cunning employed in the resort to new devices by 
which fresh sympathy can be collected when the old stock is exhausted. 

So also in periods of popular excitement, either on religion or any other 
prominent topic. Let the love of attention be appealed to—let public interest 
be drawn to persons exhibiting certain symptoms—and these symptoms will 
be assumed, until at last hypochondriasis or hysteria follows. Intense self- 


(1) See an essay on this point, in 1 Am. Journ. of Insanity, 249. 
(m) Relations of Religion to what are called Diseases of the Mind. Philadelphia : 
J. W. Moore, 1850. 
247 


§ 219] RELIGIOUS INSANITY : [BOOK I. 


consciousness, the power of imitation, and the desire to excite interest, gene- 
rate this form of disease, which, in its turn, generates a refined and elegant 
_but misanthropic selfishness. 

“There is one perversion of moral feeling,” says Archdeacon Stopford, 
in a late pamphlet, ‘“ which always exists in hysteria, and more than anything 
else may make us doubt whether hysteria be chosen of God as a means of 
conversion, and that is selfishness. Now, I protest against being thought to 
imply that all persons who are hysterical are constitutionally selfish. I have 
known the contrary in several instances, and I know the effect in such cases of 
appealing to unselfish feeling ; but it will be easily understood from the fore- 
going account, that the predominance of the idea of ‘self’ as the object of 
the mind is of the very essence of the disease, and it is the necessary conse- 
quence of this, ¢f allowed to proceed, to engender selfishness; the woman who 
habitually indulges hysterical feeling, becomes the most selfish and unsympa- 
thetic being in the world, except one—the man who indulges and cherishes 
hypochondriacal feeling. 

“T must suggest caution in coming to an opposite conclusion on apparent 
evidence to the contrary in mild forms of hysteria in its incipient stages. I 
struggled long against admitting that the predominance of the idea of ‘self’ 
in hysteria always contains the germ of selfishness; but I had to admit the 
conviction, that this is true. As hysteria grows by habit or indulgence, all 
its evils become apparent; but a trained observer detects the germs in its | 
origin.” (7) . 

§ 219 (b). 0% By constitutional idiosyncrasies.—This topic has been pre- 
viously noticed. (0) 

§ 219 (c). (¢.) Fanatico-mania as a defence. 

Crimes committed under the influence of fanatical impulses, such as those 


(n) In connection with the above, it is well to call attention to the following re- 
marks of a very sagacious and experienced physician, Dr. Francis: ‘‘ In at least three 
cases out of four, I have found hysteria associated with uterine derangement, and the 
restoration of the menstrual function to its healthy state has proved the precursor of 
the removal of the hysterical annoyance.”’ Hysteria, again, may manifest itself 
chiefly by disorder of the mental faculties, and the moral feelings and emotions. 
“The mental affections,” observes Dr. Copeland, ‘connected with hysteria may be 
referred, 1st, to certain states of monomania, among which excited desire, amounting 
in some cases to nymphomania, may be enumerated; 2d, to ecstasis and mental 
excitement, in some cases of a religious nature, in others of different descriptions ; 
3d, to a state of somnambulism; 4th, to a form of delirium, generally of a lively 
character, with which various hysterical symptoms are often conjoined. “ Hysterical 
females are not merely capricious or whimsical, but they often become enthusiastic 
for a time in the pursuit of an object, or in cherishing an emotion by which they 
have been excited. In many such cases the nervous excitement and vascular tur- 
gescence of the uterine organs determine the character of the mental disorder ; 
elevating certain of the moral sentiments, or of the intellectual manifestations, 
to a state of extravagance, passing in some instances into delusion or monomania. 
Many cases of puerperal mania are merely extremes of the hysterical disorder of the 
moral and intellectual powers or states of the mind. All these more extreme forms 
of mental affection are observed only where, in connection with much local or uterine 
irritation, there is a great deficiency of nervous energy generally, and of mental power 
in particular; or where, with such deficiency, there has been much injudicious cul- 
ture, or perversion, or improper excitement of the imagination. Females sometimes 
become passionately attached to an object, and this passion may advance even to 
nymphomonia or monomania.” 

(0) Ante, §§ 1-83, 107, 211. 

248 


BOOK I. ] POLITICO-MANIA. [§$ 221 


which have been just mentioned, may be considered in the same light as crimes 
committed in a state of drunkenness. In the latter case, an individual who 
knowingly takes intoxicating liquor, cannot defend himself on the fact of guilt 
by proof of his intoxication. It is otherwise, however, when the guilty act is 
the immediate result of mania-a-potu, in which case the malady has assumed 
the shape of a substantive and permanent type, and like any other delirium, 
is to be treated as destroying responsibility.(00) In like manner, the volun- 
tary adoption of a religious belief which includes among its incidents a known 
violation of law, does not relieve the party who commits such violation of law 
under such influences, from responsibility. If, however, he sink into conse- 
quential delirium, and then commit the crime, he is irresponsible.(p) 


(9.) Politico-Mania.(q) 


§ 220. ‘‘Psychical infection,’ to use the expressive term of Ellinger, is 
peculiarly operative in political relations. Attempts at insurrections, acts of 
lawlessness against government, murderous assaults upon public officers, become 
at times epidemic. Marc illustrates this by the cases in which public conspi- 
cuous crimes have become contagious ; e.g., arson and murder. The tendency 
to seditious violence is generated by an oppressive government bearing on 
temperaments tainted with just such an infection. 

§ 221. “Certain forms of government,” says Dr. Rush, “ predispose to 
madness. ‘They are those in which the people possess a just and exquisite 
sense of liberty, and of the evils of arbitrary power against which complaints 
are stifled by a military force. The conflicting tides of the public passions, by 
their operations upon the understanding, become in these cases a cause of 
derangement. The assassination of tyrants and their instruments of oppres- 
sion is generally the effect of this disease. That madness is thus induced, I 
infer from its occurring so rarely from a political cause in the United States. 
I have known but one instance of it, and that was of a gentleman who had 
been deranged some years before, from debt contracted by extravagant living. 
In a government where all the power of a country is representative and elec- 
_tive, days of general suffrage, and free presses, served, like chimneys in a house, 
to conduct from the individual and public mind all the discontent, vexation, 
and resentment which have been generated in the passions by real or supposed 
evils, and thus to prevent the understanding being injured by them. In des- 
potic countries, where the public passions are torpid, and where life and pro- 
perty are secured only by the extinction of the domestic affections, madness is 
a rare disease. Of the truth of this remark, I have been satisfied by Mr. 
Stewart, the pedestrian traveller, who spent some time in Turkey, also by Dr. 
Scott, who accompanied Lord M’Cartney in his embassy to China, and by Mr. 
Joseph Rexas, a native of Mexico, who passed nearly forty years of his life 


(00) See ante, §§ 62-70. 

(p) See an essay on this point, 3 Am. Journ. of Insan. 166. See also for a report 
of Thom’s case, Ibid. 170. 

(q) See on this point Influence des Evénemens et des Commotion Politiques sur le 
Développement de la Folie, par le Docteur Belhomme, Paris, 1849; and a review of 
the same in Journ. Psych. Med. vol. iii. p. 31. ai 


§ 222] IDIOCY: [BOOK I. 


among the civilized but depressed natives of that country. Dr. Scott informed 
me that he heard of but a single instance of madness in China, and that was 
_in a-merchant who had suddenly lost £100,000 sterling by an unsuccessful 
speculation in gold dust.’’(r) With regard to Mexico and China, however, 
recent observations show that these remarks should be greatly qualified. 


VIII. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS AS ACCOMPANIED BY PROSTRATION. 


Ist. Idiocy.(s) 


§ 299. “Tdiocy,’”’ says Dr. Ray, “is that condition of mind in which the 
reflective, and all or a part of the affective powers, are either entirely wanting, 
or are manifested to the slightest possible extent.”(¢) The intellectual and 
moral faculties, in cases properly falling under this head, are almost null, the 
effect being in most instances congenital, and arising in all cases from want of 
development, not from perversion of the functions. And the development of 
the senses is almost equally defective.(w) The power of speech does not exist, 
or exists only so far as to enable the patient to articulate a few unintelligible 
monosyllables. This incapacity depends sometimes on the imperfect conforma- 
tion of the organs of speaking, sometimes upon those of hearing, but more 
frequently on a deficiency in or want of the powers of imitation; so that even 
when the hearing and the speech are both entirely mature, the patient remains 
unable to do more than in the one case to show his knowledge of the existence 
of sound, and in the other to give utterance to noises not above, if equal to, 
those of the brute creation. Taste and smell are equally imperfect. In many 
cases there is an inability to perceive odors, and in most nothing but the 
coarsest discrimination in the selection of articles of food. Wallowing in per- 
sonal filth, devouring even excrement with apparent avidity, indisposition to 
eat at all unless food be placed directly before the eye, drinking urine with as 
little appearance of distaste as water, are incidents one or more of which are 
to be found in almost every case of idiocy. And the same low grade of sensi- 
bility and of flexibility is found in the purely physical system. The nerves are 
almost torpid. Limbs sometimes have been amputated without apparent pain, 
and Esquirol even tells us of labor having been undergone without the patient 
being conscious of the fact or of its meaning. The arms are frequently of un- 
equal length, and misshapen; and the limbs generally are crooked and feeble. 
A careless and broken gait distinguishes them in most cases. Even the eyes 
are defectively hung, and seem incapable of poising themselves at a right level. 


(r) Rush on the Mind, pp. 66, 67. 

(s) Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, §§ 110, 
125. Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med., Berlin, 1847, § 200. 

See on this point the following works: The Principles of Medical Psychology, being 
the outlines of a course of lectures by Baron von Feuchtersleben, M. D., Vienne, 1845 ; 
translated from the German by the late H. Evans Lloyd, Esq. ; revised and edited by 


G. B. Babington, M. D., F. R.8., &c., London; printed for the Sydenham Society, 1847, 


p. 354. Morel, sur les Maladies Mentales, vol. i. p. 52, Paris, 1822. 

And see a very remarkable report by Samuel Kneeland, Jr., M. D., read before the 
Boston Soc. for Med. Improvement, Jan. 13, 1851; Am. Journ. of Med. Science, 1851; 
and a review of the same Journal of Psychological Med. vol. iv. p. 366. 

(t) ae § 51. (u) Esquirol, 466. 

250 


BOOK I.] NATURE AND CLASSIFICATION OF. [$ 225 


And in the lower class of cases there is sometimes so great a defectiveness of 
vision as to prevent the patient from perceiving the most obvious objects. 
And even when the powers of vision and of motion exist, the intellectual 
powers are sometimes so attenuated as to make attempts to reach a desired 
point entirely abortive, though there be entire muscular power for such a 
purpose. 

§ 223. While, however, the reasoning powers are almost entirely defective, 
there is sometimes a perceptible, though unequal, development of the moral 
sentiments. Self-esteem,(v) love of approbation, religious awe, sometimes 
assume a supremacy over the system, which is the more marked because it is 
checked by no countervailing qualities. Dr. Rush tells us of an idiot who 
spent his life in little acts of benevolence to others, though in the dispensation 
of them, as well as in all other points in his life, he showed no reasoning 
powers whatever. Religious veneration and awe is sometimes developed to 
an exaggerated degree, expended upon the most unnatural objects. Vanity— 
such as that which distinguishes some branches of the brute creation—finds 
with them a pregnant place. And Esquirol gives us numerous instances in 
which the talent for thieving, and that to a very remarkable extent, was found 
associated with entire vacuity of mind in all other relations. The same 
observation applies, though in a much less marked extent, to the sexual pro- 
pensities. 

§ 224. The following useful classification of these beings is made by Mr. S. 
G. Howe :— 

“Iptors of the lowest class are mere organisms, masses of flesh and bone 
in human shape, in which the brain and nervous system have no command over 
the system of voluntary muscles; and which, consequently, are without power 
of locomotion, without speech, without any manifestation of intellectual or 
affective faculties. 

“Foous are a higher class of idiots, in whom the brain and nervous system 
are so far developed as to give partial command of the voluntary muscles; 
who have, consequently, considerable power of locomotion and animal action, 
partial development of the intellectual and affective faculties, but only the 
faintest glimmer of reason, and very imperfect speech. 

‘‘SIMPLETONS are the highest class of idiots, in whom the harmony between 
the nervous and muscular systems is nearly perfect; who, consequently, have 
normal powers of locomotion and animal action, considerable activity of the 
perceptive and affective faculties, and reason enough for their simple individual 
guidance, but not enough for their social relations.’’(w) 

§ 225. It does not take the case out of the definition of idiocy that some 
particular faculty has been saved from the general wreck. This is often the 
case, particularly with music. Thus there is at present in the Salpétriére a 
girl idiotic to an extreme degree, who does not speak, and cannot even dress 
herself. However, her keeper has recently discovered in her a decided taste 


(v) Ray, § 53. 

(w) Second Report of the Legislature of Massachusetts, by the Commissioners ap- 
pointed to inquire into the condition of Idiots within the Commonwealth, by 8. G 
Howe, pp. 147. Boston, 1848. Senate Doe. aah 

2 


§ 226] IDIOCY : [BOOK I. 


for music. She often can repeat faithfully a whole passage of music played 
or sung to her only once; even if the passage is left incomplete, in repeating 
it she will terminate it in the right key and tone. A first-rate performer on 
the piano was brought to play to her, and her transports amounted almost to 
frenzy. At certain passages of rapid transitions from flats to sharps, she 
uttered cries of transport, and commenced biting her fingers to calm her emo- 
tions. She is an immense eater, and greedily snatches at fruit; but the moment 
she hears the instrument she stops until the music has ceased. 

Mr. Howe mentions an idiot who had an astonishing power of reckoning. 
“Tell him your age, and he will in a very short time give you the number of 
minutes.” 

§ 226. The following statement by Esquirol will throw much light on this 
phase of mental unsoundness: “ With each case of idiocy which I have pub- 
- lished in this chapter I have also given the admeasurements of the head taken 
during life. By bringing them together, we may compare the means with the 
results obtained by my young confréres; time will not permit me to do it. 
For those who are fond of this kind of investigation, I subjoin a table of 
the mean results of admeasurement of the head taken from a woman in the 
enjoyment of good health, and from plaster casts, taken after their death, in 
the case of thirty-six insane women, seventeen imbeciles, and seventeen idiots. 
In the case of three idiots, whose heads were very small, the admeasurements 
were taken from the crania. 


TABLE OF CRANIAL ADMEASUREMENTS. 


Circumfer- | Antero-pos- | Antero-pos-| Transverse 
ence. terior terior diameter. 
curvature. | diameter. 


Totals. 


Women in a state of health | 21.87 in.| 13.30 in.| 6.98 in.| 5.29 in. | 47.44 in. 
Insane : : : 20.82 11.50 - 6.96 5.67 44.95 
Imbeciles . i 4 20.19 11.49 6.69 5.63 44. 
Idiots 3 - A 19.92 11.26 6.85 5.39 43.42 

Idiots—Microcephalous . | 15.07 7.51 4.88 4.17 31.63 


“From this table we learn: Ist. That the circumference of the head, accord- 
ing to admeasurements taken among women enjoying the use of their reason, 
from insane women, imbeciles, and idiots, diminishes in an almost equal pro- 
portion from the women in the enjoyment of usual health to the idiot, deprived 
even of instinct. 2d. That the fronto-occipital curvature diminishes in a re- 
markable degree from the women in sound mind to the insane female, whilst 
no variation is noticed in the insane person to the imbecile, and a difference of 
but six millimetres between the latter and idiocy. 3d. That the fronto-occi- 
pital diameter is the same in the case of the women enjoying the use of their 
reason and the insane women, and that there is a diminution of but six milli- 
metres between the insane person and the idiot; while the difference is enor- 
mous on passing to the lowest degree of idiocy. 4th. That the bi-temporal 
diameter is more considerable in the case of the insane women, and even the 
imbecile and idiot, than in that of a woman possessing the ordinary degree of 
intelligence. 5th. That if we suppose that the sum of those four admeasure- 

252 


BOOK I.] NATURE AND CLASSIFICATION OF, [$ 227 


ments express the volume of the brain, it follows that the volume of this organ 
diminishing in the same proportion with the intellectual capacity, that of the 
cranium would be the expression of this capacity.’’(x) 

§ 227. “In that remarkable obliteration of the mental faculties,” says 
Abercrombie, “which we call idiocy, fatuity, or dementia, there is none of the 
distortion of insanity. It is a simple torpor of the faculties in the higher 
degrees, amounting to total insensibility to every impression; and some re- 
markable facts are connected with the manner in which it arises without bodily 
disease. A man mentioned by Dr. Rush was so violently affected by some 
losses in trade, that he was deprived almost instantly of all his mental facul- 
ties. He did not take notice of anything, not even expressing a desire for 
food, but merely taking it when it was put into his mouth. A servant dressed 
him in the morning, and conducted him to a seat in the parlor, where he 
remained the whole day, with his body bent forward and his eyes fixed on the 
floor. In this state he continued nearly five years, and then recovered com- 
pletely and rather suddenly. The account which he afterwards gave of his 
condition during that period was, that his mind was entirely lost, and that it 
was only about two months before his final recovery that he began to have 
sensations and thoughts of any kind. These at first served only to convey 
fears and apprehensions, especially in the night-time. Of perfect idiocy pro- 
duced in the same manner by a moral cause, an affecting example is given by 
Pinel. Two young men, brothers, were carried off by the conscription, and in 
the first action in which they were engaged one of them was shot dead by the 
side of the other. The survivor was instantly struck with perfect idiocy. He 
was taken home, where another brother was so affected by the sight of him, 
that he was seized in the same manner; and in this state of perfect idiocy 
they were both received into the Bicétre. I have formerly referred to various 
examples of this condition supervening on bodily disease. In some of them 
the affection was permanent, in others it was entirely recovered from.” (x) 


(x) Esquirol on Insanity, Lea & Blanchard, Philadelphia, 1845, p. 473. 

(xx) Abercrombie on the Intellectual Powers, pp. 273, 274. As the different races 
of men, says M. Renaudin, have a characteristic physiognomy, and as individuals reflect 
in their features the most salient points of their moral idiosyncrasy, so the idiot in this 
respect presents a peculiar stamp, which the least discerning can recognize. Itisa 
type which can be distinguished in all its varieties, even when the external conforma- 
tion of the head does not differ much from the normal proportions. But that which 
strikes us most in this class is the want of symmetry, not only in the encephalic organ, 
but also in the other parts of the body; and if sometimes the physiognomy is deceitful 
in this respect, the other parts of the organism soon reveal to us the want of co-opera- 
tion indispensable to the complete development of man. It is rather by an observation 
of the whole constitution, than of its separate parts, that the essential characters of 
this infirmity are to be detected. Idiots generally deceive in their age, which always 
offers at the different periods of their existence a ridiculous admixture of decrepitude 
and puerility. The hypertrophy of certain glands, the flaccidity of the tissues, mal- 
formation of external essential organs, absence of all proportion in the length of their 
limbs, difficulty and uncertainty in their movements, which are almost convulsive, the 
retraction of certain tendons, an arrest of development in the figure and in muscular 
contractility—such are the general appearances that characterize the idiot in his ex- 
ternal conformation. His mode of living is in keeping with this degradation of form, 
and furnishes us with the means of perceiving some of the relations existing between 
the physical and the moral. His language is scarcely rudimentary. He does not 
think, has nothing to say, and nothing in him calls for the vocal motion. When, how- 
ever, this mutism is not idiopathic, he can be made to articulate certain words, and his 


253 


§ 229] IMBECILITY. [BOOK I. 


§ 228. Cretinism finds no place in the United States, and cannot, therefore, 
claim here extended consideration. (y) 


2d. Imbecility.(z) 
§ 229. Imbecility has perhaps as many degrees as it has victims, and yet it 


movements can be placed under some moral control; but in undergoing this external 
influence he still rests faithful to that automatism which is his principal characteristic. 
It is always a material and instinctive impulse that controls. The idiot shows, in the 
satisfying of his wants, a brutality in close connection with the irregularity of all his 
actions, and the want of balance of his functions, which all coincide with personal 
instinct. He yields himself to onanism with a revolting cynicism; he eats with a vo- 
racity that defies everything, and which proves how obtuse his sensibility is, although 
he in fact suffers more than any other the unhappy effects of climacteric changes. 
Finally, in spite of the violence of certain appetites, the functions are so incompletely 
performed, that we must not be surprised to see these unfortunates very short-lived. 
If, on the one hand, nothing has wasted life, nothing, on the other hand, has vivified 
it, and one can easily conceive that it is extinguished, since it is without essential 
nourishment and without object. 

The psychical element plays no part in such an organization. External influence is 
unable to develop it, since the somatic element is not in a condition to receive it; and 
as to spontaneousness, one can but with difficulty perceive the germ. So, when these 
degraded beings, impelled by a brutal instinct, or obeying another’s will whose instru- 
ment they are, commit a culpable act, all the world agree in not imputing to them any 
moral responsibility. (See Etudes Psychologiques sur l’Alienation Mentale, par L. F. 
E. Renaudin, p. 170, Paris, 1854.) 

Idiocy, says M. Falret, cannot, strictly speaking, figure amongst the forms of insanity. 
In this degraded state man is fallen below the brute; he does not even possess the 
instinct of self-preservation. It is necessary for charity not only to bring him the food . 
required for his nourishment, but to place it in his mouth, and to protect him against 
the mischievous influences which surround him, and against all destructive causes. 
Instead of language, the exclusive appendage of man, since it is the expression of 
thought in all its development, the complete idiot only utters certain harsh, savage 
inarticulate sounds. Instead of that firm, assured step which executes the exact com- 
mand of the will, the rough, disorderly movements of idiots seem only phenomena of 
irritability. Besides, they are often immovable, bent down towards the ground, and 
only execute a kind of rocking movement, balancing forward and backward, to the 
right and to the left. Without doubt this is the extreme degree of idiocy, for there 
are idiots less degraded in their organization, and consequently in their manifestations ; 
but, unfortunately, to this feeble development of the intelligence is too often joined 
either an absolute want of character, or low tastes, incitations to a brutal lascivious- 
ness, to robbery, pyromania, and ferocity, which they turn against themselves and 
against inanimate objects. (See Lecons Cliniques, de M. Falret, p. 243, Paris, 1854.) 

(y) The student, however, who seeks for particular information as to its character, 
is referred to the following treatises: Etudes des Maladies Mentales, de M. Morel, 
tome i. p. 64, Paris, 1854. Gedanken tiber Kropf und Cretinismus als Beitrag zur 
Homatologie und Homonymie. Von Joh. Mich. Huber, Geritchswundarzt zu Ried in 
Tyrol. Mit einer Abbildung. (Medicin. Jahr. des k. k. Osterr. Staats, Mai.) Ueber 
den Cretinismus in Canton Waadt in der Schweiz. von Dr. H. Lebert, prakt. Arzt zu 
Paris. (Archiv fiir physiologische Heilkunde VII. B. 6 Heft.) Notice of a very re- 
markable disease analogous to Cretinism. By Hugh Norris; Med. Times, Jan. 1848. 
Les goiteux et les cretins de la Savoie ; Annales de Thérapeutique, 1848. Mais, Ueber 
den Cretinismus in grossen Stiidten und dessen Aenlichkeit mit dem in den Alpen. 
Von Dr. Behrend. (Gaz. des Hépitaux, 1848. Nos. 6 and 7.) Cretinismus als gene- 
tisch—contagiése Endemie in Neudenau, &. Bad. Annalen d. Staats-Arzneikunde, 
1846. Esquirol, Mental Maladies, &c., 481-2. Sonsburg, ueber den Cretinismus. 
Wurzb., 1825. MHaiiflser, ueber die Beziehung des Sexualsystems zur Psyche ueber- 
haupt und zum Cretinismus ins besondere. Wiirzb., 1826. See also a very valuable 
report on this point, by Samuel Kneeland, jun., M. D., read before the Boston Soc. for 
Med. Improvement. Jan. 13,1851. Am. Journ. of Science, 1851; and a review of 
the same in Journal of Psychological Med., vol. iv. p. 366. See also ‘ A Physician’s 
Holiday, or a Month in Switzerland in the Summer of 1848. By John Forbes, M. D., 
F. R. 5,” London, 1848, in which the management of the Cretins is fully described. 

(z) Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med. Berlin, 1847. § 200. L. Krahmer, Hand- 
buch der Gericht. Med. Halle; C. A. Schwetschke, 1851. § 125. Etudes Cliniques 
des Maladies Mentales, par M. Morel, tome i. p. 39, Paris, 1854. 


254 


BOOK I.] IMBECILITY WITH CONCOMITANT INSANITY. [$ 230 


becomes the task of psycho-forensic medicine to assign a line of demarcation 
within which the judge is to declare the responsibility of the agent to cease 
to exist. But this problem is only so far capable of solution as we are enabled 
to detect and recognize the existence of imbecility in general, and to estimate 
its relation to a given action; the personal discretion of the tribunal must 
always have considerable scope in all cases near the boundary line. In order 
to obtain as firm a common ground as possible, it becomes advisable to subdi- 
vide and classify imbecility, particularly where it depends upon particular dis- 
eased conditions capable of ascertainment and distinction. In this respect we 
distinguish, in the first place, embecility with, and tmbecility without concomr- 
tant insanity. 

§ 230. Imbecility with concomitant insanity presents the following subdi- 
visions :— 

1. The original imbecility which has lapsed into unsoundness of mind. 
The nature of the latter will determine in the first instance, in how far the 
patient is amenable to the penal laws in a given case; but the fact of imbe- 
cility will always favor the psychological arguments in favor of irresponsibility. 

2. Imbecility supervenes upon the course of a mental disorder, and mani- 
fests itself particularly in the form of a failure of memory. The question of 
responsibility will depend, in this case, upon the same principles as stated in 
the last preceding head. 

3. Spectous tmbecility, as in the case of melancholia attonita, and as such 
will receive but little attention at the hands of the forensic physician. 

4, Imbecility with confusion of mind. This is found side by side with a 
failure of memory, and a more or less conspicuous incoherence and inconsist- 
ency of the perceptions, and a certain agility and activity of the super-physi- 
cal life. It is either a primary or secondary form, and in the former case it 
may be consequent upon severe diseases of the brain, epilepsy, intemperance, 
sexual excesses, and senility ;(zz) in the latter case it may arise from the 
various forms of mental unsoundness, and may be considered as always ex- 
cluding the idea of moral responsibility. 

5. Imbecility remaining after the patient has recovered from an attack of 
insanity. It will never contain a sufficient reason for suspending the responsi- 


(zz) In senility its effects are touchingly illustrated in the following passage, from 
the life of the late Wm. Jay :— 


At length, however, this prop fails him. After thirty years of uninterrupted do- 
mestic happiness, this excellent and amiable woman was stricken with an extraordi- 
nary malady, resulting in such a prostration of mental and physical powers, as 
rendered her, from that time forward, no. longer the support of her husband in his 
trials, but the object of his deep solicitude and tender care. It had become her almost 
invariable habit to call things by names the reverse of what was right, and of what 
she herself intended :— 

“She spoke of a drop of bread, and a thin bit of water; she called the black white, 
and the white black; the cold heat, and the heat cold; preaching was hearing, and 
hearing was preaching ; in the morning she wished you good evening, and in the eve- 
ning good morning.” 

It appears that she herself was conscious of her mistakes, but without the power to 
correct them. We have known of similar cases, but the solution of them is beyond 
our reach.. They would form a physiological problem which might have exercised 
the ingenuity of Lord Brougham, Abercrombie, or Brodie. 


259 


§ 232] IMBECILITY WITHOUT INSANITY. [BOOK I. 


bility of the agent, but may often deserve the attentive consideration of the 
judge in the moulding of the sentence. (a) 

§ 231. Imbecility without insanity has several gradations, all being sepa- 
rate denominations; the highest degree is called zdiocy. Next to this is 
imbecility proper; dulness, feebleness, stupidity, are inferior grades of a 
stunted growth of mind. The reasons which, in the higher stages, exclude 
understanding and self-control are the more potent, as no education has been 
imparted here, or, if imparted, has produced no effect. The lower stages do 
not justify the physician in casting a doubt upon the existence of legal respon- 
sibility. They are for the consideration of the judge alone, and are interest- 
ing in this point of view, because simpletons and fools often have a touch of 
malice, brutality, ill-will, and mischief in their dispositions, and may be led, 
by teasing and ill-treatment, to vindictive hatred, revenge, and violent out- 
bursts of anger. 

§ 232. The Emperor Napoleon hits upon a very happy illustration of the 
distinction between two of the above mentioned phases. In one of his con- 
versations with Las Casas, he said that there was such a thing as “folie inno- 
cente,’’ and “ folie terrible’’—a fatuous state which is safe, and one which is 
dangerous. A fatuous person, ‘un fow’” of the first kind, the Emperor 
describes as reasoning with the proprietor of a vineyard in which he was 
trespassing, thus: ‘‘ Why, here are we two: the sun sees us both; therefore, 
I have a right to eat grapes.” The “ fou terrible,’ he proceeds, ‘‘is he who 


(a) In some circumstances, says M. Renaudin, the idiotic germ is less prominent, 
nothing tends to reveal it in infancy, and the early years lead us to expect a normal 
ulterior development. But it may happen that a severe disease, deeply affecting the 
organism, supervenes, or the subject may have been submitted to an intellectual labor 
above his powers, and at a given moment an arrest of development, as much in the 
physical as in the moral system, shows itself. This condition sometimes supervenes 
even without the action of any apparent cause and then we can only attribute it to 
the influence of this idiotic principle. Instead of pursuing the course marked out by 
the laws of nature, it is arrested at a point of development, rarely transitory but most 
generally permanent, which is known everywhere under the name of imbecility. The 
physical organization in imbeciles offers less abnormities than that of idiots ; the body 
is straighter, and if the physiognomy is less repulsive and shows a little more regu- 
larity in its features, it exhibits but little animation. The feelings are seen in their 
rudimentary state in this class of beings; they are susceptible of a more advanced 
education, and when they belong to a family of easy circumstances, they can be made 
to submit themselves to the habits of a regular life. The impressions they receive 
are sufficiently durable, providing they do not overstep a sufficiently restricted limit. 
They are susceptible of a certain amount of memory, which in some cases reaches a 
very remarkable height. Sometimes the ideas they acquire are very limited and their 
intellectual spontaneousness is on a footing with the small development of their phy- 
sical spontaneousness. Although less stupid than the idiot, automatism is the cha- 
racteristic trait of the imbecile. He never gives the impulse, he receives it; and it 
is amongst the imbeciles that an asylum especially finds valuable aids in its internal 
service. If the effective sentiments are but feeble, the instinct of the feeling of per- . 
sonality shows itself perhaps in an absurd vanity, or in a savage egotism in the sat- 
isfaction of wants whose stimulus is ordinarily very energetic. Hence an excessive 
irritability that readily degenerates into mania, or a malicious cunning, in order to 
obtain the thing coveted. The imbecile has but few ideas ; and as he knows but little 
abandons himself to his impulses when fear does not control him. But little capable 
of distinguishing between good and evil, he may be a dangerous instrument in crimi- 
nal hands. The imbecile commits a murder with coolness, shows often a great de- 
pravity of tastes, and itis only an exception, if you can perceive in him any rudi- 
mentary traces of the moral sense. It is at this point that his intellectual aptitude 
ceases, and we can easily understand how a like condition necessarily excludes all 
responsibility. —Renaudin sur l’ Alienation Mentale, p. 173, Paris, 1854. 

256 


BOOK I.] GENERAL IMBECILITY. [§ 238 


cuts off the head of a man whom he found sleeping under a hedge; then hid 
himself behind it, in order to witness the surprise—embarras—of the body 
when waking.” 

“Of these half-witted persons,’’ remarks Dr. Mayo, ‘‘the former indulges 
a love of grapes, the latter a love of bloodshed: the process of thought in 
each case is that of a deficient understanding, which could neither prevent 
the one from stealing grapes, nor the other from committing violence under 
the influence of opportunity, but rather forwarded the crime by suggesting 
excuses.”? ‘An idiot,’’ says Dr. Hainsdroff, “in the Hospital of Salzburg, 
appearing to be singularly insusceptible of fear, an experiment of an appalling 
character, and of appalling consequences, was made upon him, as a means of 
putting his susceptibility to the test. It was proposed to make the impression 
upon him that he saw a dead man come to life. A person accordingly laid 
himself out as a corpse, enveloped in a shroud; and the idiot was ordered to 
watch over the dead body. The idiot perceiving some motion in the corpse, 
desired it to lie still; but the pretended corpse raising itself, in spite of this 
admonition, the idiot seized a hatchet, which unluckily was within his reach, 
and cut off first one of the feet of the unfortunate counterfeit, and then, un- 
moved by his cries, cut off his head. He then calmly resumed his station by 
the real corpse :—a strong illustration of the dangerous hypothesis of harm- 
lessness, as connected with this state of mind.’’(d) 

§ 233. “Dr. Rush says,” we quote from Dr. Ray, “that in the course of 
his life he has been consulted in three cases of moral imbecility; and nothing 
can better express the true character of their physiology, than his remark 
respecting them. ‘In all these cases,’ he observes, ‘there is probably an ori- 
ginal defective organization in those parts of the body which are occupied by 
the moral faculties of the mind’—an explanation which will receive but little 
countenance in any age that derives its ideas of the mental phenomena from 
the exclusive observation of mind in a state of acknowledged health and vigor. 
To understand these cases properly, requires a knowledge of our moral and 
intellectual constitution, to be obtained only by a practical acquaintance with 
the innumerable phases of the mind, as presented in its various degrees of 
strength and weakness, of health and disease, amid all its transitions from 
brutish idiocy to the most commanding intellect.’ ”’(c) 


(b) Mayo on Medical Testimony in Lunacy, pp. 93, 94. 

(c) Ray on Insanity, p. 90. 

In the course of clinical lessons delivered at Bicétre, M. Ferrus gives an account of 
the different intellectual debilities in a way that throws a strong light upon these 
difficult questions :— ; 

Between idiocy and dementia, he says, there is a most striking analogy. In both 
cases, human intelligence is abolished ; it no longer possesses the means of perfecti- 
bility. But the analogy ceases in examining the producing causes. With the idiot, 
deprivation of reason is congenital; the demented, on the contrary, arrives progres- 
sively at the total loss of his faculties. Dementia is the abolition of the intellectual 
faculties, both moral and instinctive, supervening after the period of puberty: it is a 
kind of debility which appears either in an insensible manner or with the rapidity of 
lightning—breaking, more or less, all the connections which unite the man with the 
rest of the world. 

The characters of dementia are sufficiently decided, so as not to be confounded with 
those of other mental affections. In idiocy, the faculties of the mind have never existed, 
or have been destroyed before their complete development. In dementia, you may 


17 257 


§ 234] DEMENTIA. [BOOK I. 


3d. Dementia.(d) 


§ 234. “This form of Insanity,” says Dr. Ray, “‘is attended by a general 
enfeeblement of the moral and intellectual faculties, which were originally sound 


(d) L. Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, 
§ 125; Siebold, Lehrbuch der Gericht. Med., Berlin, 1847, § 200; and also see post, 
§ 233, n (c.) 


still possibly see some traces of an intelligent past; but it betrays in vain its past 
perfection: it is stamped forever with the seal of feebleness and nullity, and destined 
to be extinguished by a kind of exhaustion of nervous influence. 

Stupidity consists in an accidental, sudden, complete abolition of the intellectual, 
moral, and instinctive faculties, as well as of the movements. It has for its cause a 
sudden and violent physical or moral shock: it is distinguished from dementia by the 
rapidity of its appearance, the intensity of its symptoms, their frequent remission and 
exacerbation, and especially by the possibility of a complete cure.—Ferrus, lecons 
cliniques faites a Bicétre. 

Dementia, says Esquirol, is characterized by the enfeeblement of the sensibility, 
intelligence, and will. Incoherence of ideas; want of intellectual and moral sponta- 
neousness are the signs of this affection. The man suffering from dementia has not 
the faculty of properly receiving objects, of noticing their relations and comparing 
them, of preserving a complete remembrance of them ; whence results an impossibility 
of reasoning correctly. In dementia, he adds, the impressions are too feeble; it may 
be because the sensibility of the organs, or of the sensations, is weakened ; or it may 
be because the brain itself has not sufficient power to perceive and retain the impres- 
sion that is transmitted to it. From this it necessarily results that the sensations are 
languid, obscure, and incomplete. Individuals in dementia are not susceptible of a 
sufficiently strong attention—objects only strike them in an obscure and false manner : 
they can neither compare nor associate ideas, nor abstract them; the organ of thought 
has not sufficient energy—it is deprived of the tonic force necessary to the integrity 
of its functions. Then the most incongruous ideas succeed each other, following each 
other without connection and without motive: the matter is incoherent; the patient 
repeats words and entire phrases without attaching to them distinct sense ; he speaks, 
as he reasons, without any consciousness of what he is saying.—Hsquirol de la 
demence, p. 221. The demented, in spite of the general decrepitude of his organic 
functions, is not freed from the laws of action and reaction. There are periods in his 
existence when the old phenomena of possession appear to be renewed. When he is 
agitated, he cries and tears his clothes, and may, perhaps, perform some dangerous 
actions. The hallucinations are often sufficiently intense to provoke veritable attacks 
of fury ; but this rage lasts but a little while; it is appeased like the anger of a child. 

The demented from this excited state falls back into his ordinary automatonism. 
He has no more any wishes, hate, or tenderness ; he holds the objects formerly so dear 
to him in the greatest indifference ; he sees his relations and friends without pleasure, 
and leaves them without regret. He is not disquieted by any privations imposed on 
him ; and pleasures obtained for him gratify him but little. What goes on around 
him does not affect him. The events of life are as nothing to him, since he is unable 
to attach any remembrance, any hope to them: indifferent to everything, nothing 
gratifies him. He laughs and plays whilst other men are afflicted, and weeps when all 
the world is satisfied. If his position discontents him, he does nothing to change it. 
His determinations are vague and uncertain: he is a perfect automaton, that has not 
sufficient energy to be ungovernable: his isolation is the more necessary, as he yields 
himself to acts which are the result of the abolition of conscience, and as he becomes 
but too often the sport and the victim of those who wish to take advantage of his con- 
dition.—See Morel sur les Maladies Mentale, tome i. p. 402. Paris, 1852. 

Dementia, according to Falret, is a period, and not a true form of mental unsound- 
ness. Amongst the demented, who are only the chronic insane arrived at an advanced 
stage of the disease, there are some who are agitated like maniacs, and some who 
remain motionless, like hypomaniacs. There are others in whom are seen some pre- 
dominant ideas—resembling, in this respect, monomaniacs ; but it is difficult to classify 
them. If they speak, their unconnected words have no relation, and convey no sense ; 
often even this is not due to incoherence alone, but to the absence of ideas: it is a 
flow of words without thoughts. 

If they remain quiet and silent, their countenances express neither concentration 
‘ or passion, but dulness and stupidity; they seem, at least in extreme cases, to be 


258 


BOOK I.] DEMENTIA. [$ 284 


and well developed, in consequence of age or disease, and is characterized by 
forgetfulness of the past, indifference to the present or future, and a certain 
childishness of disposition. The apparent similarity of this state to that of 
imbecility or idiocy, renders it necessary that they should be accurately distin- 
guished; for nothing could be more improper or unjust than to view them 
merely as different shades of the same mental condition. Idiocy and the 
higher degrees of imbecility are congenital, or nearly so, and consist in a 
destitution of powers that were never possessed.”’(e) 

“Dementia,” continues the same high authority, ‘is distinguished from 
general mania, the only other affection with which it is liable to be confounded, 
by characters that cannot mislead the least practised observer. The latter 
arises from an exaltation of vital power, from a morbid excess of activity, by 
which the cerebral functions are not only changed from their healthy condition, 
but are performed with unusual force and rapidity. The maniac is irrational 
from an inability to discern the ordinary characters and relations of things, 
amid the mass of ideas that crowd upon his mind in mingled confusion ; while 
in dementia the reasoning faculty is impaired by a loss of its ordinary strength, 
whereby it not only mistakes the nature of things, but is unable, from want of 
power, to rise to the contemplation of general truths. The reasoning of the 
maniac does not so much fail in the force and logic of its arguments, as in the 
incorrectness of its assumptions; but in dementia the attempt to reason is 
prevented by the paucity of ideas, and that feebleness of the perceptive powers, 
in consequence of which they do not faithfally represent the impressions 
received from without. 

“Yn mania, when the memory fails, it is because new ideas have crowded 
into the mind, and are mingled up and confounded with the past; in dementia 
the same effect is produced by an obliteration of past impressions as soon as 
they are made, from a want of sufficient power to retain them. In the former 
the mental operations are characterized by hurry and confusion ; in the latter 
by extreme slowness and frequent apparent suspension of the thinking pro- 
cess. In the former, the habits and affections undergo a great change, becom- 
ing strange and inconsistent from the beginning, and the persons and things 
that once pleased and interested, viewed with indifference or aversion. In the 
latter, the moral habits and natural feelings, so far as they are manifested at 
all, lose none of their ordinary character. The temper may be more irritable, 
but the moral disposition evinces none of that perversity which characterizes 
mania. 


ciphers both in understanding and character. The observer, in fact, sees in them only 
ruins: he sees before him all the moral and intellectual elements in an almost com- 
plete state of isolation from one another. This separation is a kind of dissolution 
which betrays the radical blow that has been inflicted upon the psychical forces, and 
destroys all hope of ever seeing these elements united and co-ordinate. If sometimes 
a gleam of intelligence sparkles in this chaos, and in the midst of these ruins—far 
from consoling, it adds to the gloom, so manifest is it that the patient himself is neither 
its author nor its witness. Everything, in fact, in dementia, betrays an inability to 
form ideas, to experience sentiments, to possess a will. It is the tomb of reason, with 
the exception of some flashes that mark it, and which are, as it were, the reflections 
of the ancient brilliancy of the mind.—See tudes cliniques sur l’ Alienation Mentale, 
par M. Falret, p. 242. Paris, 1854. 
(e) Ray on Insanity, p. 291. . 


259 


§ 287] DELIRIUM: [BOOK I. 


‘In dementia, the mind is susceptible of only feeble and transitory impres- 
sions, and manifests little reflection even upon these. They come and go 
without leaving any trace of their presence behind them. The intention is 
incapable of more than a momentary effort, one idea succeeding another with 
but little connection or coherence.’ (/) 


IX. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS ACCOMPANIED BY DELIRIUM. 


Ist. General Delirium. 


§ 235. What distinguishes delirium from the delusions of the senses, is that 
in the latter the sensational faculties are really acted upon, subjectively, though 
in an eccentric manner, while in the former the interior reproductive activity 
of the brain predominates in the generation of phantoms.(g) Consciousness 
is disturbed at the same time, and there is incoherent speaking and action, as 
if it were a waking dream. External objects are perceived indistinctly, or 
not at all, and on the whole there is the less delirium, the more activity there 
is in the peripheric nerves, for which reason hydrocephalic children generally 
relapse into delirium when they cease vomiting. The external senses may, 
however, be at the same time open to perceptions, and may convey them; but 
the patient is so controlled by his internal dreams as to act as if they did not 
exist. Here there is, accordingly, a predominance of dreams, which deprives 
the individual of the possibility of the power of maintaining a corresponding 
relation with the external world. Delirium may, therefore, be defined as a 
state of dreams brought. on, not by sleep, but by disease. Like a dream, a 
delirium may become active, the beginning of which is the speaking delirium. 
Where a crime or misdemeanor proceeds from a delirium, there is no freedom 
of agency, z. é., the action is to be regarded as the product of a morbid state 
of mind. 

It is judicious for forensico-medical purposes, to distinguish particularly the 
following forms of delirium :— 

§ 236. (a.) Depressed delirium, which is both passive and active. 

§ 237. (b.) Maniacal delirium, which comprises several varieties, depend- 
ing upon the frame of mind by which it is accompanied. (/) 


(f) Ray on Insanity, pp. 292, 293. 

(g) Haygen, vol. ii. p. 707; Schiirmayer, &c., § 555. 

(h) The most remarkable phenomenon of mental unsoundness (we translate from 
Morel) is unquestionably delirium, whether it shows itself in words or deeds. Deli- 
rium, considered as an essential symptom of insanity, should possess a type of con- 
tinuity, should connect itself with lesions of a special nature, and should present 
altogether the elements of a certain systemization of the frenzied conceptions. This 
systemization alone gives to the delirium which produced it, a particular stamp. It 
shows off what has been called the fixing of ideas, and that logic peculiar to the insane 
that leads them to the justification of the falsest conceptions, and the most deplorable 
acts. If it was otherwise, who could have flattered himself that he had escaped in- 
sanity ; for we have all suffered in a more or less degree the phenomena of delirium. 
Weare delirious during fever, under the influence of spirituous liquors, as also of some 
narcotics. Febrile delirium is a generic term comprising the universality of abnormal 
phenomena that can in a more or less permanent manner, in a given disease, hinder 
the association of our ideas, or that directs the association in the way of producing illu- 
sions and hallucinations of all kinds. 

The word insanity is likewise a generic expression for pointing out the universality 


260 


BOOK I.] GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF. [§ 239 


§ 238. (c.) Delirium tremens.(t) 
§ 239. (d.) Mania puerpera, which attacks women in childbed, and is 


of the abnormal phenomena which, under the united influence of physical and psychi- 
cal causes, can, in a more or less permanent manner, pervert our manner of feeling and 
seeing, or in other words, bewilder our understanding. 

In this point of view, febrile delirium and the delirium of madness are the same, 
inasmuch as deliriums are identical; but it is excessively important not to confound 
the symptoms with the diseases that produced them. 

An individual suffering from an acute disease approaches the period of convales- 
cence. At the approach of night, or whenever he shuts his eyes, fantastical apparitions 
besiege him. He himself recognizes that these painful impressions are the results of 
his fever; or if he does not recognize it at the first glance, he receives the explana- 
tions of those surrounding him. He raves before sleeping, and it is not strange if he 
still raved under the influence of the depression as well as of exaltations of the organs 
of the senses. Upon awaking, he makes known to his relations and friends the fatiguing 
sensations that his dreams have produced, and seems to search with eagerness for ex- 
planations to reassure him. As he returns to consciousness, the motives of his judg- 
ment become more certain, the tumult of his bewildered senses is appeased, the nights 
are quieter, and when convalescence follows an ascending course, there only remains 
a vague and confused remembrance of the stormy scene through which he has passed. 

Things, unfortunately, do not pass so when the delirium has a tendency to the per- 
manent or chronic form; and it is this which makes the essential difference between 
properly called febrile delirium, and maniacal delirium. There may be aperiod when 
these two deliriums possess the same external characteristics on account of the simili- 
tude of the perverted sensorial phenomena; but when the phenomenon of deliriuin 
is produced by a maniacal state, it is then a situation which often passes unnoticed 
in the beginning, but which, as a diagnostic element, it is of the highest importance 
to describe. 

This situation, so painful for the friends, first betrays itself in a perversion.of the 
feelings, and in a complete change in the character and habits of the patient. He 
becomes impatient and fretful; speaks passionately, and in an unaccustomed tone. 
He often loses the feeling of modesty, whatever may be his.age or education. His 
friends and relations attribute these disgusting phenomena to the effect of the primi- 
tive disease which shows itself with all the characteristics of an ordinary febrile deli- 
rium. But soon another more disgusting phenomenon shows itself, and often without 
enlightening them. The care bestowed upon the sick person, the marks of the live- 
liest affection which are shown to him are repulsed, sometimes with irony and disdain, 
and sometimes with passion and fury. In ordinary diseases the sick person attaches 
himself with happiness to everything that tends to recall him to existence. He hears 
with emotion of the different stages of his disease, and of the delirium which was its 
consequence; he speaks often of its causes, deplores its effects, and makes innumera- 
ble excuses for any malignant or obscene words which may have escaped him during 
the delirium. The patient, on the contrary, in whom the insanity is confirmed, will 
not admit that he was delirious. He sustains the errors of his imagination, and takes 
them for realities. The hallucinations and delusions of all sorts which he has felt, 
and which still beset him, fortify him in his madness. Still more, in this he systema- 
tizes his delirium, and whatever intellectual energy is left, is employed by him in 
establishing upon the basis of a desperate logic, motives for the new existence which 
he is just commencing. Several authors, basing themselves on the fact that the de- 
lirium of insanity is often found unaccompanied by fever (delirium sine febre), have 
thought that the train of physiological phenomena that accompanies the delirium of 
acute diseases, is sufficient to mark out the difference between these primitive condi- 
tions. This appreciation, though very true on one side, may nevertheless lead us into 
error. We willingly admit that the delirium of acute diseases is accompanied with 
redness of the cheeks and turgidity of the face. The expression is troubled, and there 
are marked changes in the circulation. The eyes are brilliant, respiration often pain- 
ful, and the excretions involuntary ; the language takes an unaccustomed accentua- 
tion. The sick person expresses himself sometimes with vivacity ; sometimes with 
great slowness; his sentences and his words are badly articulated ; he speaks some- 
times to himself, and at other times deep drawn sighs are the only manifestations of 
his soul. But these phenomena are also to be met with in the delirium of insanity, 
and especially in the first stages of this disease.—See Ktudes Cliniques des Maladies 
Mentale, &c. M. Morel, tome i. p. 124. Paris, 1852. 

(7) L. Krahmer, Handbuch der Gericht. Med. Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 116. 

See also 7 Am. Jour. of Ins. 364. See as to responsibility of persons so affected, ante 


§§ 36-38. 
261 


§ 240] PARTIAL DELIRIUM. [BOOK I, 


sometimes distinguished, in addition to a high degree of violence, by lewdness 
and shamelessness, and more rarely by the homicidal mania.(/) 


9d. Partial. 


§ 240. This head may be considered as including Muror transitorius, mania 


Privation of stimulants, says Morel, and the employment of opiates, generally suf- 
fice to restore reason to those persons who are generally not considered as insane un- 
less afflicted with a special affection known by the name of dypsomania; even when 
the fatal consequences resulting from the abuse of spirits impress upon the delirium, 
which is its consequence, a form of continuity which has by some authors been . 
pointed out under the name of drunken madness. LHrrors made in this respect may be 
productive of grave consequences for those who are the victims of them. The follow- 
ing is an example :— 

In the month of May, 1850, there was brought to the asylum of Moreville, a sick 
person, whom a physician’s certificate represented as a dangerous madman. We ob- 
served at first in him a very great disorder of ideas, and a peculiar difficulty of ex- 
pressing himself. The face was pale, and the lips agitated with convulsive move- 
ments, and there was a general trembling of the imbs. The employment of opiates 
and a bath soon removed these appearances, and the next day we had a man in the 
~ perfect possession of his faculties before us. The error in this case had arisen from 
the fact, that the physician’s certificate had been given without a proper examination 
of all the causes necessary to a correct judgment. If he had, indeed, gone back to 
the appreciation of the causes, he would have found out that very grave dissensions 
existed between two brothers, of whom one was this pretended madman, who, endowed 
with a violent but feeble character, after having yielded in the strife of discussion, 
ordinarily sought to console himself in alcoholic libations. It was after having swal- 
lowed a too abundant ration that a family quarrel brought its contingent of trouble 
to the natural excitement that controlled him, and resulted in delirium tremens, which, 
if it had been better appreciated in its origin and effects, would not have brought this 
person to an insane asylum, and compromised in a certain degree his social position. 
—Morel, sur les Maladies Mentale, tome i. p. 146. Paris, 1852. 

(j) “A homicidal propensity,” as we are told by Dr. Taylor, “towards their off- 
spring, sometimes manifests itself in women soon after parturition. It seldom appears 
before the third day, often not for a fortnight, and in some instances not until several 
weeks after delivery. The most frequent period is at or about the commencement of 
lactation, and between that and the cessation of the lochia.”” According to Esquirol, it 
is generally attended by a suppression of the lochia and milk. The symptoms do not 
differ from those of mania generally, but it may assume any of the other forms of in- 
sanity; and in one half the cases it may be traced to hereditary tendency. Ac- 
cording to Dr. Burroughs, there is delirium, with a childish disposition for harmless 
mischief. The woman is gay and joyous, laughing, singing, loquacious, inclined to 
talk obscenely, and careless of everything around. She imagines that her food is 
poisoned. She may conceal the suspicion, and merely avoid taking what is offered to 
her. She can recognize persons and things, and can, though perhaps will not, answer 
direct questions. Occasionally there is great depression of spirits, with melancholy. 
These facts are of some importance in cases of alleged child-murder. This state may 
last a few hours, or for some days or weeks, and we are told by Dr. Hartshorne, the 
accomplished American editor, sometimes for months and years; but it generally goes 
off within a few months, if not earlier. The murder of the child is generally either 
the result of a sudden fit of delirium, or of an uncontrollable impulse, with a full 
knowledge of the wickedness and illegality of the act—so that the legal test of re- 
sponsibility from a knowledge of right and wrong cannot be applied to such cases. 
Mothers have been known, before the perpetration of the murder, to request their 
attendants to remove the child. Such cases are commonly distinguished from deli- 
berate infanticide by there being no attempt at concealment, nor any denial of the 
crime on detection. Several trials, involving a question of puerperal mania have 
been decided generally in favor of the plea within the last few years. Dr. Ashwell 
has remarked, that undue lactation may give rise to an attack of mania, under which 
the murder of the offspring may also be perpetrated. (Diseases of Women, 732.) 
Females in the pregnant state have been known to perpetrate the crime apparently 
from some sudden perversion of their moral feelings. I am not aware that a plea of 
exculpation on the ground of insanity has been admitted in this country under these 
circumstances. (See case Ann. d’Hyg., 1831, i. 374.) For an able analysis of the 
present state of our knowledge on the subject of Puerperal Insanity, by Dr. Reid, see 
Jour. Psychol. Med., 1834, pp. 128, 284. Taylor’s Med. Jurisprudence, pp. 594, 595. 
See as to the legal responsibility in such cases, ante, §§ 53-61. 


262 


BOOK I.] DELUSIONS AND HALLUCINATIONS. [§ 241 


transitoria, transitory ravings.(k) By this, says Schiirmayer,(/) is under- 
stood an attack of frenzy, fury, and raving madness, accompanied with more 
or less confusion of the senses, and of the thinking faculties, and peripheric 
consciousness, which arises without any perceptible, or from a very slight ex- 
ternal provocation, generally lasts but a short time, hardly a few hours, and 
after sometimes leading to the most serious consequences, leaves but an indis- 
tinct trace in the memory. It is either the opening symptom of a disturb- 
ance of the super-physical faculties which has hitherto remained occult, and 
now first manifests itself, or it appears in persons hitherto entirely sane, or in 
individuals who have already suffered from pronounced insanity, particularly 
from melancholy, depressed delirium, lunacy, and imbecility. In the latter 
class of cases, the question of responsibility presents no difficulties; far more 
in the former, in view of the possibility that the guilty act may have been the 
result of the outbreak of violent passion.(J7) It will then be often impossible 
to do more than to set forth the possibility or probability of a furor transt- 
torius, which is effected by establishing the existence of facts which may have 
caused it. Such are ‘epilepsy, irregular development, gastric irritations, dis- 
turbances of the menstrual or hemorrhoidal courses, or the secretion of milk, 
the sudden dispersion of eruptions of the skin, sunstroke, drunkenness, poi- 
son, violent agitation, anger, dread, fright, deep shame, over-exertion of the 
mind. But where no such probable causes are to be discovered, the examina- 
tion is necessarily confined to the statements of the party, and the immediate 
investigation of his intellectual and moral condition, the principal point of 
attention being the search and scrutiny of the motives of the acts, and the 
inquiry whether or not they were mingled with hallucinations or illusions, and 
whether the act was not preceded immediately or for some length of time by 
bodily disturbances, sleeplessness, restlessness, sadness, &c. Very great diffi- 
culties are involved in those cases in which an additional doubt arises whether 
the ravings were not occasioned by the criminal act itself, the probability of 
which, with a certain class of temperaments, has been already noticed.(m) 


X. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS, AS CONNECTED WITH DELUSIONS AND HALLUCI- 
NATIONS.(mm) 


Ist. General. 


§ 241. Under this head will be treated that species of mental unsoundness 
which is marked by the continued and controlling existence of insane ideas, 
without being either accompanied with delirium or with moral-maniacal pro- 
pensities to specific crimes. It may be considered as covering the same phrase 
as the partial lunacy (partielle verriicktheit) of Schiirmayer, who declares it 
to consist in crazy notions, with only a secondary participation of the affective 


(k) Friedreich, Handbuch der gerichtlichen Psychologie, p. 591. 

(1) Gericht. Med. § 552. (ll) Ante, §§ 53-60. 

(m) See ante, §§ 116-118. 

(mm) For a full account of Hallucinations and Illusions, we would refer the reader 
to Les Lecons Cliniques de M. Falret, Legons 3, 4, 5, 6, pp. 95, 185, Paris, 1854; also 
Etudes Psychologiques, par L. F. G. Renaudin, chap. viii. p. 388, Paris, 1854. 


263 


§ 242] DELUSIONS AND HALLUCINATIONS: [BOOK I. 


faculties, without damage to the peripheric consciousness, and without a de- 
cided weakness of the intellectual powers. The subjects of it have completely 
resolved their individuality into their madness, it is in their eyes an absolute 
truth, and all demonstration and argument in opposition to it, are idle. Per- 
sons of this kind often suffer no external mark to betray their inward disorder, 
frequently speak and act quite rationally about, and in matters outside of the 
circle of their hallucinations, and only suffer the point of derangement to 
transpire when it is adverted to in conversation or when they have occasion to 
write. The malady may easily lead to the gravest violations of law, for which 
reason it is of the greatest judicial interest. Where the act is clearly the 
result of this morbid condition of the mind, no legal responsibility can attach 
to it.(n) 

This species of mental unsoundness appears less frequently as a primary 
disease, than as a secondary result, developed out of prior disease, in the form 
of melancholy or otherwise. When the general expansive and depressive 
affection of the sentiments recedes, the confusion of the peripheric conscious- 
ness is dispelled, the bodily health regains its equilibrium, the patient finds 
himself endowed with a system of affections and perceptions to which he was 
before a stranger, but which revolve round one or more manifestly insane stand- 
points. 

§ 242. These various fancies are reducible to certain groups, which take 
their point of departure, (1) in the relations of the individual to the external 
world, to the supernatural, and to his own personality, or (2) in perceptive 
anomalies of depression and mania. 

The former view admits the following classification: crack-brainedness, (0) 
where the erroneous notions relate to the objects and relations of the external 
world, and of the body of the individual ; frenzy, where they concern things 
beyond the reach of the senses, religious mysteries and divine inspirations; 
folly (Narrheit), where the identity of the person has undergone a change, 
and advanced to a higher stage of worldly honors. In the latter view, the 
subject matter of the delusion generally depends upon the kind of erroneous 
notion which accompanied the preceding stages of depression and mania. 
The delusion itself is of a depressing or elevating description. The depres- 
sive form subdivides as follows :— 

(a.) Hypochondriacal delusions, where anomalous bodily sensations—de- 
lusions of the sense of touch—suggest. the idea, that particular parts of the 
body have been transformed, that there are parasitic animals in them, or inju- 
rious substances, which must be removed, &c. 

(b.) Demoniacal delusions. The patients declare and maintain, with per- 
- fect self-possession and entire calmness, that demoniac beings or other persons, 
living or dead, have their seat in their bodies. (00) 

(c.) Such delusions,(p) called by Hllinger ‘“‘ Concentric,” as consist in the 


(n) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 556, ante, §§ 47-49. 

(o) “A little cracked,” to use Dr. Rush’s popular synonyme, for what he at the © 
same time tells us is expressed by the Scotch by the phrase “ having a bee in his 
bonnet.” 

(00) See ante, §§ 210-219. (p) Ellinger, p. 132. 


264 


BOOK I.] CLASSIFICATION OF. [$ 248 


delusion that the personal reputation of the sufferer has been injured by a real 
or imaginary misfortune, that the infamy incurred has reached the ears of the 
highest circles—impressions still further confirmed by delusions of the sense 
of hearing—and that no resource is left but either seclusion from all inter- 
course with mankind, or restitution of good fame by some brilliant exploit. 

(d.) Pertpheric delusions, in which the patients regard themselves as the 
objects of a plot on the part of the authorities or of their relatives, or of 
some secret society, surrounded by spies and functionaries of the secret police, 
watched and dogged at every step, injured bodily and mentally in action and 
repose; persecuted and endangered in life and property, or that they are be- 
leaguered by thieves, robbers, and murderers, or that spirits hover in the air 
to torment and disquiet them, &e. 

The elevating phase of this species of mental unsoundness, subdivides 
itself, according to Schiirmayer :—(pp) 

(a.) Religious delusions, which may be considered in connection with de- 
monio-mania, already noticed,(q) in which the patient pretends to stand in a 
particular position, as regards degree and distinction, in the eye of God, to 
have been appointed censor, prophet, reformer, and Messiah, &c. ; itis generally 
accompanied with hallucinations of sight and sound, and often leads to the 
most dreadful crimes. 

(b.) Delusions of pride. The patients suppose themselves called, by their 
qualifications of person and mind, to the most important missions. 

(c.) Delusions of vanity. The delusion here is a supposed descent from a 
princely lineage, elevation to a higher social position, &c., the enjoyment of 
which, however, is destroyed by the machinations of the envious and malevo- 
lent. 

(d.) Sexual delusion, which is sometimes of a more intellectual, sometimes 
of a more carnal nature, is a state of mind in which the patients suppose that, 
in consequence of their personal charms or other advantages, either all people 
of the opposite sex, or even persons occupying a higher rank, such as princes, 
are in love with or betrothed to them in spirit. This is attended with many 
hallucinations, particularly of the sexual kind. (qq) 

§ 243. It is not to be denied that the proper consideration of this species 
of mental unsoundness presents great difficulties, and the practical suggestions 
of Hllinger(7) are indeed worthy of peculiar attention. He notices the fol- 
lowing phases :— 

‘1, An impression of having sustained wrongs at the hands of certain 
persons, against whom revenge is meditated and executed. Here the diseased 
individual often acts on mature reflection, and in the full knowledge that he 
has no right to take revenge, and of the consequences which ordinarily ensue, 
and then it may occur either that he prefers undergoing the extremity of the 
law, and perishing together with the supposed wrongdoer, to remaining longer 
exposed to his assaults, or that he proceeds on the ground of his known and 
established insanity, calculating to escape responsibility and punishment on 


(pp) Med. Jour. § 556. (q) Ante, §§ 210-221. 
(qq) Ante, § 199. (7), PolsT, 


265 


§ 243] DELUSIONS AND HALLUCINATIONS: [BOOK I. 


the strength of the indulgence accorded to his case. Here there appears in 
general some ground to assume a moral responsibility. (77) 

-“9, An impression that the patient is acting at the instigation or under 
the constraint of demons. In this case it might become necessary to inquire 
whether, and in how far, the patient understood that the demands of the 
demons were wrongful, and that he was at liberty to withstand them, and 
whether, and in how far, it was actually in his power to withstand them. 

“3. The patient imagines himself beset by thieves, &c., and neither sure of 
his property nor of his life. This may perhaps be treated as a case of self- 
defence, and all responsibility excluded. 

“4. The self-consciousness of the patient is perverted, and he acts with that 
plenitude of power with which he is invested in view of his position and his 
destiny, in religion, politics, &c. In this case, as under the third position, 
responsibility is out of the question. 

“But as a fixed idea never occurs in such isolation as is erroneously sup- 
posed, there being always a series of phantoms connected into a system, the 
outlines of which it may be perhaps impossible to define with accuracy—as 
the entire affective life has become altered and irregular, the general views of 
men and things having become distorted, and illusions of the senses being 
often brought to light by a rigid scrutiny, which entirely escaped the eye of 
the superficial observer—as the action, reaction, and intro-action of the psychi- 
cal faculties is no longer measurable by the ordinary standard—opinions must 
be given with the greatest circumspection, and every possible reservation, 
whenever the connection or want of connection between the illusion and the 
deed is not perfectly evident.”’(s) 

It is not easy to mistake the error of a lunatic for the error of a sane man. 
The decisive point of difference between them is, that in the latter case the 
action of the thinking faculties, from whatever cause it be, only terminates too 
soon, and before the entire subject has been thoroughly sifted, and that such 
an error, after having been properly refuted, can only be maintained by dint of 
obstinacy or indolence. In insanity, on the contrary, the error of the under- 
standing is occasioned by the abnormal function of the perceptive faculty. 
One or two prevailing schemes of perception(ss) are applied to almost all 
other perceptions to which they can be adjusted in any way, and thus one and 
the same tout ensemble of perceptions is continually reproducing itself on the 
slightest provocation. Here the chain of association loses, in the eye of the 
individual, its accidental, personal, and contingent character, and, by its con- 
stant recurrence, deludes the understanding with the idea that the same con- 
nection subsists between the objects in reality as in the imagination of the 
individual, until at last reason herself is misled into seeing a necessary relation 
of cause and effect in the perceptions with which it finds itself invariably asso- 
ciated. ‘The individual is therefore compelled to think accordingly ; and even 
if it is sometimes brought, by instruction, to acknowledge its error, it is only 
to relapse into it, not so much from obstinacy, as because of this compulsory 


(rr) See ante, §§ 47-49. (s) Ibid. 
(ss) Compare Hagen, vol. ii. p. 707. 


266 


BOOK I.] CLASSIFICATION OF. [§ 244 


synthesis of the perceptive faculties. A sane man in error retains the power 
of doubting, not the madman. This condition of the perceptive faculties is 
also the cause of the great indifference manifested towards surrounding things, 
of the dreamy manner and the illusions growing out of it. It is also a matter 
of course that the perceptions, by their constant recurrence, cease to be mere 
perceptions, but subsequently take rank as thoughts and ideas, in consequence 
of their constant action upon the understanding, and their assumption of the 
form of propositions. (¢) 

§ 244. Delusion may spread in such a way as to cover the whole surface of 
the mind, leaving no sound perception untouched. It is then distinguished by 
the general want of connection and consistency between the perceptions, and 
by the absence of any symptom of positive feebleness of the understanding, in 
spite of the disruption of the thread of ideas, and the incongruous juxtaposi- 
tion of the fragments. Dr. Rush, in the following report given by him of the 
conversation of a patient laboring under this phase, very happily illustrates 
this incoherence, and at the same time the occasional point by which its intel- 
lectual operations are distinguished: ‘‘No man can serve two masters. I am 
Philip, King of Macedonia, lawful son of Mary, Queen of Scots, born in 
Philadelphia. I have been happy enough ever since I have seen General 
Washington with a silk handkerchief in High Street. Money commands 
sublunary things, and makes the mare go; it will buy salt mackerel made of 
ten-penny nails. Enjoyment is the happiness of virtue. Yesterday cannot 
be recalled. I can only walk in the night-time when I can eat pudding enough. 
I shall be eight years old to-morrow. ‘They say R. W. is in partnership with 
J. W. I believe they are about as good as people in common—not better, 
only on certain occasions, when, for instance, a man wants to buy chincopins, 
and to import salt to feed pigs. Tanned leather was imported first by lawyers. 
Morality with virtue is like vice not corrected. lL. B. came to your house and 
stole a coffee-pot, in the twenty-fourth year of his majesty’s reign. Plum- 
pudding and Irish potatoes make a very good dinner. Nothing in man is 
comprehensible in it. Born in Philadelphia. Our forefathers were better to 
us than our children, because they were chosen for their honesty, truth, virtue, 
and innocence. The Queen’s broad R originated from a British forty-two 
pounder, which makes too loud a report for me. I have no more to say. I 
am thankful I am no worse this season, and that I am sound in mind and 
memory, and could steer a ship at sea, but am afraid of the tiller. * * * * 
Son of Mary, Queen of Scots. Born in Philadelphia. Born in Philadelphia. 
King of Macedonia.’ (x) 

And Shakspeare gives, with equal truth, the following soliloquy of a mad- 
man, in whom the depressing rather than the elating phrase is exhibited :— 


‘¢ Who gives anything to poor Tom, 
Whom the foul fiend has led through fire, 
And through flame, through ford and whirlpool, 
Over bog and quagmire, that hath laid 
Knives under his pillow, and halters in his pew, 
Set rats-bane by his porridge, and made him to 
Ride upon a bay trotting horse over four-inch 
Bridges, and to course his own shadow for a traitor.’’ 


(t) Ibid. p. 818. (u) Rush on the Mind, pp. 242, 243. 
: 267 


§ 245] HALLUCINATIONS: PARTIAL DELUSIONS. [BOOK I. 


And Lear, in language still more expressive of misery, thus complains :— 


Dae ‘‘T am bound 
Upon a wheel of fire that mine own tears 
Do scald like molten lead.’’ 


2d. Partial Delusion.(v) 


§ 245. Under this head may be enumerated, Delusions of the Senses, Illu- 
stons and Hallucinations. A distinction is very properly drawn by Schiir- 
mayer, following in this respect the general current of modern opinion, between 
illusions and hallucinations, the former comprising mistakes in the conception 
and interpretation of the perception of objects actually present, while in the 
latter, the perception which originates in a diseased action of the senses, 
appears to the patient as if the sensation were produced by a real external 
object acting upon the senses.(w) 

The same distinction is thus stated by Dr. Taylor: “‘ Hallucinations are 
those sensations which are supposed by the patient to be produced by external 
impressions, although no material objects may act upon the senses at the 
time.(~) Jllwsions are the sensations produced by the false perception of 
objects.”(y) ‘ When a hallucination,”’ he proceeds to say, ‘‘or an illusion is 
believed to have a real and positive existence, and this belief is not removed 
either by reflection or an appeal to the other senses, the individual is said to 
labor under a delusion; but when the false sensation is immediately deiccue 
and is not acted upon as if it were real, then the person is sane.’’ 

“ As a morbid condition of the brain,’’? says Sir Benjamin Brodie, ‘“ may 
produce the impression of visible objects, or of voices, which have no real 
existence, so it may also produce notions of a more complex and abstract 
character, and these may be constantly obtruded on the mind, so that the in- 
dividul is unable to withdraw his attention from them, being, as it would seem, 
as much beyond the influence of volition as the muscles of a paralytic limb. 
Thus, one person believes himself to be ruined as to his worldly affairs, and 
that he and his family, though really in affluence, are reduced to extreme 
poverty ; while another is persuaded that he is in possession of unbounded 
wealth, the consequence being that he is in danger of being ruined by extrava- 
gance; and a third, is under the apprehension of his being accused of some 
dreadful crime, and perhaps seeks refuge from his fears in self-destruction. It 
is more difficult to escape from the latter than from the former class of illu- 
sions, as the appeal lies not from one sense to another, but to a more refined 
process of thought and reflection, and the examination of evidence.’’(z) 

We may step for a moment from the strict line of discussion to notice the 


(v) See the very interesting discussion of this point by Feuchtersleben—Principles 
of Medical Psychology, being the outlines of a course of Lectures by Baron Von Feuch- 
tersleben, M.D. Vienne, 1845. Translated from the German by the late H. Evans 
Lloyd, Esq. Revised and edited by G. B. Babington, M. D. , F. R. 8., &. London, 
printed for the Sydenham Society, 1847, pp. 279-343. 

(w) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 554. 

ae See on this subject, remarks by Dr. Sigmond, Jour. of Psychol. Med. p. 585. 
1848 
(y) Taylor’s Medical Jurisprudence, p. 552. 
(z) Psychological Inquiries, &c. p. 79. London, 1854. 
268 


BOOK I.] HALLUCINATIONS : [$249 


striking remarks on this point of the great Scotch metaphysician. ‘Several 
phenomena in human nature,” says Dr. Reid, “lead us to conjecture that, in 
the earliest period of life, we are apt to think every object about us to be ani- 
mated. Judging of them by ourselves, we ascribe to them the feelings we are 
conscious of in ourselves. So we see a little girl judges of her doll, and of her 
playthings. And so we see rude nations judge of the heavenly bodies, of the 
elements, and of the sea, rivers and fountains. If this be so, it ought not to 
’ be said that by reason and experience we learn that certain things are inani- 
mate, to which at first we ascribe life and intelligence. If this be true, it is 
less surprising that, before reflection, we should for a moment relapse into this 
prejudice of our early years, and treat things as if they had life which we once 
believed to have it. It does not much affect our present argument, whether 
this be or be not the cause why a dog pursues and gnashes at the stone that 
hurt him ; and why a man in a passion, for losing at a play, sometimes wreaks 
his vengeance on the cards or dice. It is not strange that a blind animal im- 
pulse should sometimes lose its proper direction. In brutes, this has no bad 
consequence; in men, the least ray of reflection corrects it and shows its ab- 
surdity.’’ (a) 

“ Hallucinations,”’ says Hllinger, ‘generally occur in every form of mental 
derangement, but chiefly in the higher stages of depression and mania, in 
deliriums, in lunacy, and in confusion of mind, and lead to the commission of 
crimes, particularly when the patient was originally not without the taint of 
culpable passions.’’(b) For judicial purposes it will be found advantageous 
to arrange hallucinations under the four following heads :— 

§ 246. 1. In individuals who show no signs of disorder in their affective or 
intellectual systems, they will not operate to suspend the responsibility of the 
agent; but they may become the motives of violations of the law.(c) 

§ 247. 2. In individuals in whom the disease of the mind has made some 
progress, but has not yet acquired a permanent form, the victims often make 
no secret of them, and recognize them as intruders into the working of their 
thoughts ; while in other cases they keep them to themselves. 

§ 248. 3. In persons who are in a state of total drunkenness, under the 
influence of poison, or overpowered by sleep, where external consciousness is 
entirely gone, and utter confusion of the senses obtains, in such cases the free 
power of self-control may be entirely dislodged. 

§ 249. 4. In individuals whose insanity is equally mature and manifest, the 


(a) Reid on the active powers of Malevolent Affection, p. 569. See also Schiirmayer, 
Gericht. Med. § 554. 

(6) Ellinger, p. 167. 

(c) Boswell says: “ Dr. Johnson mentioned a thing as not unfrequent, of which he 
(Boswell) had never heard before—being called, that is, hearing one’s name pronounced 
by the voice of a known person at a great distance, far beyond the possibility of being 
reached by any sound uttered by human organs. An acquaintance, on whose veracity 
Boswell says he could place every dependence, told him that, walking home one evening 
to Kilmarnock, he heard himself called from a wood, by the voice of a brother who 
had gone to America, and the next packet brought the account of that brother’s death. 
Macbean asserted that this inexplicable calling was a thing very well known. Dr. 
Johnson said that one day, at Oxford, as he was turning the key of his chamber, he 
heard distinctly his mother call Sam! She was then at Litchfield; but nothing en- 
sued.”— Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide, pp. 127, 128. 

269 


§ 251] HALLUCINATIONS AND DELUSIONS: [BOOK I, 


absence of freedom of agency is not to be doubted; the responsibility of such 
persons in foro is therefore out of the question. 

~ § 250. According to Hagen,(d) the cause of the delusions of the senses is 
either a mere physical stimulus, which, acting upon the fountain-heads of the 
sensational nerves in the brain, produces eccentric sensations, and induces the 
individual to incorporate his sensations into an image, in which case it will 
depend upon the particular circumstances of the case, especially on the mental 
and moral condition of the individual, whether or not such apparitions are 
believed to be genuine. And upon another hypothesis, suggested by the same 
author, the disease is only a strong morbid susceptibility of the brain to eccen- 
tric sensations, with which some fancy or other comes into such a collision as 
to act as the stimulating cause of a paroxysm, bringing, at the same time, a 
complete phantom before the external sense, just as in cases of convulsive dis- 
eases, St. Vitus’s dance, &., an intended slight motion may bring a convulsion 
into that particular system of muscles. Great care must be taken, however, 
not to include under this head what is not really a delusion of the senses. If, 
for instance, a madman takes a person or a black cat for the devil, there is 
no delusion of the senses. On the contrary, in supposing the devil to have 
assumed such a shape, the maniac only directs his madness to an object of 
which, in itself, he has a correct perception. Delusions also, we are admo- 
nished by Schiirmayer, must not be mistaken for confusion of the senses, 
which consists in an entire obstruction of the conceptions, an incapacity to 
obtain adequate apperceptions, and sometimes in an entire want of objective 
consciousness and recollection. 

§ 251. The following interesting illustration of partial delusion is given to 
us in Dr. Mayo’s late work: “In a case to which I was called in by Dr. Monro, 
a few years ago, it was our painful duty to resist the liberation of a patient, an 
old lady, whose confinement under certificates had continued for sixteen years. 
For six years she was described as having been in a state, first of acute, and 
then of chronic mania. For many years, we learned, that she had regained 
the power of conversing consecutively and sensibly, indeed without the smallest 
evidence of incoherent or irrational remark, and such appeared to us her present 
state. The objections which existed to her being then considered sane, if she 
had been insane, up to the time we saw her, on the ground of her advanced age, 
weighed on our minds, but seemed insufficient. The evidence of her attendants, 
who considered her still insane, on the ground of occasional outbreaks of tem- 
per, was that of interested witnesses. She was a patient in chancery, and the 
visiting physicians had become favorably disposed to her enlargement, as a 
sound-minded person. Now, the question was in this instance determined in 
our minds by a discovery of a very remarkable notional delusion which held 
its ground in her mind. In a set of drawers in this lady’s bedroom, and in 
certain trunks there, to which we were conducted without her knowledge, we 
witnessed a large and very heterogeneous and dirty collection (dirtiness had 
been a symptom of her insane state), consisting of old bottles, broken cups 
and saucers, brass knobs, bits of old string, shreds of linen and cloth, small 


(d) Compare Wagner’s Handworterbuch der Physiologie, vol. ii. p. 811. 
270 


BOOK I.] CLASSIFICATION OF. [$ 252 


bundles of wood, such as light fires, pieces having been apparently picked up 
and tied together, a cup containing dirty food of the most disgusting appear- 
ance, which had evidently been long there, bits of valueless stones, coals, nails, 
&e. This accumulation, which could not have been extemporized by the 
attendants to make out a case, and of which accordingly the patient must 
have been long aware, would have occasioned strong doubts as to her sanity, 
even if no prior grounds of suspicion had existed; but carefully preserved by 
one who up to a recent date had been so far suspected of insanity that she had 
not been set free by the visiting commissioners, who was in her seventy-first 
year, and therefore the less likely to have obtained a cure, it became, in the 
opinion of Dr. Monro and myself, a conclusive ground for resisting this lady’s 
immediate enlargement.’’(e) 

§ 252. Particular hallucinations are classified by Abercrombie under the fol- 
lowing heads :— 

1. Propensities of character, which had been kept under restraint by reason 
or by external circumstances; or old habits, which had been subdued or re- 
strained, developing themselves without control, and leading the mind into 
trains of fancies arising out of them. Thus, a man of an aspiring, ambitious 
character may imagine himself a king or great personage; while in a man of 
a timid, suspicious disposition the mind may fix upon some supposed injury, 
or loss either of property or reputation. 

2. Old associations recalled into the mind, and mixed up perhaps with more 
recent occurrences, in the same manner as we often see in dreaming. A lady, 
mentioned by Dr. Gooch, who became insane in consequence of an alarm from 
a house on fire in her neighborhood, imagined that she was the Virgin Mary, 
and had a luminous halo around her head. 

3. Visions of the imagination which have formerly been indulged in, of 
that kind which we call waking dreams, or castle-building, recurring to the 
mind in this condition, and now believed to have a real existence, I have been 
able to trace to this source of the hallucination. In one case, for example, it 
turned upon an office to which the individual imagined he had been appointed ; 
and it was impossible to persuade him to the contrary, or even that the office 
was not vacant. He afterwards acknowledged that his fancy had, at various 
times, been fixed upon that appointment, though there were no circumstances 
that warranted him in entertaining any expectation of it. In a man, men- 
tioned by Dr. Morison, the hallucination turned upon circumstances which 
had been mentioned when his fortune was told by a gipsy. , 

4. Bodily feelings giving rise to trains of associations, in the same extra- 
vagant manner as in dreaming. A man, mentioned by Dr. Rush, imagined 
that he had a Caffre in his stomach, who had got in at the Cape of Good 
Hope, and had occasioned him a constant uneasiness ever since. In such a 
case, it is probable, that there had been some fixed or frequent uneasy feeling 
at the stomach, and that about the commencement of his complaint, he had 
been strongly impressed by some transaction in which a Caffre was concerned. 

5. There seems reason to believe that the hallucinations of the insane are 


(e) Mayo on Medical Testimony in Lunacy, pp. 33, 34. 
271 


§ 254] LUCID INTERVALS. [BOOK I. 


often influenced by a certain sense of the new and singular state in which their 
mental powers really are, and a certain feeling, though confused and ill-defined, 
of the loss of that power over their mental processes which they possessed 
when in health.”’(/) 

§ 253. Hallucinations involving a belief that the patient has been trans- 
formed into various species of animals have been at times almost epidemic. 
Analogous to these is the belief that worms, frogs, or snakes have taken up 
their abode in the head or stomach, which consume the brain or entrails. 
Men have fancied themselves pregnant, and imagined themselves shadows or 
corpses, or to be constructed of glass, butter, or wax. At one time the belief 
in a transformation into wolves or other wild animals became so prevalent as 
to acquire a title to itself (Lycanthropia). In cases of this last phase the 
disease became so uncontrollable as to impel its victim to a close imitation of 
the wild animal itself, falling upon other men and animals, and snapping at 
and biting them. Andral relates a case of a child of fourteen years, who tore 
wildly about the fields, biting other children that came in its way, and produc- 
ing the greatest consternation in the neighborhood. (g) 


XI. MENTAL UNSOUNDNESS AS CONNECTED WITH LUCID INTERVALS.(h) 


§ 254. Mental diseases are not always continuous, but they improve, and 
alter their form in such a manner as to exhibit abatement or cessation of the 
disease. When, therefore, an illegal act has been committed by a man at such 
a time, 7. e. after the occurrence of a manifest disorder of his mental faculties, 
the question at once arises, whether the mental alienation has really ceased, or 
whether it is not still present in a slumbering state, and possibly influential in 
determining the act. (7) 


(f) Abercrombie on the Intellectual powers, pp. 255, 256. 

(g) Cours de Patholog. Interne, tome iii., Paris, 1836, p. 186. The curious will 
find a very interesting disquisition on this point in Wierus’s work, De Prestigiis De- 
monum, lib. iv. c. 23. 

(h) L. Krahmer, Handbuch der gericht. Med., Halle, C. A. Schwetschke, 1851, § 124. 

(2) The subject of lucid intervals has lately been investigated in a very learned 
treatise by Dr. Lehr (Die Lehre von den lichten Zwischenzeiten in gerichtlich-medi- 
cinischer Beziehung, Henke’s Zeitschrift, 3). Two views of lucid intervals present 
themselves, which vary widely in their judicial relations, one of which (that espoused 
by Dr. L.) regards them as a suspension of the disease, while the other treats them 
merely as a temporary suppression of its manifestation. 

We condense from M. Renaudin the following very interesting remarks - on this 
point :— 

Lucid intervals is b the name ordinarily given to the condition in which the insane 
person is placed at the end of a strong delirious excitement, or when he awakes from 
a profound stupor. 

We are generally led to believe the existence of a lucid interval when delirious ideas 
no longer manifest themselves, and when the insane person shows himself accessible 
to other preoccupations, and thus appears to enjoy the full amount of moral liberty 
allowed to him. 

It has been already said that the approach of insanity is rarely sudden, and that, 
being based in some respect upon a natural or acquired predisposition, it is preceded 
by a period of incubation, that paves the way for a manifestation of the disorder often 
long before its actual appearance. When a retrospective examination of the ante- 
Sees of the disease is made, a proof is found of the latent advances which insanity 
makes. 

But under this apparent reason is concealed a disorder which makes a sensible pro- 
gression every day. Irritability is developed; the regimen is irregular; the affective 


272 


BOOK I.] LUCID INTERVALS, [§ 254 


As indicated above, there is, strictly speaking, but one species of unsound- 
ness of mind, and what we term forms are more properly stages of one and 


sentiments are changed or perverted ; everything has become an object of contrariety ; 
delirious convictions are organized upon the perceptive errors every day more nume- 
rous; and finally insanity shows itself in a critical excitement, the more decided as 
the lesion of sensibility has become more complete, and as the incubation is marked 
by a more or less concentrated struggle. The patient is then isolated ; irritating causes 
are removed, and immediately the over-excitement diminishes ; a calmness succeeds. 
This transient remission, however, ceases as soon as the unhealthy influence regains 
its empire, and we then see that which was called a lucid interval was, in fact, but a 
transient remission. 

Continuity is essentially the characteristic of monomania and lypomania. Either 
the insane person, by a convalescence, advances to a complete cure, or he still remains 
affected with the original type. Every intermediate situation is inadmissible, except 
when an incidental affection, causing a kind of metastasis, for the moment suspends 
or masks the madness. Whenever it is not a true crisis, it only causes a fleeting 
remission of the symptoms rather than of the pathological condition ; and the physi- 
cian assumes a Serious responsibility when, simply on the face of this apparent calm, 
he conceives the possibility of the patient’s return to his family, where but too soon 
the causes will be found reunited that restore to insanity all its intensity. It is in not 
sufficiently resisting the desires of friends, that the physician paves the way for these 
returns, which are less relapses than the recrudescence of an uncured pathological 
state. 

But though, in an absolute diagnostic point of view, we reject the lucid interval— 
though, when the existence of mental unsoundness has been once shown, we do not 
admit that the remissions diminish irresponsibility—we still think that the deranged 
can perform certain acts with a perfect knowledge of cause, and can even exercise his 
intelligence, provided that he is placed under the influence of certain protecting con- 
ditions. The regulating discipline of an asylum tends greatly to this result, and 
therefore it is not astonishing if our insane can perform certain civil acts of a simple 
character, and may consent to a division of property, or even authorize a marriage. 
The legality of the act is essentially subordinate to a previous appreciation of the 
extent of the delirium at the time, and the relations existing between the action and 
the delirious conception. So, though not admitting the existence of a lucid interval, 
we still believe that the madman may be placed in a situation that permits him to 
appreciate the action demanded of him. In a criminal point of view, this distinction 
cannot be established, since the action is a logical consequence of the madness; and 
daily observation teaches us that it is during these moments of apparent sanity that 
the maniac meditates and prepares the most dangerous projects, as much against him- 
self as against others. The ingenious combination of means that the lypomaniac uses 
in order to obtain his object is urged in vain as proof of lucidity, since the delirious 
conceptions, whilst rendering the premises false, are far from always deranging the 
logical chain of the other intellectual operations. We should then consider the lypo- 
maniac aS an oppressed person who conspires against his enemies, and as he is the 
most feeble, he calls cunning to the aid of his legitimate means of defence. 

In the maniac, especially in the paroxysm, we observe a disordered agitation, 
accompanied with such an amount of incoherence that the affected person appears to 
be rather the sport of some strange motive power than the originator of this extreme 
mobility. There are times when even this storm is dissipated as if by enchantment. 
Dissimulation becomes possible for a certain time; the delirium is in some degree 
suspended, and we may be led to suppose a spontaneous return to reason. How often 
have we seen maniacs cease to rave during the questioning of the judge, and imme- 
diately afterwards recommence their course of wanderings. 

The more vivid the excitement is, the more considerable is the expenditure of the 
vital forces ; so that when it has lasted a certain time, a period of prostration arrives ; 
but, allowing a remission of some somatic symptoms, still the incoherence of ideas is 
persistent with other symptoms. Sometimes the transition is rapid; and then, above 
all, is it necessary to attribute the situation to its true causes, in order not to expose 
the examiner to an error of diagnosis. 

Periodicity is generally observed in mania; and it is then that insanity of actions 
must be distinguished from insanity of ideas. Though often united, still they are 
sometimes isolated from each other, or follow one another. It is on this account that 
the most extravagant acts sometimes correspond with a certain intellectual lucidity, 
which at the first glance may impose upon us; and it is then that we observe persons 
thus insane justify their actions by the most specioWS reasonings. We must not, 


18. 273. 


§ 254] LUCID INTERVALS, [BOOK I. 


the same disease. This disease, however, may become fixed for life at one or 
the other stage, or may travel slowly or rapidly, and, so to speak, imperceptibly 


however, take this intellectual waking for a lucid interval; for, although masked, the 
delirium still continues. 

In other cases, the madness is less intense. All excitement has disappeared, and 
the insane person answers all our questions so reasonably as to lead us to infer the 
existence of a lucid interval; but the illusion is soon destroyed when, in pushing our 
examination, we weary him with questions: he becomes agitated ; loses the thread of 
his ideas; becomes more and more incoherent, and so proves to us that he has had 
what scarcely might be called a transitory remission. 

There are cases where the periodicity appears more determined, and where the 
conduct of the patient betrays no sign of the insanity which he formerly manifested. 
The lucid interval can perhaps be sometimes admitted under these circumstances ; 
but it is still necessary to exercise some caution in regard to the value of these appear- 
ances. Ifthe patient denies his situation; if he refuses to acknowledge the principal 
acts which have characterized his paroxysm; if he seeks to attribute them to some 
foreign cause, it is a proof that the reason is not sound, and that a paroxysm is always 
imminent; and lucidity cannot be admitted, since errors of perception and judgment 
still exist. This observation especially applies to that kind of mania in which exces- 
sive irritability plays the principal part ; where the remissions are irregular, and the 
paroxysms are shown under the influence of the slightest cause. We cannot, then, 
consider this momentary repose of a permanent effect which is always ready to break 
out, as a lucid interval. We might say as much of the period of prostration following 
a period of strong excitement. 

When periodicity is complete, it is recognized at first by the appearance of the 
paroxysm, which has, in some measure, a critical termination. The lucid interval 
can then be admitted, if there is a complete contrast between the two situations, if the 
patient appreciates them, and if the manifestation of each fit is shown by an approach 
which is always regular, and which is always produced under the influence of the 
same causes. It is, if we can thus express ourselves, a momentary cure, which is 
prolonged for a longer or shorter period of time, and which often finishes by becoming 
a complete one. 

Finally, when the affection passes to the chronic state, the patient raves less, because 
excitement fails him, and also because his will is in want of a regulating force. We 
cannot consider this as a lucid interval where the patient is unable to act except when 
directed by another’s mind. When mania passes into dementia, the transition is 
sometimes shown by an apparent reawakening of reason, which is, as it were, its last 
glimmer. Generally it is the mobility of maniacs which is most favorable to the action 
of the derivations whose results sufficiently impose upon the superficial observer so as 
to cause him to admit the existence of a lucid interval. 

The stimulated attention of these patients fixes, for a moment, this mobility, directs 
cunning towards the accomplishment of a project, where a personality is in play, and 
we are often surprised with the address shown in organizing a plan of escape. But, 
in spite of this incidental derivation, the maniacal temperament still remains the same, 
unless, indeed, this transitory action of the mind should become a crisis. 

Dementia, where the psychico-somatic existence is gradually extinguished, is a ruin 
in which a trace of a better time is sometimes found. If, occasionally, remembrances 
of the past show themselves, this apparent lucid interval is no more than a retrospec- 
tive reasoning without actual application. When, instead of being the termination of 
the other forms, dementia is primitive or idiopathic, the lucid intervals can be suffi- 
ciently clearly drawn, and the diagnosis does not present as many difficulties as in the 
other forms. In fact, the demented cannot dissimulate; since, to do this, a reactive 
power would be necessary, which in him is entirely wanting. He cannot conceal his 
incapacity under the mask of an energy whose absence is the principal feature of his 
disease. More submissive than the others to somatic influences, he is sometimes a 
prey to an almost maniacal excitement; but if this is not critical, it forms an expendi- 
ture of power resulting in pure loss, and making one more step in this period of pros- 
tration. Ina word, if the man lives for a moment in the past, he is as nothing in the 
present ; and it is under privilege of this restriction that a lucid interval, provoked 
by some foreign stimulant, but without root in an exhausted moral system, can be 
admitted. : 

Hence we see that the lucid interval is of much rarer occurrence in mental unsound- 
ness than is generally thought. It is in mania that the periodicity of regular pa- 
roxysms permits us to admit it;,but then, also, it is still necessary to guard against 
being imposed upon by a remission of excitement, which is not that of the frenzied 
condition. (See Etudes Physio-Somatiques sur l’Alienation Mentale, par L. E. F. Re- 
naudin, chap. ix. p. 522. Paris, 1854.) 

274 


BOOK I.] LUCID INTERVALS. [$ 255 


from one stage to the other, if recovery does not intervene. We must, there- 
fore, look for criteria to prove that the symptoms observed are not those of a 
progress of the disease, but of recovery, for without such criteria we should be 
induced to presume the continuance of the disorder. The following sugges- 
tions, given by Ellinger, and repeated by Schiirmayer, are important in the 
consideration and decision of such cases. As a general thing, there is no 
recovery from mental unsoundness which has been attended with permanent 
and general delusion: in the other forms it sometimes, though very rarely, 
takes place suddenly, the consequence of strong excitement, as a sudden out- 
burst of rage, or even in sleep, without any preceding physical or moral change. 
Its general development, however, is slow, being marked with a gradual less- 
ening of the affective irritations, with an increased coherency and consequent- 
iality of thought, with a return of the natural inclinations and appetites, of 
sleep and nourishment, and with a disappearance of the physical anomalies. 
Sometimes, however, it advances with a more fluctuating step, agitated as it 
were with mental tides, the flood of each of which, however, falls below the 
high water-mark of its predecessor, while each ebb more and more nearly 
approaches the line of sanity. To constitute a recovery, the patient, if he 
has not acquired a more rational constitution of his moral character, must at 
least have regained that which he enjoyed before the appearance of the disease : 
he must have reacquired a taste for his former occupation, must again display 
his former inclinations and points of interest, must understand what he remem- 
bers of his disease when assisted by explanations, must speak of it as of some- 
thing to which he is now superior, must clearly see the erroneous nature of 
the delusions under which he labored, and must be really contented and inter- 
nally at peace. But if, on the other hand, the former character of the disease 
has only disappeared in part; if the old insane grudge against one person or 
another is manifested ; if there is a smothered rage, or aversion to persons or 
things formerly cherished ; if the alleged convalescent refuses to acknowledge 
his disease in general or in regard to particular points; if he dislikes to speak 
of it; if his conduct is marked by unnatural irritability, suspicion or boisterous 
and immoderate joy, or by other anomalous features, a perfect recovery has 
not taken place, although in point of intelligence, formal and substantial, not 
the slightest anomaly is perceptible.( 7) 

§ 255. Where the patient’s recovery from a mental disorder is not clearly 
established, it may still be doubted whether an alleged criminal act was com- 
mitted under circumstances involving the full responsibility of the agent. 
Whether the malady was of long or short duration, whether it was more or 
less intense, is here of no decisive import, and of equally little moment is the 


apparent reflection and preparation with which the act may have been com- 
mitted. 


The different kinds of improvement or interruption in cases of unsoundness 
of mind, present various features, which vary in accordance with the duration 
and degree of abatement. 

1. Intervallum lucidum, with a restoration of consciousness in general and 


(j) Compare Ellinger, p. 169. Schiirmayer, § 573. 
275 


§ 257] LUCID INTERVALS, [BOOK I. 


of insight into the past and present, but without entire clearness, and with the 
continuance of a more, though not entirely subdued temperament. The pa- 
tient is not yet the same as he was before the disease overtook him. If he was, 
he would have to be regarded as restored to health, and there would, in its 
strict meaning, be no question as to a lucid interval. 

9, Remission differs from a lucid interval only in degree, being generally 
attended with a subsidence of the external manifestations of the disease, not 
sufficient, however, to be mistaken for recovery. 

3. Alternation is the term given to the change from one form of mental 
unsoundness to another, particularly from depression to mania and the con- 
verse, not however from psychical to bodily, or from bodily to psychical mani- 
festations. Where for instance the individual has long suffered from morbid 
depression or elation of spirits, this may gradually decrease and give place to 
an apparent return of health, which, however, does not last long, but sooner 
or later lapses into the opposite condition, so that depression turns into mania, 
and mania into depression. 

4, Intermission, when the disease recurs at more or less regular periods, 
and the disease presents no anomalous symptoms. 

§ 256. The restoration of moral responsibility progresses in correspondence 
with the progress of recovery. In passing, therefore, upon a given case, re- 
gard should be had, not only to the individual circumstances, but also to the 
time intervening between the cessation of patent insanity and the commission 
of the offence.(£) 

§ 257. On this point Dr. Rush thus speaks: ‘ The longer the intervals 
between the paroxysms of madness, the more complete is the restoration to 
reason. Remissions rather than intermissions take place when the intervals 
are of short duration, and these distinguish it from febrile delirium in which 
intermissions more generally occur. In many cases everything is remembered 
that passes under the notice of the patient during a paroxysm of general mad- 
ness, but in those cases where the memory is diseased as well as the understand- 
ing, nothing is recollected. I attended a lady in the month of October, 1802, 
who had crossed the Atlantic Ocean during a paroxysm of derangement, with- 
out recollecting a single circumstance of her voyage any more than if she had 
passed the whole time in sleep. Sometimes everything is forgotten in the 
interval of a paroxysm, but recollected in a succeeding paroxysm. I once 
attended the daughter of a British officer, who had been educated in the habits 
of gay life, who was married to a Methodist minister. In her paroxysms of 
madness, she resumed her gay habits, spoke French and ridiculed the tenets 
and practices of the sect to which she belonged. In the intervals of her fits, 
she renounced her gay habits, became zealously devoted to the religious prin- 
ciples and ceremonies of the Methodists, and forgot everything she did and 
said during her fits of insanity. A deranged sailor, some years ago, in the 
Pennsylvania Hospital, fancied himself to be an admiral, and walked and com- 
manded with all the dignity and authority that are connected with that high 
rank in the navy. He was cured and discharged : his disease some time after- 


‘ (k) Schiirmayer, Gericht. Med. § 574. 
276 


BOOK I.] TREATMENT OF INSANE CONVICTS. [8 959 


wards returned, and with it all the actions of an admiral which he assumed 
and imitated in his former paroxysm. It is remarkable that some persons 
when deranged éalx rationally, but act irrationally, while others act rationally 
and talk irrationally. We had a sailor some years ago in our hospital, who 
spent a whole year in building and rigging a small ship in his cell. Every 
part of it was formed by a mind apparently in a sound state. During the 
whole of the year in which he was employed in this work, he spoke nota 
word. In bringing his ship out of his cell, a part of it was broken. He im- 
mediately spoke and became violently deranged soon afterwards. Again, some 
madmen talk rationally and write irrationally; but it is more common for 
them to utter a few connected sentences in conversation, but not be able to 
connect two correct sentences together ina letter. Of this, I have known 
many instances in our hospital.’’(Z) . 

§ 258. Mania frequently assumes a type in which the periods of return and 
of cessation are marked with the greatest exactness and regularity.(m) Medi- 
cus, in his history of periodical diseases,(n) tells us of a girl who was subject 
to a delirium which came on every evening at exactly the same hour, and lasted 
three hours and a half. Of two women attacked with periodical madness, 
one was deranged nine days in each month, and the other two days. (0) 


XII. TREATMENT OF INSANE CRIMINALS. 


§ 259. The enlargement of the range of insane irresponsibility which the 
preceding sections recognize, makes the subject of the subsequent treatment of 
the insane offender of very momentous importance. Even if we adopt the 
severest legal tests, yet when a case occurs of an acquittal, as it sometimes 
must on the most stringent principles, the offender, who in this case, on the 
law’s own assumption, is a mere ‘ animal,’”’ should be no more permitted to 
range the streets than should a mad dog or a mad bull. But in point of fact, 
there are a myriad of phases of mental unsoundness, none of which are con- 
sistent with entire responsibility, and yet each of which has its distinct degree 
of moral culpability attached to it. Rare, indeed, are the instances, where 
there is not a consciousness of guilt, which, though distorted or faint, is, never- 
theless, appreciable. Still rarer are the cases of acquittal in which the insanity 
of the perpetrator is so abhorrent as to exclude it from the range of imitation 
by those who may desire to commit crime with impunity. And if these con- 
siderations be thrown aside, there still remains the fact that insane crime be- 
comes epidemic when it becomes heroic ; and that the only way to divest it of 
this quality, is to subject it to that wholesome but homely discipline which 
strips it of its sentimentality, and, at the same time, destroys its capacity for 
mischief. In this view it is recommended that wherever such provision does not 
already exist, there should be a separate penitentiary establishment for insane 
offenders, where they may continue to be confined, under the severest discipline 
consistent with health, until it appear on evidence taken upon due notice to 


(1) Rush on the Mind, pp. 162, 163, 164. (m) Siebold, Gericht. Med. § 217. 
(n) Kailsr. 1764. 
(0) See also Henke’s Zeitschr. 13 Bd. sec. 159. 


277 


§ 262] . TREATMENT OF INSANE CONVICTS. [BOOK I. 


the prosecuting authorities, that the patient is entirely sane. The propriety 
of such a course will appear by an examination of the subject under the fol- 
lowing heads :— 

(1.) Retribution. 

(2.) Prevention. 

(3.) Example. 

(4.) Reform. 


(1.) Retribution. 


§ 260. The question here depends on that of guilt. Was the offender in any 
sense a moral agent in the act complained of ? The answer presupposed by the 
present inquiry, viz., that of the relations of a person judged irresponsible on 
account of insanity, is, that he was not. And in a strict technical sense, this 
is undoubtedly true. The inquiry, however, may be pushed farther back, and 
here the case of delirium tremens may be taken as an illustration.(p) Delirium 
tremens, even on the most stringent principles, exonerates its subject from the 
penal consequences of a crime committed under its direct influence. And yet 
it is clear, first, that delirium tremens is the result of a prior vicious indulg- 
ence; second, that if the patient be permitted to wander about when the delirium 
continues, he will do further mischief, and, third, that if the offender escape 
with entire impunity, the example will be likely to be followed as a pretext, if 
not caught as a contagion. And under these circumstances what is to be done? 
It is plain that some species of confinement must be resorted to ; and that if 
such a method of discipline be applied, it will be, in a moral point of view, 
thoroughly justified by the delinquency which was the voluntary cause of the 
diseased mental condition under which the crime was committed. 

§ 261. What has just been said of delirium tremens applies with greater 
or less exactness to all other cases of mental unsoundness. Insanity, which is 
not congenital, or the result of accident or old age, is, in most cases, the result 
of causes which the patient himself might have averted if he had chosen.( pp) 
And particularly is this the case with that very species of mental unsoundness 
—that of monomania, or moral insanity—which is the cause of the greatest 
difficulty in the present connection. This is very admirably stated by Dr. 
Barlow, in his powerful essay on this very point :— 

§ 262. “T have said that mental derangement and madness are different 
things ; thus, a person may fancy he sees others around him who have no ex- 
istence, as in the well known cases of Nicholai, of Berlin, and Dr. Bostock. 
This is a certain degree of mental derangement while it lasts; but as both 
soon satisfied themselves that these personages were merely the creation of a 
morbid physical state, they were not mad. A man of less resolution would 
have shrunk from the labor of convincing himself that he was fooled by his 
senses, and would have insisted that the figures were real, and then he would 
have been mad. On these cases Dr. Connolly very justly remarks, ‘Let any 


(p) This question has already been touched upon, and the authorities bearing upon 
it have been noticed. See ante, §§ 62-70. In opposition to the views expressed in the 
text will be found Mr. M. B. Sampson’s “ Criminal Jurisprudence considered in rela- 
tion to cerebral organization.” London, 1843. See also ante, §§ 79-85. 

(pp) See ante, §§ 79-85, where this subject is discussed. 


278 


BOOK I.] MORAL RESPONSIBILITY OF LUNATICS. [$ 268 


one reflect how Nicholai preserved his reason under such visionary and audi- 
tory delusions for so many months ; and why the English physiologist, though 
visited with the images which are so well known to be familiar with mad 
people, never lost the use of his excellent understanding. The ready answer 
will be, they never believed in their real existence. But why did they not? 
And why does the madman believe in their real existence? The evidence of 
both is the same, the plain evidence of sense. The explanation must be this. 
The printer of Berlin and the physician in London retained the power of 
comparison ; they compared the visual objects of delusion, with the impres- 
sions of other senses,’ and the perceptions of other persons, and became con- 
vinced of their unreality. ‘This is exactly what madmen cannot do. One 
form of madness consists in this very illusion of sense, but it is conjoined with 
the loss or defect of the comparing power, and the madman concludes that 
what is only an illusion, is a reality. But the illusion is not the madness.’ 
Thus, according to the opinion of this very able judge, the affection of the 
brain which causes these delusions, 7s not madness, but the want of power or 
resolution to examine them is. Nothing, then, but an extent of disease, 
which destroys at once all possibility of reasoning, by annihilating, or entirely 
changing the structure of the organ, can make a man necessarily mad.’’(q) 

§ 263. “A man may labor under a mental delusion, and yet be a responsible 
agent; and if sanity or insanity be in a great many instances the consequences 
of a greater or less resolution in exerting the power of reasoning still pos- 
sessed, the same kind of motives which influence a man in common life, are 
still available, though they may require to be somewhat heightened. It is on 
this principle that the treatment of lunatics has been generally conducted. 
Fear, one of the lowest, but also one of the most general of instinctive emo- 
tions, has been called in to balance the delusions of sense, and excepting in 
cases where the structural disease is so extensive as to deprive the man of all 
power of connecting cause and effect, it has been found sufficient to curb vio- 
lence, and enforce a certain degree of peaceable demeanor towards the attend- 
ants. And in this the insane person differs not from the cultivated man who 
is left at liberty, whose self-control rarely amounts to more than the avoiding 
actions which would have unpleasant consequences to himself. Suppose an 
irascible man, incensed by a false report, which, however, he believes to be 
true; he seeks his supposed enemy, and horsewhips, or knocks him down; he 
does not assassinate, because he fears for his own life if he does; for it is clear 
that no feeling of duty has held his hand, or he would not have transgressed 
the laws both of God and man by thus revenging himself. The madman has 
the false report from his own senses; wherein do the two differ? Neither has 
employed means within his power to ascertain the truth, and both are aware 
that such vengeance is forbidden. I can see no distinction between them, save 
that the delusion of sense has, as a chemist would say, decomposed the cha- 
racter, and shown how much of the individual’s previous conduct was rational, 
and how much the result of mere animal instinct. It would be well for the 


(q) Barlow on Man’s Power over Himself, to Prevent or Control Insanity. London. 
W. Pickering, 1843. Phila. Lea & Blanchard, 1846. 
279 


§ 265] MORAL RESPONSIBILITY OF LUNATICS. [BOOK I. 


world if the soz-disant sane were sometimes to ask themselves how far their 
sanity would bear this test, and endeavor to acquire that rational self-command 
which nothing but the last extremity of cerebral disease could unseat. We 
do not descend from our high rank with impunity; and as when the matter 
has become organized, if the process of change, occasioned by the vital force, 
be impeded or arrested, the plant pines away and perishes; as, after the organs 
of locomotion have been superadded, the animal debarred from the use of 
them, languishes and becomes diseased; so man, if he give not full scope to 
the intellectual force, becomes subject to evils greater than animals ever know, 
because his nature is of a higher order.”’(7) 

§ 264. ‘Neither do severe injuries from external causes, though, like para- 
lysis, they might cause a loss of those faculties which connect man with the 
world about him, necessarily disconnect him with the world within, so as to 
place him beyond his own command. 

‘“‘A case has been communicated to me illustrative of this. A young lad 
who had been carefully instructed in the principles of religion and virtue, by 
the clergyman of his parish, afterwards went to sea. When he was about 
twenty-two, he unfortunately fell from the mast upon his head on the deck, 
and the injury to the brain was such that he was discharged from the service 
in a state of imbecility, and sent home to his parish. He was then in pos- 
session of the use of his limbs and hearing; but articulation was apparently 
difficult to him, and collected thought, which should enable him to speak con- 
nectedly, still more so; his sight, too, was subject to a delusion which made 
him imagine he saw gold and silver coin strewed about on the ground; which, 
as was natural, he eagerly endeavored to pick up. He was now visited by the 
clergyman who had been the instructor of his youth, who in kind terms as- 
sured him he was under a false impression, and advised him to give no heed 
to what he imagined he saw. The poor young man thanked him, and pro- 
mised to do as he desired, and for a time abstained from attempting to pick 
up the coin, but gradually the delusion became too strong for his resolution, 
and he recommenced. Yet, after every visit from his former instructor, he 
again controlled himself for a time; and, if he did not come, anxiously sought 
him at his own house. He died in a few months, but during the whole time 
was mild and submissive, seeming perfectly aware that his mind was disorder- 
ed; and, like a child who distrusts his own power, seeking to throw himself 
on the guidance of one whose kindness he remembered, and whose character 
he respected. This man was suffering mental derangement from injury of the 
parts, but was not insane; for the faculties left him were rationally exer- 
cised.(s) 

§ 265. “Cases of this kind have been considered by some as a peculiar 
type of insanity. By French authors it is entitled manie sans délire. Dr. 
Pritchard styles it instinctive madness. I am inclined, nevertheless, to refer 
such deranged propensities in some instances to a peculiar morbid state of 
sensation, and these will come under the head we are now considering, conse- 


(r) Barlow on Man’s Power over Himself to Prevent or Control Insanity. London, 
W. Pickering, 1843. Philadelphia, Lea and Blanchard, 1846. (s) Ibid. 


280 


BOOK I.] TREATMENT OF INSANE CONVICTS. [$ 267 


quently the desire is not irresistible, though strong, for we see that it has been 
successfully resisted ; in others I should refer it to the second class, under the 
head of ‘ Inefficiency of intellectual force,’ and then it depends on the resolu- 
tion of the person so affected whether the morbid sensation shall be meditated 
on and indulged, and thus acquire fresh force, or whether by exciting other 
sensations, it shall be weakened and by degrees vanquished. 

§ 266. ‘There is no greater error than to suppose that thinking about a 
propensity which ought not to be gratified, will conquer it; on the contrary, 
every hour of lonely thought gives it fresh force; but let the man plunge into 
business that must be attended to, or even a lighter occupation, so it be an 
engrossing one; and do this resolutely, however irksome it may at first ap- 
pear, and the very repose thus given to the diseased part, if there be disease, 
by throwing the whole stress on other portions of the brain, will assist in 
effecting a-cure.(¢) 

§ 267. ‘‘When a man has reached mature age without making any effort 
to render the brain subservient to the rational will, the fatigue and even pain 
consequent on the endeavor to obtain the mastery over it, is such, that few 
have resolution to undergo it voluntarily. Thus the man subsides more and 
more into the animal, and is at last guided only by those instinctive emotions 
which belong to the vital force merely. His passions assume a delirious vio- 
lence, and he is only distinguished from the brute from the greater skill with 
which he pursues their gratification. There is no disease of brain, but it has 
been left unexercised and ungoverned till it is as unmanageable as a limb that 
has been treated in the same way. 

“Toes have been used for writing and other arts which are usually per- 
formed by fingers; they are capable, therefore, of such use, but those who 
have constantly worn shoes cannot direct one toe separately from the rest, as 
they can the fingers. Yet with much trouble this power of directing might 
be acquired. Itis thus that the brain, unaccustomed to direction from the 
intellectual force, rebels against it, and if this latter fails to assert its sway, 
it may justly be termed inefficient. In a man thus animalized, the actions 
differ from those of his more spiritualized fellow men, who happily are more 
numerous; and when they find no such motive as they would consider a suffi- 
cient one for his conduct, they call him mad, by way of accounting for it. 
He commits a crime, and a plea of insanity is set up as a shelter from punish- 
ment. I will give an instance. It is recorded by the elder Pinel: ‘ An only 
son, educated by a silly and indulgent mother, was accustomed to give way to 
all his passions without restraint. As he grew up, the violence of his temper 
became quite uncontrollable, and he was constantly involved in quarrels and 
law-suits. If an animal offended him, he instantly killed it: yet, when calm, 
he was quite reasonable, managed his large estate with propriety, and was even 
known to be beneficent to the poor; but one day, provoked to rage by a 
woman who abused him, he threw her into a well. On his trial, so many 
witnesses deposed to the violence of his actions, that he was condemned to 


(t) Barlow on Man’s Power over Himself to Prevent or Control Insanity. London, 
W. Pickering, 1843. Philadelphia, Lea & Blanchard, 1846. 


281 


§ 267] MORAL RESPONSIBILITY OF LUNATICS. [BOOXx I. 


imprisonment in a mad-house.’ Yet any choleric*man who does in his rage 
what he is sorry for afterwards, is as much insane as this man was; both are 
under the influence of the vital force. A shock to some nerve of sensation 
stimulates the sympathetic system ; the circulation is hurried, and the blood 
flowing more rapidly through the brain, gives an unusual activity to the motor 
nerves, the movements are sudden and violent, the speech hurried, loud, and 
perhaps incoherent ; but the intellectual force knows the source of these symp- 
toms, and can curb them by resolute silence and inaction till the blood again 
flows at its usual pace; if it does not, the man, for a time, is in a state of 
mania, but is not the less responsible for having allowed himself to be so. 
‘‘Let us suppose another case; the thing is so constantly seen that every 
one could quote examples of it. A man unaccustomed to self-control, becomes 
occupied by- one thought: his ambition has been disappointed, perhaps, or a 
law-suit has plagued him, or he has been much employed in some engross- 
ing pursuit. Unable to regulate his thoughts at will, he finds the one 
which circumstances have made habitual, recur uncalled for. An effort would 
dismiss it, for every one who has studied, knows that he has had to dismiss 
many an intruding thought, and with some effort, too, if he wished to make 
progress in what he has undertaken; but this individual has never been ac- 
customed to make any such effort, and he knows not how to free himself from 
the subject which thus haunts him. If it be an unpleasant one, he is wearied 
and worn by it; but every day that it is not driven off, it assumes a greater 
power, for the part of the brain thus brought into action is now by habit ren- 
dered more fit for use than any other: he has not resolution enough to free 
himself from his tormentor by a determined application to something else 
which would require all his attention; he sits brooding over it, and when life 
has thus become irksome, he strives to terminate his discomfort by suicide ; 
yet, here is no structural disease ; and if the man could be persuaded to exert 
himself, he might be sane. I will give an instance. The master of a parish 
workhouse, about thirty years of age, was subjected frequently to groundless 
suspicions of peculation. Being naturally a taciturn, low-spirited man, these 
false accusations which involved his character, and consequently the mainte- 
nance of his family, preyed upon his mind, and a profound melancholy was 
the result, attended by the usual symptomatic derangement of the digestive 
functions, and a constant apprehension that he had done something wrong, he 
did not know what. No assurance on the part of those who knew and esteemed 
him had any effect, and finally, after some months of melancholy, he attempted 
to destroy himself. He was then removed to St. Luke’s Hospital, whence, after 
a year had elapsed, he was discharged incurable. He was now placed in a © 
private receptacle of the insane, and here suffered all the misery which at that 
time pauper lunatics were subjected to. He was visited at this place by a be- 
nevolent man, who, seeing his state, immediately ordered him to be removed 
into the gentleman’s apartments, and paid for his maintenance there. Ina ' 
few months afterwards he was visited by the clergyman of his parish, who, on 
conversing with him, considered him sane. The man begged to be allowed to 
rejoin his wife and family, and the rector, after many difficulties and some 
threats to the parish authorities, succeeded in setting him free. The man from 
282 


BOOK I.] HOW LUNATICS ARE TO BE DISCIPLINED. [$ 268 


that time was able to maintain his family by his trade of shoemaking, for if 
ever a fit of melancholy came over him, a threat from his wife that he should 
be sent back to the madhouse was sufficient to engage him to make an effort 
to resume his cheerfulness ; and he remained to old age a sane man. Here the 
insanity had been merely tneffictency of the intellectual force. Placed in a 
situation of comparative ease, his mind had become calm ; the wish to return 
to his wife and family, and the hope of it, kept up by the visits of benevolent 
friends, did the rest: for, be it observed, during the whole time he never felt 
himself abandoned. The poor and the uneducated are the classes which most 
usually suffer from the ¢nefficzency of the intellectual force; it is among the 
higher ranks usually that its misdirection is a source of insanity. Among 
these, more distant objects of pursuit keep the thoughts longer upon the 
stretch towards one point ; the organs of mechanical memory are strengthened, 
nay, even strained by the habit of learning much by rote, while the constant 
supply of learning ready-made, leaves no necessity for the more laborious pro- 
cesses of reasoning and comparison. Hence we not unfrequently find an elegant 
scholar, who can readily quote the words and opinions of others, unable himself to 
carry on a course of close argument, or to prove the truth of what he advances. 
Whoever has moved in society, knows that it is rare to meet with any one who 
can command his thoughts in conversation frequently to reject all that is not 
relevant to the subject, so as to keep on the chain of reasoning unbroken. (wu) 

§ 268. ‘‘When the mind is thus exercised in remembering the opinions of 
others, thus unaccustomed accurately to examine its own, what wonder is it if 
it should become prepossessed with some irrational notion which cannot be 
removed by reasoning, because the individual man in his healthiest state had 
never chosen so to exercise his mind; or if, when a delusion of sense occurs, 
he should choose rather to act upon it as truth, than to examine into the 
erounds he has for believing it to be such. It is a melancholy fact that a 
ereat number of mankind are in this state as regards the faculties most re- 
quisite to self-control, and depend far more on the accident of good health, 
than the exertion of their own intellectual power, for their sanity. I have 
heard of more than one instance of hard livers, as they were termed, who 
probably, in consequence of a slight affection of the brain from the unnatural 
stimulus of wine long kept up, became possessed with an opinion that they 
were slighted by one or more of their friends; and, resisting all reasoning on 
the subject, ended by destroying themselves. Yet, they were rational on other 
matters of importance, and therefore it is to be concluded, that even on this 
point, they were capable of being rational also, had they chosen to make the 
exertion. It is recorded of Henri of Bourbon, son of the great Condé, that 
at times he imagined himself transformed into a dog, and would then bark 
violently. Once this notion seized him while in the king’s presence; he then 
felt it needful for him to control himself, and he did so; for though he turned 
to the window, and made grimaces as if barking, he made no noise. Had the 
king’s eye been upon him, it is probable that he would have avoided the 
grimaces also.”’(v) 


(u) Ibid. (v) Ibid. See ante, 78-85. 
283 


§ 271] TREATMENT OF INSANE CONVICTS. [BOOK I. 


§ 269. “The indulgence of violent emotions,” observes Dr. Connolly, ‘is 
singularly detrimental to the human understanding, and it is to be presumed, 
that the unmeasured emotions of insanity are sometimes perpetuated in con- 
sequence of the disorder of brain originally induced by their violence. A man 
is at first only irritable, but gives way to his irritability. Whatever tempo- 
rarily interferes with any bodily or mental function, reproduces the disposition 
to be irritated, and circumstances are never wanting to act upon this disposi- 
tion till it becomes a disease. The state of the brain, or part of the brain, 
which is produced whenever the feeling of irritation is renewed, is more easily 
induced at each renewal, and concurs with the moral habit to bring on the 
paroxysm on every slight occasion—other vehement emotions and: passions 
effect the same disorders of the mind.’’(ww) 


(2.) Prevention. 


-§ 270. A very eminent American physician tells us, that ‘no argument 
should weigh, for a moment, with a court of justice, in favor of liberating 
such an individual (one subject to homicidal mania). The fact that life has 
been taken, should overbalance all motives to send such person into society 
again, while the delusions and estrangements of insanity continue; and, we 
add, not until months, if not years, of peace, and freedom from excitement 
should have confirmed their entire release from this dangerous form of disease.”’ 
‘‘We recently attended,” says the same authority, “an interesting trial on a 
subject of this nature in a neighboring county in this State. An habitually 
peaceful and worthy man was indicted for the most shocking murder of his 
wife, with an axe, and a horrible attempt upon the lives of his children with 
the same weapon. The facts were not denied, and his only defence was, that 
of insanity. He was acquitted, principally upon our testimony as to the fact 
of his being insane at the time the murder was committed, of which we have 
not the slightest doubt ; but our astonishment was only exceeded by our alarm, 
when subsequently informed that bail had been admitted, and this afflicted, 
but truly dangerous man, was permitted to go at large. This ought not to 
be so. Science and humanity may interpose for the life of the homicide, but 
society should ever be protected from the effects of his dreadful disease. The 
lunatic asylum is their proper place; and it should be duly prepared for their 
reception and detention.’’(x) 

§ 271. The man who, in an insane impulse, kills one man, is more than 
likely, under the same impulse, to kill another. And, indeed, the several facts 
of moral mania imply a chronic tendency to the particular crime. This was 
agreed on all sides in Hadfield’s case, where the point was first mooted. “For 
his own sake,’’ said Lord Kenyon, ‘and for the sake of society at large, he 
must not be discharged, for this is a case which concerns every man of every 
station, from the king upon the throne to the beggar at the gate; people of 
both sexes and all ages may, in an unfortunate, frantic hour, fall a sacrifice to 


(w) Ibid. 
(x) Dr. Woodward, cited in 4 Journal of Psychological Medicine, p. 469. 
284 


BOOK 1.] EXAMPLE, [$ 272 


this man, who is not under the guidance of sound reason, and therefore it is 
absolutely necessary, for the safety of society, that he should be properly dis- 
posed of, all mercy and humanity being shown to the unfortunate creature; 
but, for the sake of the community, he must somehow or other be taken care 
of, with all the attention and all the relief that can be afforded him.”’ Here- 
upon the counsel for the crown and the counsel for the defendant agreed that 
the safety of the community required that he should be taken care of. ‘‘It is 
laid down in some books,” said the former (Sir John Mitford, afterwards Lord 
Redesdale), ‘‘that, by the common law, the judges of every court are competent 
to direct the confinement of a person under such circumstances.” “That may 
be, Mr. Attorney-General,’ interposed Lord Kenyon, “but at present we can 
only remand him to the confinement he came from; but means will be used to 
confine him otherwise in a manner much better adapted to his situation.” It 
was then suggested by Mr. Garrow (afterwards a baron of the exchequer) 
that “it would be for the benefit of posterity if the jury would state in their 
verdict the grounds upon which they gave it, viz., that they acquit the prisoner 
of this charge, he appearing to them to have been under the influence of 
insanity at the time the act was committed. ‘There would then,” he added, 
‘‘be a legal and sufficient reason for his confinement.’’(y) This reeommenda- 
tion was adopted by the jury, who returned a verdict in these terms. Thus 
originated the form of verdict now commonly returned in cases of this de- 
scription. 


(3.) Haample. 


§ 272. The recorded cases are numerous in which the supposed irresponsi- 
bility of lunatics has led to the perpetration of crime by the insane. ‘They 
cannot hang him,’’ was whispered about in the York Lunatic Asylum, when 
the firing of York Minster by a supposed lunatic was under consideration, 
“he is one of ourselves.” And one of the most dangerous convicts in the 
Kastern Penitentiary—one laboring under homicidal mania in its most invete- 
rate shape—was constantly expressing his disappointment at finding that, 
notwithstanding his acquittal on the ground of insanity, he was to be continued 
in prison. He had, in fact, supposed himself privileged by his disease to com- 
mit this particular crime.(yy) And even taking the strongest case—that of 
the man who is possessed by a homicidal mania which equals in intensity the 


~y) Howell’s State Trials, vol. xxvii. p. 1354 et seq. Suggestions for the future Pro- 
vision of Criminal Lunatics, by W. Charles Hood, M. D., London, 1854, pp. 16, 17. 

(yy) In reference to this case I have the following note from Mr. nee Paul Brown, 
who was counsel for the person mentioned :— * 

“You refer, as I suppose, to the case of Wiley Williams, who shot Dr. Kirkbride. 
I have some knowledge of that case, tending clearly to show, in your language, that 
‘the recorded cases are numerous in which the supposed irresponsibility of lunatics 
has led to the perpetration of crime by the insane.’ 

“ Shortly before Williams shot Dr. Kirkbride, I received a letter from the lunatic, in 
which he complained of his sufferings during several months of confinement at the 
asylum, expressed his delight at his escape, and desired to know what redress he could 
obtain for the injuries he had unjustly sustained. In conclusion he stated that if the 
law did not furnish redress, he would be his own avenger. ‘If,’ says he, ‘I was not 
insane when I was placed in the asylum, those who put or those who kept me there 
deserve death for their cruelty ; and if I was insane, then, if I kill them, my insanity 
will exempt me from the consequences of crime!’ ” 


285 


§ 274] TREATMENT OF INSANE CONVICTS. [BOOK I. 


passion of particular classes of dogs for sheep’s blood—we will have strong 
ground to believe that such an instinct can be tutored. Monomanias, in fact, 
‘are epidemics, and spread precisely to the degree in which they are invested 
with sentimental celebrity. The Leipsic ‘ Madchen-Schneider,” who when 
charged with gratifying a morbid sexual impulse by striking lancets in the 
arms of such young girls as he might meet in a crowded street, never exer- 
cised this propensity except when it was likely it would be undetected. Shame 
and the fear of punishment restrained him thus far; but it was quite otherwise 
when he became the object of 4 sentimental curiosity, which visited him during 
his trial and imprisonment with the same attentions, perhaps more, which 
would have been paid to a live mermaid or the Siamese twins. The mono- 
mania became an epidemic, and would have continued so had not an igno- 
minious punishment been affixed. 


(4.) Reform. 


§ 273. To permit a monomaniac to go at large, will be to give fuel to his 

disease, as well as to supply it with victims— 

‘‘ Mobilitate viget, 
Viresque acquiret eundo.”’ 

And to nothing does this apply with greater force than that exaggerated state 
of the moral system which has just been discussed. If the indulgence in 
passion, even in a healthy mind, tends, as has been just shown, to derange- 
ment, it will readily be seen that no recovery can be effected while the patient is 
permitted to run at large, exposed to all the irritating influences of unguarded 
society, and gathering a momentum for coming excesses from the very liberty 
he is allowed in the present. 

§ 274. Dr. Mayo thus well illustrates the awkward position of insane crimi- 
nals under the present administration of the law: ‘‘It must be confessed that 
the conditional responsibility which the law, and, as I think, the reason, of 
the case attributes to the insane is not easily applicable in practice, either 
under lucid intervals, or under such other phases of the insane state as might 
seem to justify it. The law will remain a dead letter, or will be continually 
ignored by the sympathies of judges, juries, and, I may add, of medical wit- 
nesses, unless some practical distinction can be arranged which may enable the 
responsible insane to undergo some lower degree of punishment than that 
inflicted on similar delinquents being of sound mind. The position of many 
such persons under capital charges is at present anomalous. They are acquit- 
ted in defiance of the law, as laid down by the judges respecting M’Nughten’s 
case, because the punishment at present appertaining to the offence would be 
too severe; and then, instead of being consigned to confinement in a gaol, as a 
secondary punishment, they are consigned to it in an asylum, as a place simply 
of detention. This becomes a scene of severe virtual punishment to some of 
them, of gratification to vanity and idleness to others; those, meanwhile, to 
whom it is a grievance, as they do not regard it in the light of a punishment, 
derive from it none of the preventive effects of punishment on future conduct, 
while the public, for the same reason, find it equally unproductive of good, as 

286 


BOOK I.] UNSUITABLENESS OF THE ORDINARY ASYLUMS. [$ 277 


an example to persons of actually diseased mind, or to that large class of 
other persons who are drifting into disease under uncontrolled eccentricity.”’(z) 

§ 275. It is impossible to carry out the proper disciplinary and remedial 
measures in a penitentiary common to the sane and insane. ‘I am satisfied 
of the fact,” says Dr. Hood, “that criminal lunatics are more difficult to 
manage than other lunatics; there is more irritability of temper and general 
restlessness about them; they are cognizant of the offences they have com- 
mitted, and being under the impression that they will never recover their 
liberty, they are less disposed to be contented or happy. They are also con- 
scious that they are separated into and form a distinct class of patients, and 
this very circumstance establishes a species of fraternity among them; for 
they are in constant communication with each other, and their curiosity is 
naturally excited to ascertain the circumstances connected with every new 
arrival. They thus soon become acquainted with each other’s history, which 
is often the cause of much quarrelling and mutual recrimination; the better 
class of patients are unhappy at being associated with the inferior order— 
criminals whose manners and language are habitually of the most revolting 
description. Hence I conclude that the fundamental principle upon which we 
should proceed, in providing for the safe custody, maintenance, and medical 
care of our criminal lunatics, should be that of establishing a certain classi- 
fication among them, founded upon the degrees or nature of the crimes which 
they may have committed. This principle conceded, we have then to consider 
the expediency or inexpediency of organizing a State lunatic asylum for their 
common reception; the possibility or impossibility of each county providing 
adequate accommodation in existing asylums for its own criminal lunatics; 
and whether arrangements might not be made in prisons, and houses of cor- 
rection, for the medical treatment of such prisoners as may, while undergoing 
imprisonment or penal servitude, become insane.” (a) 

§ 276. On the other hand, the confinement of an insane criminal in an 
ordinary lunatic asylum, is beset with still greater difficulties. ‘It is,” says 
Dr. Hood, “not only annoying to other patients, but greatly disturbs the 
ordinary discipline of the establishment; for be it observed, lunatics, whether 
criminal or non-criminal, are capable of some degree of reasoning; and their 
conscious incapacity of enjoying this faculty to its full extent, often recoils 
painfully upon their feelings, and becomes, in itself, a source of irritation. In 
providing, indeed, for the safe custody, and the management of the insane of 
all classes, we should proceed upon the same principles as if we were legislating 
for professedly sane persons ; because, the mind is never totally eclipsed, there 
is always some lingering ray of light which the intact reflection may seize upon 
with instinctive truthfulness.”’(0) 

§ 277. Concluding observations on the remodelling of our present sys- 
tem.—If the views taken in the preceding sections be sound; if, in the first 
place, there are inherent difficulties in the way of making insanity a ground 


(z) Mayo on Medical Testimony in Lunacy, pp. 50-52. 
' (a) Suggestions for the future provision of Criminal Lunatics, by W. Charles Hood 
M.D. London, 1854. pp. 28-29. 
(b) Ibid. pp. 27, 28. a 
287 


§ 277] HOW OUR PRESENT SYSTEM SHOULD BE REMODELED. [BOOK I. 


of defence on the trial of a man, who, on this hypothesis is psychologically 
incapable of either tendering or preparing any such issue ;(c) if, in the second 


(c) The absurdity of our present practice, in making insanity a personal defence, 
to be taken or rejected by the alleged lunatic in the exercise of a volition which the 
very nature of the defence supposes him incapable of exercising, is fully exhibited by 
the following case :— 


SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF LOUISIANA. 
The Court met Monday, April 9th, 1855. 


Present, their honors Thomas Slidell, Chief Justice ; Cornelius Voorhies, A. M. Bu- 
chanan, A. N. Ogden, H. M. Spafford, associate justices. 


The State of Louisiana, appellee, Appeal from Ist District Court, New 


3838. Orleans. 


v. 
James Patton, appellant. 
Spafford, Justice, delivered the opinion of the Court. 


Upon the trial of James Patton for the murder of Walter Turnbull, the following 
bill of exceptions was taken by the prisoner’s counsel :— 

Be it remembered, that on the trial of this cause, on the 20th day of March, 1854, 
after the evidence on the part of the State was closed, and when the counsel of the 
prisoner were proceeding to prove by the evidence of witnesses the insanity of the said 
prisoner, at the time of the killing set forth on the indictment, and a long time before, 
and ever since the said killing, the said prisoner arose and objected to and repudiated 
the said defence, and insisted upon discharging his counsel, and submitting his case 
to the jury without any further evidence or action of his counsel in his defence ; his 
counsel opposed and remonstrated against the prisoner’s being permitted to do so, 
alleging that they were prepared to prove the defence by clear and irresistible testi- 
mony; but the court overruled the objection of the said counsel, and permitted the 
prisoner to discharge his counsel, and refused to hear them further on his defence, and 
gave the case to the jury without any further evidence or pleading on his behalf; to 
all which opinion and ruling of said court the defendant’s said counsel excepts, and 
prays his exceptions may be signed, &c. 

(Signed) John B. Robertson, Judge. 


There was a verdict of “guilty without capital punishment’”’—and, after the former 
counsel had in the quality of amicz curte attempted to obtain a new trial and arrest 
of judgment without success, the prisoner was sentenced to hard labor for life in the 
penitentiary. 

From this judgment the present appeal has been taken :— 

The sanity or insanity of the prisoner is a matter of fact; the admissibility of evi- 
dence to establish his insanity, under the circumstances detailed in the bill of excep- 
tions, is a matter of law, and the only matter which the constitution authorizes this 
tribunal to decide. 

The case is so extraordinary in its circumstances that we are left without the aid 
of precedents. 

In support of the ruling of the district judge, it has been urged that every man is 
presumed to be sane until the contrary appears, and that a person on trial for an 
alleged offence has a constitutional right to discharge his counsel at any moment, to 
repudiate their action on the spot, and to be heard by himself; hence the inference is 
deduced that the judge could not have admitted the evidence, against the protest of 
the prisoner, without reversing the ordinary presumption, and presuming insanity. 

In criminal trials, it is important to keep ever in mind the distinction between law 
and fact, between the functions of a judge and those of a jury. 

It was for the jury, and the jury alone, to determine whether there was insanity or 
not, after hearing the evidence and the instructions of the court as to the principles 
of law applicable to the case. 

By receiving the proffered evidence for what it might be worth, the judge would 
have decided no question of fact; he would merely have told the jury, “the law per- 
mits yan to hear and weigh this evidence; whether it proves anything it is for you 
to say. 

By rejecting it, he deprived the jury of some of the means of arriving at an enlight- 
ened conclusion upon a vital point peculiarly within their province, and in effect - 
decided himself, and without the aid of all the evidence within his reach, that the 
prisoner was sane. 

It is idle to say that the legal presumption, and the prisoner’s own declarations, ap- 
pearance and conduct on the trial, established his sanity to the satisfaction of both 


288 


BOOK I.] INSANITY INQUIRED INTO AFTER CONVICTION. [$ 277 


place, the doctrine of instinctive or moral mania be allowed in legal theory the 
sweep which is asserted for it by medical experts, and which in this country at 
Jeast is conceded to it by the courts; if, in the third place, it be right that the 
present system of confinement of insane criminals be remodelled—then it will 
become necessary for those to whom the work of legislation is committed to 
amend the law so as to reserve the question of insanity to be determined by a 
competent tribunal after a conviction of the fact of guilt. For the following 
undeniable evils result from the present system :— 

(a.) A tribunal of, at least, but secondary competency is charged with the 
determination of the most difficult-and yet most momentous question to which 
human observation can be applied. (d) 


judge and jury; for presumption may be overthrown, declarations may be unfounded, 
and conduct and appearances may be deceitful ; and the prisoner’s counsel, sworn 
officers of the court, with their professional character at stake upon the loyalty of their 
conduct, alleged that they stood there prepared to prove, by what they deemed clear 
and irresistible testimony, that the accused was insane at the time of the homicide, 
long before, and ever since; so that the sole inquiry now is, not whether they or the 
court were right as to the fact of sanity upon which we can have no opinion, but 
whether they should have been allowed to put the testimony they had at hand before 
the jury, to be weighed with the counter evidence. 

If the prisoner was insane at the time of the trial, as counsel offered to prove, he 
was incompetent to conduct his own defence unaided, to discharge his counsel, or to 
waive a right. 

Upon the supposition that the counsel were mistaken in regard to the weight of the 
evidence they wished to offer, as they may have been, still its introduction could 
do the prisoner no harm, nor could it estop him from any other defence he might 
choose to make on his own account; neither could it prejudice the State, for it is to 
be presumed that the jury would have given the testimony its proper weight ; if, on 
the other hand, the counsel were not mistaken as to the legal effect of this evidence, 
the consequences of its rejection would be deplorable indeed. 

The overruling necessity of the case seems to demand that, whenever a previous 
soundness of mind and consequent accountability for his acts are in question, the rule 
that he may control or discharge his counsel, at pleasure, should be so far relaxed as 
to permit them to offer evidence on those points, even against his will. Considering, 
therefore, that it would be more in accordance with sound legal principles, and with 
the humane spirit which pervades even the criminal law, to allow the rejected testi- 
mony to go before the jury, the cause must be remanded for that purpose. 

It was said in argument, on behalf of the State, that the alleged insanity was, at 
most, but a monomania upon another topic, which could not exempt the prisoner from 
responsibility for the homicide. 

The judge will instruct the jury in regard to the principles of law which govern this 
subject, when all the facts shall have been heard. At present, the discussion is pre- 
mature. 

It is therefore ordered, adjudged, and decreed that the judgment of the court below 
be reversed, the verdict of the jury set aside, and the cause remanded for a new trial 
according to law. 

(d) Dr. Hood very justly remarks: ‘All human tribunals are fallible, and how, 
when this plea of insanity is raised, can we unveil the mind of the accused, and de- 
termine where responsibility ends and irresponsibility begins? We may appreciate 
outward and visible signs, but we have no mentometer (if I may be allowed to coin a 
word) which will indicate the thoughts that may be passing through the mind. In 
medical jurisprudence the diagnosis between sanity and insanity is, in many cases, 
infinitely difficult ; and it is upon this account that specialists in this branch of our 
profession so often come into collision with members of the bar, and draw down upon 
themselves occasionally animadversions from the judges on the bench. There would 
be no difference of opinion between the two learned professions if we could arrive at 
any fixed principles by which we could explain the silent operations of the mind; 
but this, so far as insanity is concerned, is as impossible in law as it is in medicine. 
We may adjudicate upon the overt act, but the motive which dictated it will very 
often elude the most searching examination. But this happens continually in sane 


19 289 


§ 277] HOW INSANITY SHOULD BE TRIED. [BOOK I. 


(b.) A subject is introduced into the question of guilt or innocence, as to 
which no fixed judicial rules can be laid down, and which really concerns only 
the character and the extent of punishment. 

(c.) A fearful confusion takes place between the sane convict; the malig- 
nant insane convict, who requires discipline and is, in some degree, morally 
responsible; the znnocent insane convict ;(¢) and the lunatic, who is in con- 
finement but is not charged with crime: for all of whom there is in some 
jurisdictions but one common method of discipline provided, viz: that of the 
penitentiary ; in others, but éwo, that of the penitentiary and of the ordinary 
lunatic asylum. The result of this is acquittals in some cases, when there 
should be convictions ; convictions in other cases when there should be acquit- 
tals, and in almost all cases an erroneous system of punishment. 

The remedy for these difficulties is one to which we must come sooner or 
later, and for which the common law has been from the beginning always 
striving, and yet always losing from almost its very grasp. It is to confine 
the inquiry before the court and jury to the mere factum of the commission 
of the offence; reserving the question of treatment to be determined by a 
special commission of experts, to be appointed for the purpose of examining 
convicts alleged to be insane. ‘The proposition to be put by the court to the 
jury, under such circumstances, is not, “ Was the defendant capable of judg- 
ing between right and wrong?’ a proposition which no jury can determine, 
but, ‘‘ Did he,” as a matter of fact, “commit the specific act charged?’ For 
whether he committed it as sane or insane, the result is, if the offence in point 
of law be indictable, that the safety of society requires that he should he 
placed in seclusion for such a period as will promote the joint ends of personal 
reformation and the preservation of the well-being of the community at large. 
If he be guilty without the palliation of mental infirmity, certainly the 
severest penal code—with the single qualification of cases of murder in the 
first degree—can ask nothing more than this. If, on the other hand, he was 
at the time laboring under mental derangement, in no other way can the ex- 
tent of his responsibility be accurately determined, and the proper degree of 
discipline adjusted. or this great question of sanity or insanity can really 
be only determined by those to whose daily and hourly care the convict is 
committed, and who have thus full opportunity of inquiring into his antece- 
dent as well as his present condition. ‘“ Thus,’’ to adopt the language of a 
late very intelligent commentator,(/) ‘except as regards the curative course 
to be adopted, on our view of the case, the subtle line of distinction which 
there have been so many abortive attempts to draw, between criminal and 
non-criminal lunatics, is of no practical importance, and the unavailing search, 


as well as in insane life.”—WSuggestions for the future Provision of Criminal Lunatics, 
by W. C. Hood, M.D. London, 1654. 
And we may add to this the testimony of a great poet on a kindred point :— 


‘* May it please your Excellency, your thief looks 
Exactly like the rest, or rather better ; 
Tis only at the bar or iz the dungeon 
That wise men know your felon by his features.”’ 


(e) See as to distinction between these, ante, §§ 232-251. 
(f) XXI. London Law Review, 364. 
290 


BOOK I.] INSANITY INQUIRED INTO AFTER CONVICTION. [§ 277 


unless as a matter of metaphysical speculation, may be abandoned as unneces- 
sary. In either case, the person concerned, whether called a lunatic, a crimi- 
nal lunatic, or an ordinary criminal, should be so placed as to put it out of 
his power to inflict further injury, and to afford the most likely means for his 
cure.’”’ And thus, also, not only will the sanctions of human life and pro- 
perty be protected from the recurrence of those monstrous acquittals, by which, 
under the plea of insanity, the most dangerous criminals are suffered to run at 
large, but the interests of humanity will be subserved by a proper discipline, 
as well as a just classification, of those whose accountability is diminished or 
destroyed. (g) 


(g) “I may be asked what principle I would propound for the guidance of courts 
of law in these cases. I cannot but repeat what I have already declared to be my 
conviction, that in every criminal case where the question of responsibility arises in the 
course of judicial inquiry: IF IT BE POSSIBLE TO ESTABLISH ANY DEGREE OF POSITIVE IN- 
SANITY, IT SHOULD ALWAYS BE VIEWED AS A VALID PLEA FOR A CONSIDERABLE MITIGATION OF 
PUNISHMENT, AND AS PRIMA FACIE EVIDENCE IN FAVOR OF THE PRISONER; AND IN NO CASE 
WHERE INSANITY CLEARLY EXISTS (WITHOUT REGARD TO ITS NATURE AND AMOUNT) OUGHT THE 
EXTREME PENALTY OF THE LAW TO BE INFLICTED. 

‘‘ What, I may be asked, is my test of insanity? Ihave none. I know of no un- 
erring, infallible, and safe rule or standard, applicable to all cases. The only logical 
and philosophic mode of procedure in doubtful cases of mental alienation, is to com- 
pare the mind of the lunatic at the period of his suspected insanity with its prior 
natural and healthy condition: in other words, to consider the intellect in relation to 
itself, and to no artificial @ priori test. Each individual case must be viewed in its 
own relations. It is clear that such is the opinion of the judges, notwithstanding 
they maintained as a test of responsibility a knowledge of right and wrong. Can 
any other conclusion be drawn from the language used by the judges when propound- 
ing in the House of Lords their view of insanity in connection with crime? ‘The 
facts,’ they say, ‘of each particular case must of necessity present themselves with 
endless variety and with every shade of difference in each case; and as it is their duty 
to declare the law upon each particular case, upon facts proved before them, and 
after hearing arguments of counsel thereon, they deem it at once impracticable, and at 
the same time dangerous to the administration of justice, if it were practicable, to attempt 
to make minute applications of the principles involved in the answers given by them to 
the questions proposed.’ This is a safe, judicious, and philosophic mode of investi- 
gating these painful cases; and if strictly adhered to, the ends of justice would be 
secured, and the requirements of science satisfied. 

“In considering the question of modified responsibility in connection with these 
cases of alleged insanity, we should never lose sight of the fact, that, even if a lunatic 
be fully exonerated and acquitted in consequence of his state of mind, he is doomed 
to linger out the remainder of his miserable existence in the criminal wards of a pub- 
lic lunatic asylum. 

“To talk of a person escaping the extreme penalty of the law on the plea of insanity, 
as one being subjected to no kind or degree of punishment, is a perfect mockery of truth 
and perversion of language. Suffer no punishment! He is exposed to the severest 
pain and torture of body and mind that can be inflicted upon a human creature short 
of being publicly strangled upon the gallows. “If the fact be doubted, let a visit be 
paid to that dreadful den at Bethlehem Hospital— 


‘ Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace 
And rest can never dwell, hope never come, 
That comes to all’— 


where the criminal portion of the establishment are confined like wild beasts in an 
iron cage! 

‘‘ Much has been said of the deterring effects of capital punishment. I do not doubt 
its having some effect in preventing crime; but I incline to the opinion that if the real 
condition of those confined as criminal lunatics was well understood (assuming the 
insane to be amenable to the fear of punishment), it would act more potently as a 
deterring agent than any apprehension they might feel at the prospect of a public 
execution. 

“Tt was the opinion of Beccaria that the impression made by any punishment was 
in proportion to its duration, and not to its intensity. ‘Our sensibility,’ he observes, 
‘is more readily and permanently affected by slight but reiterated attacks than by a 


291 


§ 277] HOW INSANITY SHOULD BE TRIED. [BOOK I. 


violent but transient affection. For this reason, the putting an offender to death forms 
a less effectual check to the commission of crimes than the spectacle of a man kept in 
a state of confinement, and employed in hard labor to make some reparation, by his 
exertions, for the injuries he has inflicted on society.’ 

‘“‘In judicially estimating cases of crime connected with alleged conditions of in- 
sanity, it is our duty always to bear in mind that if an error be committed on the side 
of undue severity, it never can be remedied. 

‘No reparation can be made for so great an injury—for so serious an act of injustice. 
If a criminal should be unjustly acquitted on the plea of insanity (and I admit such 
cases have occurred), a degree of injury is undoubtedly done to society, and the con- 
fidence in the equitable administration of justice is, to an extent, shaken. But cana 
judicial mistake like this for one moment be compared with the serious and fatal error 
of consigning an irresponsible creature to a cruel and ignominious death ? 

“It is well observed by Bentham that ‘the minimum of punishment is more clearly 
marked than its maximum. What is too little is more clearly observed than what is 
too much. What is not sufficient is easily seen; but it is not possible so exactly to dis- 
tinguish an excess. An approximation only can be obtained. The irregularities in 
the force of temptation compel the legislator to increase his punishments until they 
are not merely sufficient to restrain the ordinary desires of men, but also the violence 
of their desires when unusually excited. The greatest danger lies in an error on the 
minimum side, because in this case the punishment is inefficacious ; but this error is 
least likely to occur, a slight degree of attention sufficing for its escape; and when it 
does exist, it is, at the same time, clear and manifest, and easy to be remedied. An 
error on the maximum side, on the contrary, is that to which legislators and men in 
general are naturally inclined; antipathy, or a want of compassion for individuals 
who are represented as dangerous and vile, pushes them onward to an undue severity. 
It is on this side, therefore, that we should take the most precautions, as on this side 
there has been shown the greatest disposition to err.”—Winslow’s Essay on Legal 
Responsibility, 15 Am. Journ. of Insanity, p. 191. 

See also an interesting essay on Criminal Insane, Insane Transgressors, and Insane 
Convicts, by Edward Jarvis, M. D., of Dorchester, Mass. ,in the 13th volume of the Am. 
Journ. of Insanity, p. 195. 


292 


Bi Ovkwes LT 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO THE FETUS AND 
NEW-BORN CHILD. 


i a Te CIDR GLI WG ues al ey Od Me Wd hs Wp Oe 


CHAPTER I. 
SIGNS OF PREGNANCY. 


Ist. SUPPRESSION OF THE MENSES, § 278. 

2d. ENLARGEMENT OF THE ABDOMEN, § 279. 

3d. CHANGES IN THE MOUTH AND NECK OF THE wos, § 281. 
4th. QuickENING, § 282. 

5th. SYMPATHETIC PHENOMENA, § 284. 

6th. PULSATION OF THE FETAL HEART, § 289. 

7th. OTHER SOUNDS INDICATIVE OF PREGNANCY, § 290. 

8th. KIESTEIN IN THE URINE, § 291. 


CHAPTER II. 
DHLIV Biny. 


Ist. SIGNS OF RECENT DELIVERY, § 292. 

2d. SIGNS OF DELIVERY IN THE DEAD, § 296. 
3d. Corpus Lureum, § 297. 

4th. FEIGNED DELIVERY, § 301. 


CHAPTER III. 
DURATION OF PREGNANCY. 


lst. PRESUMPTION THAT THE CHILD BORN IN WEDLOCK IS LEGITIMATE, § 302. 
2d. PROTRACTED GESTATION, § 303. 
(1.) Usual duration of pregnancy, § 303. 
(2.) Mode of reckoning duration of pregnancy, § 304. 
(a.) Cause of conception, § 305. 
(b.) Cessation of the catamenia, § 307. 
(c.) Arrest of monthly discharge, § 308. 
(d.) Statistical results, § 311. 
3d. LEGAL DEcISIoNs, § 322. 
4th. Harty viaBiuity, § 323. 


Ce Ar PAG Eis 
SUPERFQ@TATION. 


Ist. TWIN PREGNANCIES IN WHICH THE CHILDREN HAVE HAD DIFFERENT FATHERS, § 328. 

2d. PARTURITION OF CHILDREN AT THE SAME TIME, BUT OF DIFFERENT DEGREES OF DEVELOP- 
MENT, § 331. 

3d. SHORT INTERVALS BETWEEN BIRTHS OF EQUALLY MATURE CHILDREN, § 331. 


293 


§ 278] SIGNS OF PREGNANCY. [BOOK II. 


GHA PTE RV. 
ABORTION AND FQ@TICIDE. 


ist. NATURAL cAusEs, § 335. 

2d. DRUGS AS MEANS OF PRODUCING ABORTION, § 336. 
(1.) Ergot, § 336. 
(2.) Savin and oil of tansy, § 337. 

3d. VeEneEsection, § 340. 

4th, MECHANICAL MEANS, § 341. 
(1.) Legitimate medical practice as inducing premature labor, § 344. 
(2.) Blows upon the abdomen, § 345. 

5th. Signs or aBortion, § 346. 
(1.) From an examination of the body expelled, § 346. 
(2.) From an examination of the female, § 355. 


CHAPTER VI. 
TN PaLN PUCLT OE, 


Ist. CHARACTERISTICS OF STILLBORN AND LIVING CHILDREN, § 357. 
2d. TESTS OF LIVE BIRTH, § 369. 
(1.) Hydrostatic lung test, § 370. 
(2.) Static tests, § 376. 
3d. CAUSES OF DEATH IN THE NEW-BORN CHILD, § 379. 
(1.) Causes of death before or during birth, § 380. 
(a.) Compression of, and by, the umbilical cord, § 380. 
(b.) Protracted delivery, § 384. 
(c.) Debility, § 385. 
(d.) Hemorrhage from the umbilical cord, § 386. 
(e.) Length of the umbilical cord, § 388. 
(f-) Fracture of the skull, § 389. 
(2.) Causes of death after birth, § 393. 
(a.) Exposure, § 394. 
(b.) Suffocation, § 396. 
(c.) Strangling, § 398. 
(d.) Drowning, § 399. 
(e.) Wounds, § 400. 
(f.) Dislocation of the neck, § 401. 
(g.) Unconscious delivery, § 402. 
(h.) Poisoning, § 404. 
4th. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS, § 405. 


CHAPTER I. 
SIGNS OF PREGNANCY. 


§ 278. Signs of pregnancy may be divided into the certain and uncertain. 
Until the period at which the pulsation of the foetal heart becomes audible 
there is not one sign, nor indeed any combination of signs, which will not 
occasionally prove treacherous. Some practitioners are in the habit of relying 
upon signs which by others are considered of trivial or doubtful significance. 
It may be remarked, moreover, that evidence of pregnancy which would be 
quite convincing to a practitioner of midwifery, may not be so readily accepted 
by a medical jurist. The latter, naturally, lays greater stress, by far, upon 
exceptional cases. In this view, we class among the uncertain signs of preg- 

294 


BOOK II] ENLARGEMENT OF ABDOMEN, ETC. [$ 280 


nancy suppression of the menses, enlargement of the abdomen, quickening, 
and the sympathetic phenomena. 

§ 279. Ist. Suppression of the menses.—When the catamenia are arrested 
in a woman previously regular, and the suppression is not followed by any 
morbid symptoms, this sign is usually considered quite a positive one. The 
exceptions that may be taken to it depend upon the great irregularity and 
frequent abnormal conditions of this function. Thus, pregnancy may occur in 
women who have never menstruated. Dr. Gregory, of Missouri, relates the 
case of a woman who had six living children, and had never menstruated. 
M. Gillette communicated to the Société d’Emulation de Paris the case of a 
woman who had borne three children, was thirty-five years of age, but had 
never menstruated or had any vicarious discharge. Other cases are referred 
to in the Am. Journ. of Med. Sct. for April, 1844. Many similar ones are 
cited by Dr. Reid, from Baudelocque, Lamotte, Velpeau, Bull, and others ;(a) 
and the number is still further increased by those collected or reported by 
Montgomery.(b) The same authors also mention not a few examples of 
pregnancy occurring in women who for one or more years have ceased to 
menstruate.(c) The temporary absence of the menses is, moreover, not always 
an obstacle to impregnation, and in some cases, which are perfectly well au- 
thenticated, they were perceived only during the pregnant condition. Baude- 
loeque and Deventer state that they have observed instances of this kind. A 
still more remarkable abnormality has been witnessed in some women, who 
have menstruated for the first time subsequent to impregnation. Cases also 
are occasionally met with in which the menstrual flux, or a discharge which 
cannot easily be distinguished from it, occurs at the usual periods during preg- 
nancy as well as before it, and instances are not at all infrequent in which the 
menses return during the early months, only in smaller quantity than usual, 
and for a shorter time. Burton, Maunsell, Campbell, and others, mention 
cases in which they appeared three, four, and six times; similar instances fell 
under the observation of Dr. Tyler Smith ;(d) and Dr. Gibb has reported one 
in which menstruation continued during eighteen months of lactation, and 
nearly nine months of the pregnancy which then took place.(e) On the other 
hand, the catamenia may be suppressed from various causes, and sometimes 
with no immediate bad consequences. Hence, although, as a general rule, 
suppression of the menses is the earliest indication of the existence of preg- 
nancy, it cannot be relied upon as at all positive in its nature. 

§ 280. 2d. Enlargement of the abdomen, &éc.—In pregnancy, the promi- 
nence of the abdomen generally becomes obvious about the end of the third 
month; and, from this time, the period of pregnancy can be ascertained in an 
approximate manner, by the gradual ascent of the womb. | Nothing, however, 
can be more erroneous than to consider a prominent abdomen a proof of preg- 
nancy. It may be due to dropsy, to a distended urinary bladder, or to various 


(a) Lancet, Sept. 1853, p. 206. 

(b) Signs and Symptoms of Pregnancy, 2d ed. p. 77. 

(c) A recent American case is that of Dr. Gibbs, N. Am. Med. and Surg. Journal, 
i. 741. 

(d) Lancet, Feb. 1856, p. 197. (e) Ibid., Nov. 1858, p. 475. 


295 


§ 280] SIGNS OF PREGNANCY. [BOOK II. 


kinds of tumors of the ovaries or uterus, or to enlargement of the spleen or 
liver, or to accumulations of flatus or of feces, and it may also arise from a 
retention of the menstrual discharge. So far from being a good sign of preg- 
nancy, it should not be taken into consideration until a fair presumption is first 
established by other evidence. The sad story of Lady Flora Hastings, who 
was prematurely hurried to the graye by the brutal calumnies which the altera- 
tion in her shape, from disease, had given rise to, may serve as a caution to 
those who are over hasty in their opinions. 

Enlargement of the abdomen, even independently of any solid tumor, in 
many cases simulates the distended uterus so exactly, and is so often associated 
with other signs of pregnancy, and particularly with the sensations of a moving 
body within the abdomen, as to deceive not only the patient, but even the ex- 
perienced physician. It would scarcely be believed were it not fully authenti- 
cated, that the Cesarean section has been performed to remove the foetus in 
such cases which were mistaken for examples of ovarian pregnancy. Five of 
them are referred to by Montgomery,(/) and Dr. Simpson states that six are 
recorded in which when the abdomen was opened nothing unusual or abnormal 
was discovered except a slight degree of distension of the bowels.(g) Usually, 
and when, as is most common, the distension of the abdomen arises from in- 
testinal flatus and a persistent tonic contraction of the muscles about the waist, 
simple percussion of the abdomen by producing a resonant sound shows that 
the enlargement cannot be due to the distended uterus; but sometimes a large 
amount of fat under the integuments may deaden the percussion sound, or an 
exaggerated sensibility of the skin may forbid this method of examination. In 
all such cases a solution of the problem is readily obtained by means of the 
aneesthetic agents. As soon as complete insensibility is induced by ether or 
chloroform, the protuberant abdomen subsides, and the delusion is exposed. 
With returning consciousness, however, the swelling reappears.(h) 

§ 280a. According to the observations of Elsisser,(¢) the brown discolora- 
tion of the linea alba was found in 377 out of 400 pregnant women, extending 
from the sternum to the mons veneris, in 22 only in the lower half of the 
abdomen, and in 1 only in the upper. At the same time, however, this author 
observed other women in a pregnant condition in whom no trace of this dis- 
coloration could be perceived, and still others, not pregnant, in whom it was 
found; so that, although it is no doubt present in the majority of instances, 
there can be no safety in relying upon it as a sign of pregnancy. These con- 
clusions agree with those which were earlier reached by Mr. Furner and Dr. 
Cormack, the latter of whom also found the dark abdominal line occasionally 
in males affected with disorders of the intestines or of the urinary organs.(j) 
Prominence of the umbilicus is sometimes spoken of as a sign of pregnancy, 
but it does not occur until the abdomen is considerably distended by the uterus, 


at which time certain evidence of the presence of a foetus is ascertainable by 
other means. 


(f) Signs and Symptoms of Pregnancy, 2d. ed. p. 405. 
(g) Times and Gaz., Sept. 1859, p. 225. 
_(h) For several cases of Spurious Pregnancy, see Times and Gaz., Oct. 1855, p. 342. 
(1) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1852, 4 H. 
(j) Month. Journ. of Med. Sci. , Feb. 1844. 
296 


BOOK II] QUICKENING. [§$ 282 


§ 281. 3d. Changes in the mouth and neck of the womb.—These changes 
vary, according as they are observed in those who have had children and in 
those who have never before been pregnant. We do not propose to describe 
them at length.(a) It is here sufficient to remark, in general, that the uterus 
sinks somewhat lower in the pelvis in the early months, and thus the os tince 
is brought nearer to the entrance-of the vagina, and is at the same time tilted 
somewhat backward. This gives rise to the idea that the cervix is lengthened, 
which is not the case. It does not undergo any change in length until after 
the fifth month, when it becomes gradually shorter and broader (being merged 
into the body of the womb), until the close of gestation, at which time it is 
found to be entirely obliterated. The signs from the neck and mouth of the 
womb previous to the sixth month, are not to be greatly depended upon. 

§ 282. 4th. Quzckening is defined by Dr. Evory Kennedy to be ‘‘a sense 
by the mother of the first perceptible motion in the uterine region, about the 
sixteenth week after impregnation, having for its cause either change of posi- 
tion of the uterus, or the motions of the fcetus,’’ or what is more probable, its 
first coming in contact with the walls of the uterus. It is frequently attended 
by fainting and weakness, and sometimes by a discharge of blood. Quicken- 
ing occurs at no fixed period in the course of gestation. It usually is per- 
ceived at the time stated above, but occasionally earlier, and sometimes not 
until later. Occasionally, also, the sensation is not experienced. On the 
other hand, nothing is more common than for women to suppose that they 
quickened, when they are not even pregnant. Dr Kennedy says: “I have 
known women to insist upon their having felt the child moving or kicking 
within them, not only in cases where there was indubitable proof of the child’s 
death at the time, but also, as mentioned in the case of quickening, where no 
child was in the uterus.’’(b) Queen Mary, of England, distinctly felt the 
‘babe leap in her womb” when the Pope’s legate was introduced to her, 
although dropsy was the sole result. Klein(c) reports the case of a lady who 
supposed herself pregnant, and that she felt the motions of the child, and who 
at the proper period was seized with the pains of labor. A case is reported 
by Dr. Heming, in the Lancet, in which physician and patient were both de- 
ceived. He was called to see the wife of a respectable tradesman ; she was in 
labor, it was said, and the physician in attendance had been with her two days 
and nights. This gentleman told Dr. H. that he had felt the head of the 
child at first, but could not then say what part was presenting. An examina- 
tion was made, and the woman found to be not even pregnant. She said that 
she had thought herself pregnant, because her stomach and bosom had lately 
become greatly enlarged, and because she had frequently felt the movements of 
the child, and had been irregular in her monthly periods. 

Some of the most experienced and competent judges have fallen into the 
error of supposing that they felt these movements in women who were not 
pregnant at all.(d) In these cases the error has probably arisen from mistak- 
ing for uterine contractions, those of the abdominal muscles. Dubois mentions 


(a) For a good description, see Montgomery on the Signs of Pregnancy, 2d ed. p. 183. 
(b) Obstet. Auscult. p. 26. (c) Hufeland’s Journal, 1815, p. 65. 
(d) Dewees’ Essays, p. 337; Dub. Med. Journ. vol. vi. p. 356. 

297 


§ 283] QUICKENING. [BOOK II. 


a woman on whom the toucher was practised, and who possessed the power 
_ of imitating these movements at will. In other cases the contractile move- 
ments of the uterus distended by a dead foetus, or by any other body, have led 
to the same erroneous conclusion; and in others, again, intestinal movements 
excited by flatus have deceived both patient and physician. 

The sensation which has received the name of quickening, is not always 
equally well marked in its character; sometimes it is attended with fainting, 
weakness, and a general commotion of the system, while at others it resolves 
itself into an indistinct perception of the first feeble movements of the child. 
These have received from the French the name of patties d’araignées. By 
some, the sensation is supposed to be due to these movements ; by others, it 
is attributed to the sudden rising of the womb from the pelvis. To which of 
these causes it is really due, we shall not venture to decide, considering the 
reasons for either inconclusive. The fact which, above all others, is of im- 
portance, is, that the sign is strictly a subjective one. It is perceptible by the 
woman alone, and her veracity must therefore determine our acceptance of it. 
In midwifery practice, the statement of the female is not called in question, 
unless her physician have suspicion that she may have been mistaken in her 
sensations; in legal medicine, however, the medical examiner should first con- 
vince himself by a direct examination of the probable existence of pregnancy, 
before questioning the woman, since it is evident that her assertions may be 
influenced by various considerations of interest and advantage. The examina- 
tion will enable him to determine whether there is a foetus in the womb, and 
whether it be living or dead, as well as to fix the probable period of preg- 
nancy. Unless her statements corroborate the results of this physical exami- 
nation, they may, if these results are positive, be entirely disregarded. Hence, 
the fact of quickening may be looked upon as a superfluous sign of pregnancy, 
having no value, except when sustained by other clear evidence of the existence 
of this condition. 

§ 283. The undue importance attached to quickening, from the earliest 
times, arose from an error which modern science would long since have con- 
signed to oblivion, had it not been fatally incorporated into the laws of various 
countries. It was supposed that the foetus became endowed with vitality at a 
variable epoch after conception, and that quickening was an indication of the 
moment at which it became thus animated. Such an error, explicable in the 
infancy of physiological science, by an inadequate knowledge of the develop- 
ment of the embryo, confirmed by absurd ecclesiastical canons, and handed 
down from one criminal code to another, should now, when ignorance is no 
longer excusable, disappear from our penal system. To whatever cause the 
act of quickening may be attributed, its explanation is not dependent upon a 
solution of the question relative to the precise moment at which the child 
becomes endowed with life. If it be due to the first motions of the child, 
perceptible to the mother, it is merely an indication of the strength of its mus- 
cular movements ; and if it is caused by the sudden rising of the uterus from the — 
pelvis, it evidently has a still more distant connection with the phenomena of 
life. No serious argument is required to prove that the feetus, in its embryo- 
nic condition, is a new being, living by its connection with its mother, and dying 

298 


BOOK II.] QUICKENING. [$ 288 


when this is destroyed. However rudimentary its form, it is not an inorganie 
body, constituted by the casual aggregation of atoms, but a living creature, 
from whose undeveloped lineaments a perfect human shape is to be evolved. 
A pulsating heart, and a nervous tract, are among its earliest recognizable 
elements. Reason and observation equally declare its essential original vitality. 

The following remarks by Prof. Hodge, forcibly illustrate these truths :— 

“In a most mysterious manner brought into existence, how wonderful its 
formation! Imperfect in the first instance, yea, even invisible to the naked 
eye, the embryo is nevertheless endowed, at once, with the principles of vitality ; 
and, although retained in the system of its mother, it has, in a strict sense, an 
independent existence. It immediately manifests all the phenomena of organic 
life; it forms its own fluids and circulates them; it is nourished and developed; 
and, very rapidly, from being a rudis indigestaque moles, apparently, an in- 
organic drop of fluid, its organs are generated and its form perfected. It 
daily gains strength and grows; and, while still within the organ of its 
mother, manifests some of the phenomena of animal life, especially as regards 
mobility. After the fourth month its motions are perceptible to the mother, 
and in a short period can be perceived by other individuals on due investigation. 

“The usual impression, and one which is probably still maintained by the 
mass of the community, is that the embryo is perfected at the period of quick- 
ening; say the one hundred and twelfth, or one hundred and twentieth day. 
When the mother first perceives motion, is considered the period when the 
foetus becomes animated—when it receives its spiritual nature into union with 
its corporeal. 

“These and similar suppositions are, as has been already shown, contrary 
to all fact, to analogy, to reason; and if it were not for the high authorities 
—nmedical, legal, and theological—in opposition, we might add, to common 
sense. 

‘‘What, it may be asked, have the sensations of the mother to do with the 
vitality of the child? Is it not alive because the mother does not feel it ? 
Every practitioner of obstetrics can bear witness that children live and move 
and thrive long before the mother is conscious of their existence; and that 
women have carried healthy living children to the seventh, and even to the 
ninth month, without being conscious of their motions. Moreover, how can 
a foetus be termed inanimate when it grows, of course is nourished, and mani- 
fests all the phenomena of life? The supposition of inanimate embryos capable 
of being developed, is, at the present day, an absurdity. From the moment 
of conception it must be alive, for immediately it begins to be developed; it is 
separated from the ovary, where it was generated, and travels some three or 
four inches through a narrow tube or canal, to the uterus, as much disconnected 
from the mother as the chick in ovo is separated from the parent hen. Its 
subsequent attachments to the mother, by means of the placenta and uterus, 
are so indirect (as will be hereafter demonstrated) that we will be justified in 
asserting that the mother has little more influence upon the child in utero than 
the parent bird has upon its offspring in the egg. 

“Tf the question, therefore, be returned upon us, When does that mystical 
union between our corporeal and spiritual nature, between matter and spirit, 

299 


§ 285] AREOLA. [BOOK II. 


body and soul, occur? We answer at the time of conception. It is then, 
only, the father can, in any way, exert an influence over his offspring; it is 
then, only, the female germ is in direct union with the mother—the connection 
afterwards is indirect and imperfect. To suppose that the body only is gene- 
rated at conception, and that the spirit is subsequently added, is, in the absence 
of all direct revelation on the subject, philosophically untrue—being at variance 
with the facts and with reason, as has already been illustrated and enforced.”’ 

§ 284. 5th. Sympathetic phenomena.—Pregnant women display various 
consensual symptoms, which, when confirmed by other sighs, compared with 
their sensations in previous pregnancies, or with their usual health in the un- 
impregnated condition, are not without considerable weight in determining 
the existence of pregnancy. But there is nothing more variable than these 
symptoms. Some women go through the whole of their pregnancy without 
being affected with morning sickness, salivation, dyspepsia, longings, disgusts, 
&c.; while others are hardly ever free from some of these annoyances. Further, 
they may be easily feigned, where the female is desirous to persuade herself or 
to deceive others. 

§ 285. A change in the condition of the breasts is of more importance. 
They become larger and firmer, knotty, and somewhat tender to the touch, 
and large blue veins may be seen meandering over the surface; the nipple and 
the follicles around it become more prominent, and the areola wider and of a 
dark brown color. In some females the projection of the nipples and the 
enlargement of the breasts may be more or less hindered by corsets. The 
increase in the size of the breasts being due mainly to the secretion of milk, 
does not, as a general rule, occur until the later periods of pregnancy, and 
sometimes not until delivery takes place. Occasionally, also, certain diseases 
of the uterus and ovaries will cause a tumefaction of the breasts. Retention 
of the menses from an imperforate hymen, fibrous tumors of the uterus, and 
ulceration of the mouth and neck of the uterus, are frequently, says Dr. T. 
Smith, concerned in these mammary changes; and habitual and excessive 
copulation sometimes has the same effect. The presence of milk in the breasts 
is of value, as a sign, only in cases where a woman never before pregnant, and 
menstruating regularly, has the catamenia suppressed. (e) 

The changes taking place in the areola are considered, by Dr. Montgomery 


(e) For a large number of curious instances of the secretion of milk in women 
beyond the age of child-bearing, and in others where it was developed under extra- 
ordinary circumstances, vide Beck’s Med. Journ. vol. i. p. 220. Also, Dr. Dunglison’s 
case of a man fifty-five years of age, who performed the office of wet nurse for several 
years (Physiol. p. 833). Dr. Battersby gives an instance of a male child, three weeks 
old, from whom a drachm of milk could be drawn by pressure from the breasts. Ana- 
lyzed by Mr. Moore, under the microscope, it was found to be a genuine lacteal secre- 
tion (Dublin Med. Press, April, 1850). See also Guillot’s observations, Ed. Month. 
Journ., Feb. 1854, p 165. A most interesting case is of recent occurrence. A woman 
fifty-five years of age, whose catamenia had ceased for many years, and who was also 
in bad health, undertook to bring up an infant whose mother had died in childbed. 
To keep it quiet, she was in the habit of putting it to her breast. At the end of six | 
months she was surprised to find that the child was really drawing milk from her 
breasts. All other nourishment was suspended, and the child, which before had been 
weakly, soon became hearty and vigorous entirely upon the milk which he drew from 
her. She continued to nurse him for twelve months, at which time she weaned him. 
(EH. Warren, M. D., Edenton, N. Car., in Va. Med. and §. Journ. 1854.) 


300 


BOOK II.] AREOLA. [$ 285 


and some other eminent authorities, to afford very valuable evidence of preg- 
nancy. ‘The essential characters of the true areola resulting from pregnancy, 
are described to be a circle around the nipple, whose color varies in intensity 
according to the complexion, being generally much darker in persons with 
black hair, dark eyes, and sallow skin, than in those of fair hair, light-colored 
eyes, and delicate complexion. It becomes darker in color, but mottled, and 
wider as pregnancy advances. The skin over it is moist, and the follicles 
become prominent. These phenomena, in a woman not previously pregnant, 
when found in connection with other reliable signs of pregnancy, may confirm 
the inference made from them. Viewed singly, the changes in the areola will 
be found to be far from constant in their appearance. The complexion of the 
female has a good deal to do with their production; and, as Dr. Kennedy 
remarks, “‘we will often observe them very distinctly marked in virgins of a 
dark appearance, whilst in pregnant women of fair complexion no trace of 
them will be visible, even when they are advanced in this state. Again, where 
they have once been well marked, in consequence of one or more pregnancies, 
they seldom or never disappear entirely; and on this account, in cases of mar- 
ried women, they must be acknowledged as a test far from positive in its nature.’’ 
Dr. Reid(/) observed them in a woman not pregnant but suffering from a 
chronic tumor of the left breast, and found that none of them were present in 
a@ woman who was soon after delivered of a living child. They are also known 
to occur in a variety of uterine affections. Siebold says that they may occur 
independently of pregnancy, and in cases of disease of the womb; and Dubois, 
that they may follow a suppression of menses, whatever its cause. Dr. Simp- 
son, of Edinburgh, in a case of spurious pregnancy under his own care, observed 
that the areole became dark and their glandule enlarged. This was so marked, 
that a drawing of them was made about the third month. These sketches 
presented all the usual changes as distinctly as those figured by Dr. Montgo- 
mery in his plate of the true areola at that period ; and being preserved, they 
were found, on comparison, as marked as those of the patient’s own breasts 
were at the same date, a short time after, when actual pregnancy supervened.(g) 
A bluish or dusky color of the vagina, produced by venous congestion, was 
originally declared by Jacquemin to be an almost certain sign of pregnancy in 
females who are not subject to hemorrhoids. This statement has been con- 
firmed by Kluge, Parent-Duchatelet, Kilian, Wistrand, and Montgomery, the 
last of whom says, ‘in every instance, without a single exception, in which I 
have found this appearance distinctly marked, pregnancy coexisted.’”’(h) It 
should, however, be remembered that pregnancy may exist, although this sign 
may not be visible. 

The more or less distinct presence of several phenomena, which have been 
now considered, independently of the existence of any product of conception, 
characterizes the cases known as those of spurtous pregnancy. They might 
be expected to be met with most frequently in women who have never borne 
children, and are, therefore, unacquainted with the sensations and conditions 


(f) Lancet, Dec. 1838. 
(g) Edinb. Monthly Journ., July, 1853. 
(h) Signs and Symptoms of Pregnancy, 2d ed p. 245. 
301 


§ 288] PULSATION OF THE F@TAL HEART. [BOOK II. 


peculiar to pregnancy. But such is not the case. The most numerous ex- 
amples of this delusion are presented by mothers approaching the period when 
‘the menses cease, and which is usually marked by uterine disorders of various 
kinds. Yet many are met with in the first year after marriage; and in such 
the source of the delusion is an instinctive longing for becoming a mother. 
To this powerful instinct must be attributed the occurrence of many phenomena 
of pregnancy in unmarried and pure women, associated with evidences of a 
hysterical or a highly nervous temperament, and the periodical xstus which 
often precedes and accompanies the catamenia. It is impossible to determine 
accurately whether the delusion has a mental or a physical origin, or in what 
degree either cause predominates ; but it is probable that a state of excitement 
of the reproductive organs occasions impressions, if not sensations, which 
awaken corresponding ideas in the mind, and that these in their turn render 
the various physical phenomena more intense. 'The vivid descriptions of their 
sensations, therefore, given by the subjects of these various cases, are not neces- 
sarily to be taxed as inventions, nor are the physical phenomena which they 
display to be regarded always as cunning tricks intended to deceive. They 
represent convictions as profound and distinct as those of the monomaniac, 
and are often as difficult to eradicate. | 

§ 286. All of the signs which have now been referred to are uncertain in 
their nature, and various objections may be urged against each of them, but if 
a, majority of the more important exist, the presumption of pregnancy is neces- 
sarily very strong, although certainty cannot be obtainable from them. The 
same objection cannot be made against the signs which we have designated as 
certain, from the fact that when found they indicate the presence of a fcetus 
infallibly; although it cannot, indeed, always be inferred from their absence 
that pregnancy does not exist. This class of signs demonstrates, therefore, 
the presence of a foetus in the womb, and are obtained by physical methods of | 
exploration, inspection, touch, auscultation, &c. 

§ 287. The passive movements of the child are obtained by the manceuvre 
termed ballottement by the French. The female being in a standing posture, 
the finger is introduced into the vagina, up to the mouth of the uterus, while 
the other hand is placed upon the abdomen. The womb is suddenly raised up 
by an abrupt movement of the finger, and falling again upon it with a slight 
shock, communicates the sensation of sudden displacement of a body contained 
in a liquid. This test is seldom applicable before the fifth month, and some- 
times not after the eighth, owing either to the position of the child or the 
small amount of amniotic fluid present. In competent hands the test is a safe 
one; but it can give evidence only of the presence of a foetus—whether this be 
living or dead must be ascertained by other means. Another mode of per- 
forming ballottement, but which is inferior to that just described, consists in 
giving sudden movements to the uterus by the hand, placed upon opposite sides 
of the abdomen while the woman is in an erect posture or lying upon her side. 

§ 288. The active movements of the child become perceptible, for the first 
time, usually in the fourth month. They are at first extremely feeble, and in 
some cases remain so during the whole period of gestation. There are some 
rare cases in which no movement whatever has been felt by the mother through- 

302 


BOOK I] UTERINE AND UMBILICAL SOUFFLE. [§ 290 


out pregnancy; and, on the other hand, in some instances of spurious preg- 
nancy the movements attributed to the child are described as violent. In the 
majority of cases, however, they are very distinct in the latter half of preg- 
nancy. ‘They are perceived by laying the hand upon the abdomen, and making 
gentle pressure upon it, or after dipping the hand in cold water before touching 
the skin. Sometimes an escape of gas from one portion of the intestine to 
another, or even the involuntary contraction of the abdominal muscles, or of 
the uterus itself, may momentarily deceive the examiner, but a little attention 
will prevent all chance of mistake from these sources. The child may not 
always be made to execute movements; hence, both the woman may be preg- 
nant and the child alive, without its being revealed at the time by this mode 
of physical examination of the abdomen.(?) 

§ 289. 6th. Pulsation of the fetal heart.—The pulsation of the fcetal heart 
resembles the ticking of a watch, and is discoverable at different portions of 
the uterus, according to the period of pregnancy at which the observation is 
made. These sounds cannot be mistaken for any other heard in the abdomen, 
since the pulsation is a double one, and not isochronous with the maternal 
pulse, being generally about 130 beats in the minute, varying, however, con- 
siderably in frequency, and becoming less frequent as pregnancy advances. 
These pulsations are first distinctly audible about the middle of the fifth month ; 
but M. Dépaul says that it is possible to hear them one month earlier than 
this period, he having succeeded in perceiving them, with great distinctness, 
by depressing strongly the abdominal walls, and placing the stethoscope upon 
the fundus of the uterus. This manceuvre would evidently succeed only in 
very thin persons, and when employed by a practised auscultator. The sounds 
may be more audible at one examination than at another; indeed, to an inexpe- 
rienced auscultator, they may frequently be inaudible. It is extremely rare, 
however, not to find them in the last three months of pregnancy, except when 
the foetus is dead. Of 906 women examined at this period of pregnancy, says 
M. Dépaul, the sounds were absent in 8 only. Yet in some rare cases they 
have been inaudible throughout pregnancy. The auscultation of the foetal 
heart is, therefore, a test of the existence of a foetus far more reliable than any 
other sign or combination of signs. It is easy of application, can be employed 
at a comparatively early period, and can hardly ever fail of being discovered 
when pregnancy really exists. 

§ 290. Tth. Other sounds.—There are two other sounds indicative of preg- 
nancy, which are ascertained by auscultation, but neither of which can afford 
the same positive proof as the pulsation of the foetal heart. These are the 
uterine and the umbilical souffle. The first is a peculiar blowing, cooing, or 
whistling sound, audible over a greater or less extent of the uterine tumor, 
sometimes confined to one spot, and generally most audible in the lower and 
lateral portions of the uterus. It is said to be caused by the passage of the 
blood through the uterine arteries. It is isochronous with the pulse of the 
mother. It has been perceived as early as the tenth week, but most generally 
cannot be discovered untila later period. Its intensity increases up to the 


(i) Dépaul, Traité Théorique et Pratique d’Auscultation Obstetricale. 
303 


§ 291] KIESTEIN, [BOOK II. 


end of the seventh month. (Dépaul.) Of 307 women who had passed the 
fifth month, this author observed the uterine souffle in 295. M. H. FF. Na- 
gele() found it absent in only 20 cases out of 600. In affixing a value to 
this phenomenon, as a sign of pregnancy, the observations of M. Dépaul 
render it positive that a souffle perfectly similar to this is heard when the 
uterus is developed from any other cause than pregnancy. He relates a num- 
ber of cases which show conclusively that such is the case; in some of them, 
post-mortem examination disclosed fibrous and carcinomatous tumors imbed- 
ded in the walls of the uterus.(/) If, however, a certainty can be obtained 
that the development of the uterus is not due to this cause, the sign is hardly 
less characteristic than the foetal cardiac pulsation. 

The sound discovered and described by Dr. Evory Kennedy, and called by 
him the umbilical sound (from the supposition that it proceeds from the um- 
bilical vessels) is of trivial importance in the diagnosis of pregnancy. It is 
not audible in the majority of cases, requires an experienced ear, and when 
found, is a superfluous sign, because the pulsation of the feetal heart and the 
uterine souffle will be also perceptible at the same time, and are not open to 
the same objections as is the one in question. 

§ 291. 8th. Kiestein in the urine.—Very little need be said of this sub- 
stance as a test or sign of pregnancy. The name of kzestein is applied to a 
substance which occurs at first as a fleecy cloud, and afterwards as a fatty pellicle 
or scum in the urine of pregnant women, after it has been allowed to stand 
for a few days. Its nature is not very well understood, but Dr. Golding Bird 
supposed it to contain the caseous elements of milk mixed with the earthy 
phosphates. There is, however, considerable discrepancy of opinion respecting 
its constitution, while at present few are disposed to look upon it as of any 
value as a sign of pregnancy. Among the later observations are those of Dr. 
Veit, who comes to the conclusion that the so called pellicle of kiestein is no 
peculiar matter at all, and is not of the slightest value as a sign of pregnancy. 
In urine of both non-pregnant and pregnant women pellicles are formed, con- 
taining vibriones and frequently the triple phosphate; the chief difference 
between the respective urines being, that in that of pregnant women, alkaline, 
and in that of non-pregnant women, acid reaction more frequently manifests 
itself. ‘This may depend, perhaps, upon the greater concentration of the urine 
in pregnancy, and the larger proportion of mucus mixed with it.(m) 

Montgomery, after reviewing all the evidence which has been published 
upon this subject, and comparing with it his own experience, concludes that 
we should be very slow to place any confidence in the sign in question, except 
as a “corroborative indication.”(a) Dr. G. T. Elliot, who conducted his in- 
vestigations at the Bellevue Hospital, New York, concludes that there is nothing 
positive to be learned from the urine in regard to the existence of pregnancy, 
and that its appearances can scarcely even be called corroborative. (b) 


(k) Die geburtshiilfliche Auscultation, Mainz. 1838. 

(/) The same opinion is held by Kiwisch, whose opportunities for verifying the ac- 
curacy of his views are very extensive, and whose critical acumen and sound judg- 
ment have gained him a wide reputation.—Vid. Klinische Vortraege. Bd. 2, p. 561. 
Prag. 1849. 

(m) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., Jan. 1852, p. 259. (a) Op. cit. p. 307. 

(b) New York Journ. of Med. Sept. 1856, p. 181. 

304 


BOOK It.] SIGNS OF DELIVERY IN THE LIVING. [$ 298 


CHAPTER. IT. 
DELIVERY. 


§ 292. Ist. Signs of recent delivery.—Within a week or ten days after de- 
livery, at term, the following signs are more distinct and well marked the earlier 
the examination is made. The countenance of the female is pale, her skin 
warm and moist, the body languid, and the mind and feelings very impres- 
sionable. The breasts are more or less distended, and their veins very distinct 
upon the surface. They are increased in weight, and the knotty masses of 
lactiferous tubes and glands are very easily felt. The nipples are prominent, 
and watery milk spontaneously or by pressure exudes from them. The integu- 
ments of the abdomen are loose, lying in folds, marked with livid lines, which 
ata later period become whiter than the surrounding skin, and resemble scars; 
the uterus can be felt behind the pubis, like a large firm ball; the external 
organs of generation are moist, relaxed, and swollen, and the vagina, both at 
its entrance and throughout, is very capacious, and free from folds. The 
mouth of the womb is low, open about three-quarters of an inch, its margins 
very soft and relaxed, and sometimes slightly lacerated. A sanguinolent 
mucus exudes from the internal organs of generation. This discharge is 
known under the name of the lochia; its odor is peculiar, and easily recog- 
nized by those who have once perceived it. Such are the principal signs of 
delivery, and in their combination, they present a characteristic picture which 
can leave no room for doubt of a recent confinement. ‘Taken separately, how- 
ever, there is hardly any one which is not liable to exceptions. Thus milk 
may be secreted independently either of pregnancy or delivery, as has been 
shown in the chapter on the “Signs of Pregnancy.’”? Yet the manner in 
which the secretion takes place after delivery, with the attendant warmth of 
the skin, the turgescence of the glandular structure of the breast, and a certain 
amount of constitutional sympathy, called ‘‘ milk fever,’ can rarely, especially 
during the first few days, allow one to be in doubt of its cause. There are, 
indeed, numerous cases in which no milk is secreted, and although even in 
these a certain degree of turgor and warmth may generally be observed, yet 
an opinion must be based upon a further examination. 

§ 293. A microscopic examination of the milk may sometimes contribute 
to prove the recent occurrence of parturition. This solved all doubt in a 
case reported by Mr. Mercer Adam. The body of a new-born child, much 
decomposed, was found in a moss in the South of Scotland; it appeared to 
have been dead four or five weeks. Suspicion having fallen upon a young 
woman who was supposed to have been delivered secretly about that time, she 
was arrested, and acknowledged that she had borne a child about a year and a 
half before, which she had nursed until within three months of her apprehen- 
sion, but firmly denied having been recently delivered. No feasible plan of 
deciding the question appearing, some one suggested that her milk should be 
examined by the microscope. This was done, and it was found to abound in 

20 305 


§ 297] SIGNS OF DELIVERY IN THE DEAD. [BOOK II. 


colostric globules. ‘This showed parturition to have lately occurred.” The 
girl finally confessed that she had recently given birth to a stillborn child.(n) 

§ 294. The condition, as above described, in which the genital organs, after 
delivery, are found, is one which it is entirely impossible to mistake for the 
result of disease, accident, or intentional injury. The only difficulty in ascer- 
taining the fact of delivery having taken place arises in those cases where an 
examination has not been made at a sufficiently early period. After the esta- 
blishment of the flow of the milk, and the disappearance of the relaxed and 
tumid condition of the genital organs, there remain hardly any other signs 
than the whitish streaks before referred to, indicative of the previous distension 
of the abdomen, and, in addition, the state of the os uteri. If it can be shown 
that abdominal dropsy or tumors have not been present, then the white lines, 
being usually permanent, afford good evidence of the woman having borne one 
or more children, but allow no inference as to the date of delivery, except that 
it has not been recent. The os uteri, in a woman who has been delivered 
once or more than once, differs from its virgin state, in being more open, and 
having its margins irregularly notched, or even torn. Occasional exceptions 
to this statement are met with. 

§ 295. In conclusion, it may be stated that the medical proof of recent de- 
livery, from an examination of the living woman, cannot be established with 
perfect certainty after the lapse of a week or ten days, if the female have 
already borne children ; if it, however, have been a first labor, the existence 
of the whitish streaks upon the abdomen, and the altered condition of the 
mouth of the womb, will afford strong suspicion of delivery having taken 
place at some former period, which cannot be more nearly determined. 

§ 296. 2d. Signs of delivery in the dead.—These are extremely easy of 
recognition. It is evident that, in addition to the dilated and relaxed state 
of the vagina and vulva, the volume and capacity of the uterus, the thickness 
of its walls, the blood upon its inner surface, and the lacerated appearance of 
that portion of it to which the placenta was attached, are unmistakable signs 
of recent delivery. The uterus, after delivery, does not return to its former 
size until after the expiration of eight or twelve weeks, but will be found 
during this period still larger than before pregnancy, its walls thick and firm, 
but not vascular, although traversed by dilated veins, and the mucous mem- 
brane of the os tince softened, as if excoriated, vascular, and covered with 
mucus. The appendages of the uterus partake of the vascularity which 
characterizes it at the epoch of delivery, but they soon regain their ordinary 
aspect. The rate of return of the uterus to its normal size after partu- 
rition is irregular, depending upon its energy during labor, the period of preg- 
nancy at which this process occurs, the occurrence of hemorrhage, &c., and 
consequently any attempt to infer from its condition the precise date of 
delivery must prove deceptive. 

§ 297. 3d. Corpus luteum.—It has been supposed that the finding of a 
corpus luteum, or trace of a ruptured Graafian vesicle in the ovary, was incon- 
trovertible proof of the previous existence of pregnancy. ‘This opinion can 


(n) Edinburgh Monthly Journal of Medical Science, May, 1853. 
306 


BOOK II.] ’ CORPORA LUTEA. [$ 298 


no longer be maintained. The body which is found in the ovary, as the result. 
of the rupture of a Graafian vesicle, indicates the escape of an ovum, but not 
necessarily the occurrence of impregnation. It has, indeed, been supposed that 
if a corpus luteum were formed in the ovary, this would be a reliable proof 
that fecundation must have occurred. ‘This view is, however, not supported 
by the later investigations into the physiology of menstruation and reproduc- 
tion. 

The fact is now, perhaps, universally admitted, that the maturation and 
expulsion of ova, probably at the menstrual period, or immediately after it, 
take place independently of all sexual intercourse. The act of expulsion or 
discharge necessarily involves a rupture of one of the Graafian follicles, and 
the locality is indicated by a corpus luteum and a cicatrix. 

The following is a description, by Dr. Dalton, of the corpus luteum found 
in the ovary of a girl who destroyed herself with oil of tansy, in the fourth 
month of pregnancy. ‘The foetus was found in the womb. ‘The left ovary, 
which hung down a little lower than the right, had near its external extremity 
a small conical prominence, where the fibrous coat was wanting, and its place 
occupied by peritoneum alone. There was a very slight appearance here of a 
cicatrix, visible only on close inspection. There was no unusual vascularity 
here or at any other part of the ovary. Beneath this prominence the corpus 
luteum could be felt through the ovarian tissue, tolerably firm and well defined, 
showing the form of a sphere compressed laterally, much like that of the crys- 
talline lens. On dividing the ovary longitudinally through the prominence, 
the corpus luteum was exposed. It presented nearly a circular section, mea- 
suring seven-eighths of an inch in its long diameter, and three-fourths of an 
inch in its short. It consisted externally of a convoluted wall of a dull yellow 
color, measuring at its deepest part a little over three-sixteenths of an inch in 
thickness. The space inclosed by the yellow wall was occupied by a colorless, 
reticulated, fibrous coagulum, which possessed a few minute vessels. This 
central coagulum was much compressed laterally, so that, although it pre- 
sented a cut surface of about half an inch in diameter, it had hardly more than 
one line in thickness. There was no cavity or fluid anywhere. Both ovaries 
were carefully divided in every direction, but only one other body was found 
having any resemblance to a corpus luteum, and that was so small and imper- 
fect as to be hardly recognizable. There were many Graafian vesicles in the 
interior of each ovary, varying in diameter from three-sixteenths of an inch 
downward, but none at all prominent on the surface. Both ovaries were quite 
healthy.’’(0) 

§ 298. The question of practical interest in inquiries relative to the fact of 
impregnation or delivery having occurred, is, whether there is a sufficient dis- 
tinction possible between the corpora lutea of simple menstruation and those 
of pregnancy to enable us to declare with positiveness to which cause it may 
be properly ascribed. It would certainly be a gratifying result of scientific 
observation, if this question could be answered in the affirmative. (/) 


(0) American Journal of the Medical Sciences, January, 1852. 
(p) M. Coste, in his splended work upon Embryology, says, that during the first 
eight or ten days after the escape of the ovum, it is impossible to find any difference 


307 


§ 299] CORPORA LUTEA. [BOOK II. 


M. Longet(q) gives a concise and satisfactory description. He says: ‘We 
must distinguish two kinds of corpora lutea; those which result from the 
cicatrization of a follicle, after the spontaneous expulsion of an ovum, with- 
out any subsequent conception ; and those which are produced by the same 
process, after the expulsion of an ovum followed by conception, and especially 
by gestation. Those belonging to the first class, rapidly pass through their 
different stages, never attain a high degree of development, are much inferior 
to the others in size, rapidly assume a yellow coloration, fade again in a few 
days, and in the course of one or two months become retracted and completely 
concealed in the ovarian tissue. The second species of corpora lutea, partici- 
pating in the congestion and functional activity, which are established in all 
the sexual organs during gestation, attain a size sometimes greater than that 
of the ovary itself, and pass so slowly through the different stages of their 
development and atrophy, that they are still perceptible at the termination of 
pregnancy ; they gradually diminish in size, in proportion to the growth of 
the foetus, and the approach. of the end of gestation.” 

§ 299. Dr. Dalton,(7) in his valuable monograph on this subject, Says: 
‘There can be no doubt that in the first periods, the corpus luteum follows 
the same course of development, whether the discharged ovum becomes im- 
pregnated or not. Together with the rupture of the vesicle the same effusion 
of blood takes place in either case, followed by a gradual absorption of the 
coloring matter of the clot, with hypertrophy and folding up of the membrane 
of the vesicle. When, however, the ovum becomes impregnated, and continues 
its growth in the uterus, the corpus luteum, instead of reaching its maximum 
of development at the end of three weeks, and afterwards undergoing a rapid 
process of atrophy, continues to develop itself, for a considerable period, and 
does not, in fact, become very decidedly retrograde until after the termination 
of pregnancy.’’ He states, moreover, that the yellow color of the corpus 
luteum of pregnancy fades more rapidly than that of menstruation in pro- 
portion to its size and the activity of the changes it undergoes. 

Bischoff,(s) in a paper upon this subject, which with him was one of close 
investigation for many years, states that he had the opportunity of examining 
the ovaries in thirteen women who died while menstruating or in the pregnant 
condition. The results he obtained confirm the truth of the theory, that at 


between the corpus luteum of menstruation and of pregnancy; after this period the 
first assumes a retrograde course, while the latter attaining a larger size than the other 
ever reaches, and becoming in every way more developed, remains stationary until 
about the end of the third month, at which time it begins to decline, and between the 
sixth and the ninth month has lost at least two-thirds of its volume ; still occasionally 
it is completely absorbed before delivery. During the period of decadence, it is diffi- 
cult to distinguish the corpus luteum of pregnancy from that of menstruation. M. 
Coste differs from Raciborski, Pouchet, and most other physiologists who have made 
researches upon this subject, in regard to the cause of the color of these bodies, be- 
lieving it not to be due to an extravasation of the coloring matter of the blood, but to 
other causes which the reader will find fully explained in his work. — Histoire géné- 
rale et particuliére du Developpement des Corps organisés. Paris, 1847. 

(q) Physiologie. Paris, 1850, vol. ii. p. 88. 

(r) Prize Essay on the Corpus Luteum of Menstruation and Pregnancy, by Jno. C. 
Dalton, jr., M. D., published in the Trans. of the Am. Med. Assoc. vol. iv. 1851. 

(s) Zeitschrift fiir rat. Med. Bd. iv. H. 1, abridged in Brit. and For. Med. Rev., 
April, 1854, p. 561. 

308 


BOOK II. ] FEIGNED DELIVERY. [$ 801 


every menstrual period, a Graafian follicle ripens, swells and bursts, and that 
the ovum escaping, a corpus luteum is formed. Still, in ordinary menstrua- 
tion, it never attains the full development which characterizes it when preg- 
nancy exists. It rapidly becomes contracted, and at the succeeding menstrual 
period is already indistinct, and becomes gradually more and more so, the 
color changing from yellow to brown and black, and a puckered cicatrix on 
the surface of the ovary is soon the only trace of its existence. The corpus 
luteum of pregnancy, on the other hand, progresses steadily in its develop- 
ment, and attains a size never reached by that of menstruation. It lasts 
through the whole period of pregnancy, although diminished in size after the 
sixth or seventh month, and disappears after delivery. In the early periods, 
therefore, the difference between the two bodies is too slight to be relied 
upon ; after delivery it is still difficult to distinguish that of pregnancy from 
those of fourteen days’ or three weeks’ standing, resulting from menstruation. 

§ 300. It is hence very plain, that in the many cases in which the fact of 
impregnation having taken place is important to be known, we cannot rely 
with confidence upon the evidence derivable from the corpus luteum. We 
doubt, moreover, whether, in view of the still very conflicting opinions among 
physiologists in regard to the nature, origin, and diagnostic value of corpora 
lutea, positive statements derived from this source would be well received. 
While we feel persuaded that there is, as has been so well described by M. 
Coste and Dr. Dalton, a striking difference between these bodies in mere men- 
struation and pregnancy, yet it should not be forgotten that many of the most 
experienced anatomists and physiologists of the day have failed to recognize 
it. We beg leave to refer those of our readers who desire to learn in detail 
the state of knowledge on this subject, to Dr. Dalton’s paper above quoted. 
In conclusion it may be added, as that admirable observer and microscopist, 
Mr. Wharton Jones, remarks, that ‘though phystologically one may be per- 
mitted to speculate on the relation between the occurrence of corpora lutea in 
the ovaries and preceding coitus, it would be rash and unwarrantable in any 
one to pronounce positively from the occurrence of a corpus luteum in the 
ovaries that coitus had taken place. The discovery of an ovum in the uterus, 
in process of development, could alone, in the present state of knowledge, 
warrant such an affirmation in a court of law. But, on the other hand, the 
absence of a corpus luteum could not warrant the affirmation that coitus had 
not taken place. (¢) 

§ 301. 4th. Feigned delivery.—Delivery may be feigned from a variety of 
motives, into which it is not necessary for us to enter. A medical inspection 
ean hardly fail to expose the deceit, and usually the collateral proof is sufficient. 
We have abridged the following case of feigned delivery, on account of the 
wonderful ingenuity with which the imposture was conducted. Dr. Albert 
relates that he was called upon to see a poor girl of twenty-one years of age 
in her last illness. In the presence of the physician and clergyman of the dis- 
trict, she gave the following narrative and confession. Some eighteen months 


(4) Microscopical examination of an early corpus luteum. Lond. Med. Gaz, 1844. 


309 


§ 301] FEIGNED DELIVERY. [BOOK II. 


previously she had entered the service of a married couple as housemaid. Her 
master, who was young and handsome, and assumed the title of Baron, had 
no children. He succeeded, by tempting presents, in overcoming her virtue. 
He then represented to her that an important inheritance depended upon his 
having an heir; but having been married five years, and his wife still proving 
unfruitful, he had no longer any hope of having children by her. He then 
proposed to the girl that in case she should prove with child, and would allow 
him to cause it to appear as his own legitimate offspring, he would not only 
give her a considerable sum of money, but would also let her remain in the 
house of her mistress, in order that she might be always near her child. She 
accepted the proposal, and as soon as she found herself to be pregnant the 
preparations were made to carry out the projected imposture. The girl re- 
mained in the house, living in the most retired manner, while her mistress 
played the part of a lady in an interesting condition. She introduced wool and 
folded napkins under her dress, and thus gradually let her rotundity become 
apparent, rubbed her breasts frequently, in order to develop them, fainted in 
church, was often ailing, and sent for midwives and consulted them concerning 
her symptoms; physicians were also called upon, and every means taken to 
make public her happy expectations, so that no one had any suspicion that 
she was not pregnant. The traces of her monthly sickness were carefully 
concealed. 

At last, in due time, the young girl fell in labor, which was allowed to 
advance considerably before the midwife was sent for. In the mean time the 
bed was arranged in the following manner. A board was taken out of the 
bottom of the bedstead, and immediately above this opening a hole was made 
through the mattress and paillasse, large enough to allow the legs of a person 
to pass through and rest upon the floor. The bed was made in such a manner 
as to sink down towards the headboard, while it was elevated below the open- 
ing in the mattress. The mistress now leaned in a sitting position, with her 
legs through the opening in the bed, and supported against the headboard, 
while the servant lay across her lap on a feather-bed, in the attitude of labor. 
Her body was entirely concealed by the bed-coverings, which also concealed 
her mistress up to the neck. The midwife, upon her arrival, found the baroness, 
as she supposed, in the throes of labor; she made the necessary examination, 
promised a speedy deliverance, and gave the usual words of comfort. The 
lady, however, screamed lustily at every pain, the approach of which she be- 
came conscious of by the involuntary contractions of the poor girl’s body; 
while the latter suppressed her cries as much as possible, except when she 
_ could mingle them unperceived with those of her mistress. A living male 
child was soon born, and the after-birth followed it immediately. While the 
nurse was busy in washing and dressing the child in another room, the girl 
escaped from the bed into an adjoining chamber. The baroness, before the 
return of the midwife, drew her feet up from the opening, covered it over with 
the bed, and, stretching herself out upon it, forbade the midwife (who was 
desirous of ascertaining her condition) to touch her, except to wash off the 
blood with which she had previously soiled her thighs, declaring that she was 
in so much pain that she could not endure the slightest touch. The child was 

310 


BOOK II.] DURATION OF PREGNANCY. [$ 808 


baptized, and on the second day put to the breast of the lady. As, however, 
very naturally, it found nothing there, the midwife was discharged, on the 
pretext that the baroness’s own attendant could now take care of the child, 
which, immediately upon her departure, was confided to its own mother. The 
remainder of the girl’s history not being essential here, is omitted. Unex- 
plained circumstances prevented the fraud from succeeding. The authors of 
the conspiracy fled, leaving the servant-girl sick and in a state of destitution. 
She died, from the effects of privation and exposure, shortly after having made 
this confession. (2) 

Dr. Riittel relates a case of pretended pregnancy and delivery, in which a 
girl, with the hope of persuading her lover to marry her, had stolen a child 
from eight to ten weeks old, and endeavored to pass it for her own. The 
fraud was easily detected from the entire absence of any signs of recent de- 
livery, and from the child being evidently older than was consonant with her 
statement.(v) Where, as has in some cases happened, a child of the proper 
age has been substituted, the truth will be elicited by medical examination, or 
where this cannot be obtained, the imposture is apt to be disclosed by some 
accidental or unforeseen circumstance. 


CHAPTER III. 


DURATION OF PREGNANOY. 


§ 302. 1st. Presumption that the child born in wedlock is legitimate.— 
The rule in this country, as in England, is, that when the husband has access 
to the wife, and the child is born within due time subsequent, no evidence, short 
of absolute impotence on the husband’s part, will justify a judgment of ille- 
gitimacy. The question of access, however, may be made to rest upon cir- 
cumstances.(w) And among these circumstances may be taken proof of open 
cohabitation with another man, and repudiation by the husband’s family of 
the alleged child.(7) When the marriage takes place when the mother is so 
far advanced in pregnancy, that her situation must have been known by the 
husband, this will be considered a recognition of legitimacy. (y) 

§ 303. 2d. Protracted Gestation.—(1.) Usual duration. The duration of 
pregnancy in woman, is, according to general medical and popular observation, 
about nine calendar months. Nine calendar months give a variable length of 
time, since they may contain either 273, 274, 275 or 276 days. Hence those 
who have thought precision was desirable, have described the term of preg- 
nancy as comprising ten lunar months, forty weeks, or 280 days. This, in- 
deed, was the most ancient mode of reckoning. It is given by Hippocrates, 


(uw) Henke’s Zeitschrift, vol. xliv. p. 172. 
(v) Ibid. Erg. H. 31, p. 312. 
(w) Com. v. Shephard, 6 Binn. 283. See 3 Hawks, 623. 
(x) Com. v. Stricker, 1 Br. App. xlvii.; see Com. v. Wentz, 1 Art. 269; Stegall v. 
Stegall, 2 Brock. 256; Bowler v. Bingham, 2 Munf. 442, 3 Munf. 599. 
(y) Stegall v. Stegall, 2 Brock. 256. in 
3 


§ 304] PROTRACTED GESTATION. [BOOK II. 


was incorporated into the Roman laws, and is frequently alluded to by the 
_ Latin poets. The celebrated Harvey says: ‘‘ Unquestionably the ordinary term 
of utero-gestation is, that which we believe was kept in the womb of his mo- 
ther by our Saviour Christ, of men the most perfect ; counting, viz., from the 
festival of the Annunciation in the month of March, to the day of the Blessed 
Nativity, which we celebrate in December. Prudent matrons calculating after 
this rule, as long as they note the day of the month in which the catamenia 
usually appear, are rarely out of their reckoning ; but after ten lunar months 
have elapsed, fall in labor, and reap the fruit of their womb the very day on 
which the catamenia would have appeared had impregnation not taken 
place.’’(z) 

There is a remarkable correspondence between these views of the illustrious 
demonstrator of the circulation and those which are at present attracting at- 
tention. The idea has of late years been put forward and sustained by direct 
observation, that in women whose menstrual function is regular, gestation 
will terminate at the tenth menstrual period after that upon which conception 
has ensued. Thus, as the ordinary menstrual interval is about twenty-eight 
days, the ordinary duration of pregnancy would be a few days less than 280 
days, varying according to the time occupied by the monthly flow.(zz) On 
this principle, the apparent difference among women in the length of their 
pregnancies might be explained by reference to the well-known variations in 
the length of the inter-menstrual periods; protracted gestation occurring in 
those having a menstrual interval naturally of more than twenty-eight days, 
and apparently premature confinements in those who menstruate at shorter 
intervals. The successful establishment of such a law, would afford striking 
confirmation of the general truth of a popular belief reposing upon ages of 
experience. The greater tendency to abortion or premature delivery at the 
recurrence of the menstrual epochs, and the usual re-establishment of the men- 
strual function, within one month after parturition, in case the woman does 
not suckle her child, afford a presumption in favor of its correctness. Never- 
theless, much additional and careful observation is required before we can be 
permitted to base a positive opinion in legal cases on such a mode of calcula- 
tion. (a) 

§ 304. (2.) Mode of reckoning.—The discordance in medical testimony 
upon the subject of the natural duration of pregnancy and the possible devia- 
tions from it, is accounted for by the want of a fixed period from which to 
date its commencement. 

The mode of reckoning is various. Much reliance is placed by some women 
upon peculiar sensations experienced at the moment of conception. In some 
instances, they are no doubt thus enabled to calculate the probable duration of 


(z) Harvey’s Works, Willis’ Translation, p. 529. 

(ez) In a practical point of view, says Dr. Tyler Smith, we may consider that the 
average duration of pregnancy is about 280 days from the date of the last catamenia, 
or about 274 or 275 days from the time of coitus, when this can be ascertained. (Lan- 
cet, Mar. 1856, p. 333.) 

(a) Vid. Cederschjéld. Schmidt’s Jahrbiicher, 1849. Suppl. Bd. pp. 323 and 394, 
also Schuster, Henke’s Zeitsth. 1 H. pp. 1-97. 


312 


BOOK IE] MODES OF RECKONING. [$ 307 


pregnancy with considerable certainty. Dr. Reid(b) says, that he has occa- 
sionally met with cases in which this mode of fixing the exact time of concep- 
tion, proved, by the result, to have been correct; but that, in a much larger 
number of instances, the females were very considerably out in reckoning, by 
trusting to this evidence. As a general rule, he says, “it will prove most 
fallacious, and in disputed cases of legitimacy, it is of far too uncertain a 
character to rely on.’”’ We may add, that these sensations are undefined in 
their nature, are unperceived by a great many women, have no necessary con- 
nection with conception, and if referred to at a late period in the pregnancy 
or after delivery, the evidence must be utterly unworthy of consideration. 
Hence in questions of paternity, the sensations alleged to have been per- 
ceived at the time by the women cannot be regarded. 

§ 305. (a.) Cause of conception.—In an indictment for bastardy the 
mother will not be permitted to decide which of the connections about the 
same time was the operative cause of conception.(c) “The organs of con- 
ception, like those of digestion,’’ said Chief Justice Lewis, “perform their ap- 
propriate offices, without the volition of the female. She is not conscious, at 
the moment of the occurrence of what has taken place. It is only by ¢nference 
that she can fix the paternity of her offspring. If her intercourse has been 
confined to one individual, there is no difficulty in drawing a correct conclusion 
from the premises. But if she has exposed herself to the embraces of several, 
at, or about the time she became pregnant, she has placed it out of her power 
to draw any safe conclusions on the subject. Where causes are shown to 
exist, each of which is adequate to produce the effect, and there are no circum- 
stances to determine the mind in favor of either, the true cause must neces- 
sarily remain uncertain.(d) 

§ 306. Another mode of calculation is from the period of quickening. In 
treating of the “signs of pregnancy,’’ we have already shown the fallacy, to 
which any calculation founded upon this date is liable, since it may occur as 
early as the tenth week, as late as the twenty-sixth, or may never be perceived 
at all. 

§ 307. (b.) Cessation of the catamenia.—The mode of reckoning adopted 
by women themselves, as well as by their medical attendants, is usually from 
the cessation of the catamenta, or from a period midway between the last 
monthly discharge and its next expected recurrence. It is at once obvious 
that such a computation must yield merely an approximate result. If calcu- 
lated beforehand, it may happen to prove correct, or it may either fall short 
of, or exceed the actual duration. Conception may take place at any time in 
the interval between one menstrual period and another. Hence by reckoning 
from the last occurrence of the catamenia, we may be in error by the whole 
length of the menstrual interval—viz., 23 to 25 days—since impregnation 
may have been effected immediately before the anticipated return ; or, on the 
other hand, the real duration of the pregnancy may be apparently shortened, 


(b) On the Duration of Pregnancy in the Human Female, by James Reid, M. D. 
Lancet, 1850. 

(c) Com. v. Fritz, 8 P. L. J. 43. Com. v. M’Carty, 4 P. L. J. 140. 

(d) Com. v. M’Carty, 4 P. L. J. 130. 


313 


§ 309] MODES OF RECKONING. [BOOK Il. 


by referring the impregnation to the end instead of the beginning of the men- 
_ strual interval. By adopting the common way of dating from midway between 
the two periods, the evil of falling into an extreme error is indeed avoided, but 
certainty is no better attained. 

§ 308. (c.) Arrest of menstrual discharge.—Another source of error lies 
in the irregularity of the menstrual function. If this continue to be per- 
formed during pregnancy, the female may become very much perplexed in her 
calculation. By dating from the complete cessation of the monthly discharge, 
she may make her pregnancy appear much shorter than it is in reality, or, on 
the other hand, add to its real duration by ascribing its commencement to some 
antecedent period at which she may suppose that she experienced the “ pecu- 
liar sensations’? above spoken of. In general, however, the mistake by which 
protracted cases may be accounted for, depends upon the fact of the catamenia 
having been arrested by some accidental cause before impregnation occurred. 
The female is often sustained in her error by the appearance of symptoms not 
unlike those of real pregnancy, which are apt to ensue upon the arrest of the 
catamenial discharge. Thus a lady, mentioned by Dr. Reid, who had borne 
five children, and had never before had any stoppage of the menses, except 
when pregnant, missed a period about ten months after the birth of her last 
child, which was at that time weaned, and naturally concluded that she was 
again enceinte ; this opinion was confirmed by the second period also passing 
without any catamenial appearance. All the usual general symptoms of preg- 
nancy occurred in succession, but, to her great surprise, she did not quicken as 
usual at the fourth month, and this occurrence did not take place, until the 
supposed seventh month of her pregnancy. The infant was born exactly 
twelve calendar months after the last appearance of the menstrual functions. 
Dr. Reid remarks : ‘‘ We may readily comprehend that, in this case, there was 
an accidental stoppage of the catamenia for three months, at which period 
conception took place. Fortunately, the apparently late period at which the 
movements of the foetus were perceived, but which, in reality, was the usual 
one at four months, corroborates the above fact.” (dd) 

§ 309. Although, when the duration of pregnancy is reckoned in this man- 
ner—viz., from the arrest of the monthly discharge—the calculation is subject 
to the errors indicated, which are again further increased by the sympathetic 
phenomena often ensuing upon the stoppage of the catamenia from other 
causes ; yet it cannot be denied that there are cases thus reckoned, which can- 
not be so explained. In two cases, for example, related by Prof. Simpson, (e) 
of Edinburgh, the actual enlargement of the uterus, corresponding to its usual 
size at the eighth or ninth week of pregnancy, was ascertained by manual exa- 
mination at this period after the supposed commencement of pregnancy; and 
yet in one case the number of days which elapsed from the last menstruation 
to delivery was 336, and in the other, 332. Allowing an inter-menstrual 
period of twenty-three days (since the impregnation may have occurred only 


(dd) For numerous illustrative cases, see Reid, Lancet, Sept. 1853, p. 236. 

(e) Contributions to Obstetric Pathology and Practice, by J. Y. Simpson, M. D., 
Professor of Midwifery in the University of Edinburgh. Monthly Journal of Medical 
Science, July, 1853. 


314 


BOOK I. ] CAUSES OF ERROR. [$ 310 


at its termination) the actual duration of pregnancy would have been, in each 
case, respectively 313 and 309 days, or at least 33 and 29 days in these two 
cases beyond the generally admitted limit. We might, indeed, to show that 
a manual examination is not always a reliahle indication, adduce cases related 
by another distinguished author, in which it merely confirmed the female in 
her error. Thus Dr. Reid relates that, ‘‘A married women aged twenty-five, 
who had not seen her husband for eight months previously, having procured 
a letter for a lying-in hospital was admitted into it, as labor-pains had con- 
tinued for several hours. She had experienced all the usual symptoms of preg- 
nancy and the abdomen was much enlarged. She was examined by the mid- 
wife of the establishment and by the junior medical officer, and was informed 
that she was only eight months advanced in pregnancy, and not at her full 
term. After remaining three days in the hospital, as the pains had ceased, 
she left, but was recommended to come back immediately if the pain returned. 
As she continued perfectly free from them for the space of another month, she 
then applied to a physician for his advice, who referred her to me. On exa- 
mining the patient, she did not present one single sign of pregnancy, except 
that the abdomen was somewhat enlarged, but the umbilicus was depressed, 
and it was quite evident that she had never been pregnant.’’ Nevertheless, 
we would be slow to believe that an accoucheur of the eminence of Dr. Simp- 
son could have been deceived in supposing, in the cases referred to, that the 
developed size of the uterus was owing to the existence of pregnancy at the 
time of the examination. Yet, we cannot fail to remind the reader that the 
recognition of pregnancy as early as eight or nine weeks after conception by 
the vaginal touch, and especially where, as in these cases of Dr. Simpson, 
‘spurious pregnancy”? had before existed, and there was, moreover, chronic 
inflammation and enlargement of the cervix uteri, is generally considered by 
authors to be, if not impossible, yet far from certain. 

§ 310. The value to be attached to the opinions of accoucheurs upon the 
subject of protracted gestation, depends naturally upon a consideration of the 
fallacies now enumerated. In many cases their only guide is the assertion of 
the mother, relative to the time of the supposed impregnation, the interruption 
of the menstrual discharge, and the period of quickening. In others, reliance 
is placed upon the degree of the enlargement of the womb; and in others, 
again, they are obliged to found their opinion partly upon the testimony of 
the mother and partly upon their own observation. An error in any of these 
elements for the formation of an opinion, will necessarily invalidate its accu- 
racy; and hence, the testimony of an accoucheur as to his own experience, or 
that of a large number as to theirs, does not offer any security against error. 
If, for example, a physician should conscientiously believe and testify that he 
had witnessed a case of gestation protracted to twelve months, the grounds 
for that opinion become a legitimate subject of examination. The sources of 
error have been shown, we think, to be such that it can hardly be in the power 
of any man to give an unqualified opinion of the duration of pregnancy in any 
given case, unless, perhaps, as we shall hereafter see, no more than a single act 
of intercourse has been possible. For this reason, testimony of the kind cannot 

315 


§ 311] CAUSES OF ERROR. [BOOK II. 


become authoritative, the fallacies inherent in every mode of reckoning not 
. being: in the least diminished by the nwmber of cases brought in evidence.(/) 

We will, therefore, not weary the attention of the reader by adducing the 
discordant opinions of accoucheurs upon this point, nor refer to isolated cases 
in which, upon insufficient evidence, the duration of pregnancy was considered 
to have been much protracted beyond the usual period.( f°) Our object is, to 
ascertain what degree of precision is attainable for an opinion relative to the 
true duration of pregnancy, and within what limits it may fluctuate; the 
general principles, thus obtained, may then properly be applied, to explain 
apparently exceptional cases. 

§ 811. (d.) Statistical results.—If we now, with this view, inquire into the 
statistical results obtained by the examination of a large number of cases 
of pregnancy calculated from the interruption of the catamenia, we shall 
find that the errors to which this method is unavoidably exposed give a 
range to the possible duration of pregnancy which the most credulous will 
find it difficult to reconcile with ordinary experience. The results which we 
are about to quote, are, according to the testimony of their authors, founded 
on the most reliable data. Yet it must be remarked, that these data are the 
statements of the women themselves. An amusing instance is related by Dr. 


(f) The following is an abstract of the celebrated Gardner Peerage case, which came 
before the House of Lords in 1825: “ Alan Legge Gardner, the son of Lord Gardner by 
his second wife, petitioned to have his name inscribed as a peer on the Parliament 
Roll. The peerage was, however, claimed by another person, Henry Fenton Jadis, who 
alleged that he was the son of Lord Gardner by his first and subsequently divorced 
wife. It was contended that the latter was illegitimate ; and in order to establish this 
point, the evidence adduced was partly medical and partly moral. Lady Gardner, the 
mother of the alleged illegitimate child, parted from her husband on board of his ship, 
on the 30th of January, 1802. Lord Gardner went to the West Indies, and did not 
again see his wife until the llth of July following. The child whose legitimacy was 
disputed was born on the 8th of December of that year. Therefore, the plain medical 
question, taking the extreme view, was, whether a child born 311 days (forty-four 
weeks and three days) after intercourse (from January to December), or 150 days (twenty- 
one weeks and three days), from July to December, could be considered to be the child 
of Lord Gardner. If these questions were answered in the affirmative, then it followed 
that this must have been a very premature or a very protracted birth. There was no 
pretence that this was a premature case, the child having been mature when born. 
The question, then, was reduced to this: Was this alleged protracted gestation con- 
sistent with medical experience? Many medical witnesses, comprising the principal 
obstetric practitioners in the kingdom, were examined on this point. Their evidence 
was very conflicting, but a large majority concurred in the opinion that natural gesta- 
tion might be protracted to a period which would cover the birth of the alleged illegiti- 
mate child. On the moral side of the question, it was clearly proved that Lady Gardner, 
after the departure of her husband, was living in open adulterous intercourse with a 
Mr. Jadis; and on this ground Lord Gardner obtained a divorce from her after his 
return. It was contended that the counter-claimant was really the son of Lady Gardner 
by Mr. Jadis. The decision of the House was, that this claimant was illegitimate, and 
that the title should descend to the son of the second Lady Gardner.” — Taylor’s Medi- 
cal Jurisprudence, 6th ed. p. 634. 

The decision in this case was based on the proofs of adultery, and not on the 
medical evidence. Had it depended upon the latter, it is doubtful whether it could 
have been given. The inability of the medical testimony to withstand the sifting 
examination of the Attorney-General, fully bears out the statements in the text. (Vid. 
Medical Evidence on the Duration of Pregnancy, with remarks and notes by R. Lyall, 
M.D., 2d ed. London, 1827.) 

(7) Several cases of alleged protracted pregnancy are reported by Mr. Annan, 
Edinb. Med. Journ., ii. 712; and Dr. J. M. Duncan, ibid. p. 967. Dr. Buzzell, of Mass., 
met with a case in which the dead foetus was retained in the womb for twenty-two 
months after full term. (Boston Med. and Surg. Journ., June, 1860, p. 400.) 


316 


BOOK II. ] STATISTICAL RESULTS, f$ 811 


Reid, of an expert midwife, who, when examined in the celebrated Gardner 
peerage case, deposed that she had once gone ten months with child, that she 
was always right in her calculations, that she always fainted away at quicken- 
ing, &c., so that she could not be deceived. Some time after the trial she 
applied to Dr. Reid, convinced, on such grounds, that she was seven months 
pregnant. It proved, however, on examination, that she was not pregnant 
at all. 

Dr. Murphy has published tables founded upon a registry of the cases ob- 
served in the obstetric practice of the University College Hospital for 1844. 
These tables are made up from the data furnished by the women themselves. 
The errors to which we have referred as inherent in the ordinary modes of 
calculation must therefore impair the value of the results obtained, and no 
precautions can entirely eliminate them. In addition, the class of patients 
furnishing these statistics should not be lost sight of. Now, with reference to 
hospital and dispensary practice, it may be observed that the class of women 
who are the recipients of charity from these institutions can seldom give an 
accurate account of the date at which they suppose their pregnancy to have 
commenced, but fix it in their own minds in connection with some domestic or 
other occurrence which happened about the same time. ‘With the low orders 
of Irish,” as Dr. Reid justly remarks, “dates on all subjects appear to be 
totally out of the question, or they are located merely by a recollection that 
the occurrences took place somewhere near to St. Patrick’s day, Boxing day, 
Christmas, &c. If they think that a decided answer will please, it is often 
given simply as the result of a wish to effect this object.”” In order to obviate 
the errors arising from such sources, as far as possible, this last author was 
obliged to erase several hundreds of cases from his tables as doubtful, and 
finally included in his list of 500 cases only 50 from hospital and dispensary 
practice, the rest being private cases. Yet, with all these precautions, we find 
that in one case, where gestation was apparently prolonged to the 314th day, 
it was noted that quickening did not happen until the sixth month, proving, as 
he himself says,.that conception had taken place later than had been thought. 
‘Had minute investigation been made, at an early period, into the remaining 
five cases which went beyond the forty-fourth week, it is most likely that some 
similar facts might have been observed.” The tables of Drs. Merriman, Mur- 
phy, and Reid have been condensed by Prof. Simpson into the table which 
will be found on the next page, and which the reader will also find in the 
paper by Prof. Simpson already quoted.(//’) 


(ff) See ante, § 309. 
317 


§ 312] STATISTICAL RESULTS. [BOOK II. 


TABLE. 
~ Dates of Delivery, calculated from the last day of Catamenia. 
Week. | Days. Merriman, Murphy. Reid. 

sith sie ok Wa, From 252 to 259 ees 12 23 
B8ths . ‘ i 260 to 265 13 14 48 
Both . ; ‘ ha cA ade fapral is] + 27 81 
40th . - : “ 6274 to 280 Do 28 131 
41st F a ; “281 to 287 22 39 112 
42d 4 . 5 “ 288 to 294 15 21 63 
43d 4 : a 295 BOUL 10 25 28 
44th and upwards © 302 to 326 4 2 84 

114 168 | 500 


The total number of cases here reported is 782, of which 355, or nearly 
one-half, went beyond the 280th day, up to the 326th day. If we take the 
number that went beyond the 274th day, there will be 547, or more than fwo- 
thirds of the whole number of women in these reports whose pregnancy lasted 
longer than what has been considered the average duration of this condition. 

This astonishing result would be still more striking if we refer to Dr. 
Murphy’s tables alone. In them there are fourteen cases not included in the 
foregoing table, because delivery took place before the 37th week—viz., 5 in 
the 33d, 3 in the 35th, and 6 in the 36th week. Dr. Murphy comes to the 
conclusion that 301 days is the average limit of gestation! Two of his cases 
attained the extreme period of 342 and 352 days respectively, from which, if 
we subtract the intermenstrual period of twenty-three days (not 28 days), we 
shall still be left with a protracted pregnancy of 314 and 324 days, dating 
from the first suspension of the catamenia. 

With all the sources of error we have indicated, and with the ludicrous 
results issuing from the assemblage of so-called facts in the above table, what 
inference, it may be asked, can be drawn relative to the laws passage the 
duration of pregnancy? 

§ 312. Before replying to this question, let us look at a class of cases which 
afford less room for error. We refer to those where there has been but one act 
of intercourse. 

In this, as in all other questions affecting female chastity or continence, the 
evidence is always open to objection, even where there is no apparent motive 
for deception. Nothing is more common than for an unmarried female in a 
pregnant condition to acknowledge one single act of weakness, while the sug- 
gestion of its having been repeated is indignantly denied. Indeed, to use the 
expression of a German author, the acknowledgment of a solitary transgression 
is usually accompanied with a protestation of its having been as little a sin as 
was possible under the circumstances. However much, in individual cases and 
with plausible concurrent testimony, we may be inclined to favor the statement 
of a female in so unfortunate a position, it is, nevertheless, incumbent upon us, 
in our endeavors to ascertain the existence of a natural law, to look upon the 
material before us solely in a scientific light, and examine and judge it accord- 
ingly. The possibility of error, therefore, from misstatements upon the part 
of the female, cannot be lost sight of. 

318 


BOOK II. ] INSEMINATION AND CONCEPTION. [$ 314 


§ 313. An additional source of error, even in the best authenticated cases, 
lies in determining the moment of conception. This, we do not hesitate to 
affirm, is altogether impossible. So far from conception being always coin- 
cident with insemination, as was positively affirmed in the evidence in the 
Gardner peerage case, experiments upon animals, and observations made upon 
the human subject, have now shown that a more or less extended interval 
may elapse between the sexual congress and the conception which follows it, 
when fruitful. Without entering upon this physiological question, which 
would lead us into a misplaced discussion, it may be stated without any fear 
of denial— | 

Ist. That the ovum occupies from eight to ten days in its passage from the 
ovary to the uterus ; 

2d. That the seminal fluid may retain its fecundating properties in the 
genital passages for several days ; 

3d. That conception may take place at any time in the menstrual interval ; 
and, 

4th. That, therefore, any calculation based simply upon the date of sexual 
intercourse, may cause the duration of pregnancy apparently to exceed by a 
few days the normal period. 

§ 314. Nevertheless, in the absence of any more precise method of deter- 
mining the day of conception, we must content ourselves with that which 
approaches it most nearly, and making due allowance for errors arising from 
moral causes, accept as good evidence those cases reported as dating from a 
single coition. Other cases have, indeed, been reported, in which the inter- 
course was alleged to have taken place but once; but we have rejected all 
such in which the woman’s asseveration could fairly be called in question. In 
doing so, we have been influenced by no other motive than a desire to attain 
the truth, convinced that this could only be done by a strict preliminary 
analysis of each case, in reference to the credibility and standing of the witness, 
her motives for self-deception or interest, as well as the position and reputation 
of the reporter. 

In the following table, we have placed together all the genuine cases, of 
this kind, which we have been able to collect. They amount to fifty-six, and 
are reported by various authors, mostly from their own observation. 

319 


§ 814] SINGLE INTERCOURSE. [BOOK II. 


TABLE. (g) 


Of the Duration of Pregnancy, as dated from a single intercourse. 


Total 
for 
each 
date. 


| Montgomery. 


| Girdwood 
| Skey. 
Anderson w 
Whittaker. 
e 
| Dewees. 


| Beatty. 

| Mellvaine. 

| 

| Desormeaux. 
| Merriman. 


| 
| 
| 


gby 
| Lockwood. 


=) 
© 
a 
| Raciborski. 


Sat Te 


pol 


bo 
or) 
(5) 
DH He | Reid. 


bo 
o> 
oe) 
— 


bo 
aay 
On 
bo Re to DD Oo ee bO 


— ee 


No) 
co 
fo) 
foal 
_ 
fat fe et pe 
CDK FPNMONWNMNNWHEH OWONNNNFY NF NEF 


bo 
or 
on 
(se) 
ie 
be! 
—_ 
-T 
— 
oo 
— 
i 
_ 
—_ 
— 
qn 
Or 


Average, 276 days. 


In the last edition of Dr. Montgomery’s work above referred to, he furnishes 
a table of the duration of pregnancy in fifty-six cases ‘‘in which the day of 
fruitful intercourse was known.”’ We have calculated the average duration of 
pregnancy in these cases and find it to be nearly 276 days, a result which 
agrees with and confirms that of the table already given. It does not differ 
materially from the conclusions of Elsésser from an analysis of 260 cases.(gq) 
But it is most important to bear in mind that the average number of days of 
gestation in any series of cases by no means represents the duration of the 
greater number of those very cases. For while in the table above given 276 


(g) Dr. Reid, Lancet, 1850, vol. ii.; Raciborski, De la Puberté, &c., p. 460; Rigby, 
System of Midwifery, p. 84; Lockwood, Am. Jour. Dec. 1847; Beatty, Dub. Med. Jour. 
vol. viii. ; McIlvaine, Am. Jour. 1848 ; Montgomery, Signs of Pregnancy ; Desormeaux, 
Dict. de Med. vol. x.; Merriman, 8S. W. J., Taylor’s Med. Jur., Am. Ed., p. 399 ; Gird- 
wood, Lancet, Dec. 1844; Skey ; Anderson v. Whittaker (in Dr. Reid’s Paper, loc. cit.); 
Lee, Med. Gaz. 1831; Dewees, Midwifery. 

(gg) Henke’s Zeitschrift, xxiii. 394. 


320 


BOOK IL.] DURATION OF PREGNANCY IN ANIMALS. § 317 


is the average number of days of gestation, five cases only terminated on the 
276th day, eight did so on the 274th day, four on the 287th, &c. 

The result yielded by the foregoing table brings down the average duration 
of pregnancy much below the exaggerated estimate of some authors, below’ 
even the conceded average of many accoucheurs, but places it in remarkable 
harmony with the prevailing popular and medical belief. Two hundred and 
seventy-six days are included in nine calendar months; and, according to 
these calculations, represent the average duration of pregnancy from a single 
sexual act. 

§ 315. Such appears to be the only result attainable at the present time. 
Without giving positive certainty to our knowledge respecting the law govern- 
ing the duration of pregnancy, it renders the probability of error in other 
modes of investigation than that based upon the foregoing principles, stronger 
than it can, by any arguments, be made to appear. In other words, it proves 
that the apparent variation in the length of the term is greater than the 
actual. Although not affording us any reason to consider the normal period 
to be a fixed one, from which there is really no departure, it nevertheless re- 
duces the excess within reasonable bounds. 

§ 316. That a deviation from the normal period is possible, is evident not 
only from the instance we have quoted, but is also sustained by observations 
upon certain domestic animals. Even here it is necessary to premise that 
there are sources of fallacy. The analogy between the function of menstrua- 
tion in the female, and the period of sexual excitement in the cow, mare, Xc., 
is far from being well established, although some late authors have assiduously 
endeavored to maintain that it is real. Hence the entire impossibility of 
knowing when conception occurs in them. Moreover, some of these animals 
will not refuse the male, although already pregnant, and therefore the origin of 
the pregnancy may not be dated far enough back. This is the case with the 
cow. 

§ 317. Prof. Krahmer,(h) whose observations we cite below, gives ex- 
amples of this. Thus, ‘No. 105” took the bull on the 2d of May and on 
the 23d November, 1815; she calved on the 17th February, 1816; 7. e., 296 
days from the first covering, and 86 days from the second. ‘No. 42’ took 
the bull the 30th November, 1808, and again 31st March, 1809; she calved 7th 
September, 1809; 2. e., 281 days after first, and 160 days after second cover- 
ing. Another case is mentioned in which a cow was slaughtered on account 
of this propensity, and was then found to have been some time with calf. 

Lord Spencer(?) published, some years since, the result of seven hundred 
and sixty-four instances of the gestation of cows. The average term he 
found to be 285 days. Three hundred and fourteen cows calved before the 
984th day, and three hundred and ten after the 285th. At 284 days, sixty- 
six calved; and at 285 days, seventy-four. Few cases exceeded the period of 
285 days by more than five or eight days; eight only exceeded it by more 
than twelve days; and one only went to the eighteenth day beyond it. <Ac- 


(h) Beitrage zur Lehre von der Schwangerschaftsdauer, Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1849, 

1, Bi p28. 
(7) Journal of the Agricultural Society, as quoted by Reid, Beck, and others. 
21 321 


§ 819] ARGUMENT FROM ANALOGY. [BOOK II. 


cording to M. Tessier’s observations, the excess above the average period, in 
one hundred and two mares and one hundred and sixty cows, was from fifty- 
seven to sixty days in the former, and thirty-two to thirty-five in the latter. 

§ 818. The most recent and extensive researches on this subject are those 
of Professor Krahmer, of Halle. His observations were made on sheep and 
cows. Every precaution was taken to insure accuracy, each individual in the 
flock or herd having been marked when heat appeared, then separated there- 
from and allowed access to the male. The day of covering and of the birth 
of the young were registered. Among the sheep, the birth fell on the follow- 
ing days :— 


2 fell on the 145th day, 7 fell on the 153d day. 
3 “ 146th “ 3 % 154th “ 
Ti ue 147th “ 1 ms 155th’ “ 
14 A 148th “ it ‘ 159th “ 
38 i. 149th “ 1 ee TBGTE 
44 + 150th “ 1 Me 168th “ 
31 tf 151st “ 1 a 169th, “ 
18 4 lbod 1 é 171st “ 


If the average of these 177 births be calculated, it will be found to be 150, 
and yet only one-fourth of the whole number really fell on the 150th day. 
Thus the probability appears to be, that of four ewes only one will drop her 
lamb at what may be considered the normal term of gestation in the sheep. 

The whole number of cows observed was 1105: the observations covering 
a space of twenty-six years, viz: from 1808 to 1832, and including fifty-five 
in 1847. The average duration is stated at 282 days; but the tables of Dr. 
Krahmer include no less than forty-six births before the 260th day, which 
ought certainly to be looked upon as premature. Leaving these aside, the 
average would probably be increased by a day or two. Stated in weeks, and 
neglecting forty-six births before the 88th week :— 


12 cows calved in the 38th week. 21 cows calved in the 44th week. 

ne, tc 66 66 839th a3 9 éé 6c é¢ 45th bc 
335 6é 66 cé 40th be 3 6c (73 (73 46th 6c 
4929 oe a4 6é Alst be 5 6c é6 6c A4Atth ee 
135 6é be oe 49d 66 4 bc “66 bc“ 48th éé 

33 ce (a3 $c 43d 66 if bc a3 6c 51st é 


§ 319. If the argument from analogy be admissible, the fact may be con- 
sidered as well established, that pregnancy is a condition which may occasion- 
ally exceed the normal limit for its duration; but the limit to this excess can- 
not, in the present state of physiological science, be accurately known. ft is 
undeniable, however, that the greater the amount of deviation the more au- 
thentic and convincing should be the proof required of its actual protraction. 
The suggestion has, indeed, been made, that the development of the child might 
afford a key to the extent of the protraction ; but facts derived from this 
source rather militate against than for its reality. In most of the cases in 
which a child is supposed to have been carried beyond the usual period, it has 
not attained a greater size than is met with in ordinary cases. Sometimes, 

322 


BOOK II.] LEGAL DECISIONS. [$ 822 


indeed, it has been rather smaller than the average. If we could admit that 
pregnancy ever attained the period of twelve, fourteen, or sixteen months, as 
has been asserted, there is no reason why the child should not have continued 
to grow to a size incompatible with its being born alive. The supposition, 
that after nine months it ceases to grow, is an assumption unwarranted by 
analogy or reason, and put forward only with the hope of maintaining a fore- 
gone conclusion. 

§ 320. While, therefore, we admit the occasional prolongation of pregnancy 
beyond its usual limit of 276 days, to the extent of perhaps four weeks, we 
cannot venture, with such fallacious evidence as often serves as the basis of 
the calculation, to accept, as authentic, those instances in which it has appa- 
rently been prolonged beyond this time. The following case quoted by Dr. 
Reid, from Bartholin, will form a fitting conclusion to these remarks. 

‘‘A young girl. of Leipsic, of doubtful character, accused a young man, who 
was rich, of having impregnated her. The magistrates acceded to the request 
of the friends of the accused, and had the girl confined in prison and kept 
under proper surveillance. She was not delivered until after the sixteenth 
month ; but the fceetus was very small, and lived only two days, being imper- 
fectly developed. This case was adduced as a very strong instance of pro- 
tracted gestation, the young woman being so strictly watched by the keepers 
of the prison as to preclude all chance of impregnation whilst there. The 
undeveloped condition of the foetus, however, is a sufficient proof against a 
sixteen months’ gestation, and as to the chance alluded to, we may simply 
ask— 


‘Sed quis custodvet tpsos custodes ??”? 


§ 321. We have endeavored, in this chapter, to show how far the actual 
duration of pregnancy is capable of demonstration, and have, therefore, for- 
borne introducing into the discussion any arguments not based upon direct 
observation of the phenomena of gestation in man or animals. It is not un- 
usual, however, with writers in discussing this subject to allege in proof of 
the really variable and uncertain limit of this process, that nature is never re- 
stricted in her operations within precise and well-defined limits. This argu- 
ment is presented with great clearness in the following pages, containing 
Judge Lewis’ opinion in the case of Com. v. Hoover. We cannot, however, 
refrain from reiterating the opinion that the seeming analogies of nature can- 
not for a moment be adduced in opposition to the facts of physiological 
science. 

§ 322. 38d. Legal decisions.—The following decision on the duration of 
pregnancy deserves especial weight from the character of the learned Chief 
Justice of Pennsylvania, by whom it is reported as well as decided. 

At aspecial Court of Quarter Sessions of Lycoming County, at which Judge 
Lewis presided, the following instructions were given in reference to the count 
for fornication and bastardy: ‘‘If you believe from the testimony of John 
Reibsam, that the prosecutrix had submitted to improper connection with the 
witness, about the time when the child was begotten, this circumstance de- 
stroys her competency as a witness to prove that the defendant is the father 
of her child. The organs of conception, like those of digestion, perform their 
323 


§ 322] DECISION IN CASE OF COM. v. HOOVER. [BOOK Il. 


appropriate offices, without the volition of the female. She is not conscious, 
at the moment of the occurrence, of what takes place. It is only by inference 
that she can afterwards fix the paternity of her offspring. If her intercourse 
has been confined to one individual, there is no difficulty in drawing a correct 
conclusion from the premises. But if she has exposed herself to the embraces 
of several, at or about the time she became pregnant, she has placed it out of 
her power to draw any safe conclusions on the subject. Where two causes are 
shown to exist, either of which is adequate to produce the effect, and there are 
no circumstances to determine the mind in favor of either, the cause must 
necessarily remain uncertain; and in that case there is not sufficient evidence 
to justify a conviction.’’(j) In trials for this offence, the defence is frequently 
rested upon the period of time which elapses between the alleged criminal 
connection and the birth of the child, in cases of material departures from the 
usual period. In a case of this description, Com. v. Hoover, the President of 
the Court of Quarter Sessions of Lancaster County (Lewis) gave the following 
charge to the jury: Com. v. Elisha F. Hoover. ‘The defendant is indicted 
for fornication and bastardy. ‘The prosecutrix, Catherine EH. Rife, is a compe- 
tent witness, but her credibility is for the jury. According to her account, the 
child was begotten on the 25d of March, 1845. It was born on the 30th of 
January, 1846; a male, fine, large, and healthy. The period of gestation 
was 313 days. It is conceded that the defendant had no intercourse with the 
mother after the 23d of March, 1845, and the time of delivery is fixed with 
equal certainty. A question of science has arisen, respecting the possibility 
of protracted gestation. The usual period is nine calendar months, or 273 or 
275 days. What has been denominated the extreme of the usual period is 
280 days, or ten lunar months. But whether any, and, if any, what longer 
time may be allowed as possible, are the questions which this case presents for 
decision. Medical writers of celebrity and authority are arrayed on both sides 
of these questions. And the medical witnesses upon the stand are in like 
manner divided in opinion. In constructing this evidence, so far as respects 
the facts narrated by each, it is proper to consider that writers and witnesses 
are respectively relating only the results of their own knowledge; and when 
one states that no case of protracted gestation has fallen under his observation, 
it is but negative testimony, and cannot justly be relied upon to invalidate the 
negative evidence of others, equally entitled to credit, who enumerate cases of 
the kind, which they positively affirm to have come within the range of their 
practice and knowledge. In the most familiar transactions of life, witnesses 
will differ in their narration of circumstances. In narrating a simple assault 
and battery, the bystanders frequently vary in their statement of the facts. 
Some narrate incidents which others omit. Conceding all the witnesses to be 
equally worthy of credit, the rule is to reconcile their evidence so that all will 
stand consistently together, if this be reasonably practicable. Some witnesses 
observe circumstances which others have not seen. Negative evidence is there- 
fore deemed insufficient to outweigh affirmative statements from witnesses 
equally entitled to credit. One gentleman, in a very long course of practice, 


(j) Com. v. M’Carty, 3 Penn. L. Journ. p. 140. 
324 


BOOKS|) LEGAL DECISIONS. [$ 322 


may have failed to observe any case of the kind. Another, in a very brief 
period, may have noticed several. And it is reasonable to believe that where 
such a diversity of opinion exists, each will be in some measure influenced by | 
his own professional experience, and that this will also, to some extent, affect 
his belief in the cases reported by others. ‘There are, doubtless, many of these 
cases where the struggle for character and property, and the circumstances of 
the parties whose interests have been involved, have furnished temptations to 
falsify, and may have influenced the decisions of the tribunals. But, after 
making all proper allowances for cases of this description, the whole evidence 
on the question, when fairly considered, appears to show that cases of pro- 
tracted gestation are not impossible, although their existence is very unusual. 
The heads of wheat in the same field do not all ripen together. The ears of 
corn on the same stalk do not all come to maturity at the same time. Even 
the grains of corn on the same ear ripen at different periods. The fruit on 
the same tree shows a like deviation. A portion will ripen and fall, while 
other portions remain comparatively green upon the parent stalk. The eggs 
of the fowl, under process of incubation at the same time, are subject to the 
same variation. In quadrupeds, if the testimony of M. Teissier be believed, 
we have proof of the like irregularity. Whatever may be the causes operating 
in each case to divert nature from her accustomed course, to accelerate or delay 
her usual progress, the human species, like the rest of creation, seem occasion- 
ally under their influences. The developments of puberty, although generally 
shown at a certain age, are far from regular. Some individuals approach it 
earlier, others later in life. Intellectual maturity is subject to like irregulari- 
ties. Some are precocious, others astonishingly tardy in arriving at the usual 
degree of discretion. The intervals between the catamenial visits, although in 
general regular and fixed, exhibit remarkable deviations. Their final departures, 
although generally to be expected at a certain age, areas irregular as their 
first approaches, and as subject to variations as were their periodical returns. 
A certain period of life has been usually assigned for the terminations of a 
mother’s perils, but the instances of extensive deviations from this general 
rule are numerous and well established. The gestation of one child at a time 
is according to the usual course of nature, but the birth of twins, triplets, &c., 
furnish indubitable proofs of astonishing departures from the usual course. 
The sensations of the mother, produced by the elevation of the foetus from 
the cavity of the pelvis (called quickening), although usually occurring at a 
certain period, are known to be subject to the like departure from the usual 
time. It has been said that human life does not generally extend beyond 
seventy years. But if this be the general rule, the departures are numerous. 
The most distinguished jurist perhaps now living in the whole world (Chan- 
cellor Kent) will be eighty-three years old on the first of July next; and yet, 
within a few days, I have been honored by the receipt of a letter from him, 
under the date of the 18th instant, in which he states that he is still in good 
and active health, that his relish and ardor for studies and legal learning con- 
tinue unabated, that he has the blessing of good eyes, and that he is still an 
observer of what passes with lively sensibility. This instance may serve to 
illustrate not only the occasional deviations from the general rules respecting 
325 


§ 323] . EARLY VIABILITY. [BOOK IL. 


the duration of human life, but the like variation in respect to intellectual 
vigor, by which one individual attains a pre-eminence over the generality of 
mankind. All nature abounds with occasional departures from her general 
customs. Even the compass, which guides the mariner on the trackless ocean, 
which enables science to fix with reasonable certainty the boundaries of king- 
doms and farms, and the truthfulness of which to its accustomed law has been 
perpetuated by a proverb, is subject to mysterious but acknowledged variations. 
From analogy, and from the statements of distinguished authors and eminent 
witnesses, after making every allowance for mistakes and the operation of 
unfavorable influences, we are led to the belief that although nature delights 
in adherence to her general usages, she is occasionally retarded in her progress, 
and otherwise coerced, by causes not always apparent, into extensive deviations 
from her accustomed path. And we are induced to believe that protracted 
gestation for the period of 313 days, although unusual and amprobable, is 
not ¢mpossible. The evidence to establish the existence of such a considerable 
departure from the usual period should be clear, and free from doubt. The 
witness should possess a character beyond reproach, and her testimony should 
be consistent and uncontradicted in all material facts. If the jury are satisfied 
that the evidence for the commonwealth is of this character, the unusually 
long period of gestation does not require them to disregard it. The law fixes 
no period as the uliimum tempus pariendt. The usual period has been 
stated, but longer time may be allowed, according to the opinions of the phy- 
sicians and the circumstances of the case. The question is, therefore, open 
for the decision of the jury. If they believe the witness, they may find the 
defendant guilty.”” The jury found the defendant guilty. The prosecution 
was conducted by Messrs. Frazer and Mathiot, and the defence by Mr. Stevens. 
The case is fully reported in the American Journal of the Medical Sciences, 
No. 24, new series, Oct. 1846, p. 535, accompanied with a communication from 
Professor Atlee, in which he mentions two cases within his own practice where 
the period of gestation was about a year.(%) This latter period has received 
the sanction of the legislature of Pennsylvania as the longest period of in- 
dulgence which the law allows to a married woman who has a child in the 
absence of her husband. If she cannot show that he was in her company, or 
was within the colonies between the easternmost parts of New England and 
the southernmost parts of North Carolina, within twelve months next before 
the birth of the child, she is deemed an adulteress under the 4th section of 
the act of 1705. 

§ 323. 4th. Harly Viability.—From the uncertainty which attends the estab- 
lishment of the date of conception, and from the unequal development of the 
foetus in different cases at different periods of gestation, the difficulty of know- 
ing the actual age of an immature child is often very great. When born at 
the eighth month, the weight and size do not differ materially from what is 
often met with at maturity, but yet there are marks of imperfect development 
which are generally conclusive as to its immaturity, and which enable us to | 
judge that but a few weeks were wanting to complete the development. (Vid. 


(k) Amer. Journ. of the Med. Sciences, Oct. 1846, p. 535. 
326 


BOOK II. ] CASES OF EARLY VIABILITY. [$ 825 


Axortion.) Thus, at the eighth month its length is only two or three inches, 
and its weight one to two pounds below the average. The pupillary membrane 
has disappeared, the testicles are found in the internal abdominal ring, and the 
middle point of the body is nearer the umbilicus than the sternum. In the 
foetus, at seven months, however, the length hardly exceeds a foot, nor its 
weight four pounds. Children born at this age are often reared, if they have 
not been neglected. There can be no possibility of mistaking a foetus of seven 
months for a mature child, while this error might readily be made with one at 
eight months. 

§ 324. The most important epochs, however, relative to questions of via- 
bility and paternity are the fifth and sixth months. A great discrepancy will 
be found in the statements of authors as to the weight and length of the foetus 
in these months. The weight of a six months’ fcetus is, for example, set down 
by Burns, Hamilton, and Devergie at one pound, and by Maygrier at two 
pounds ; while the last-mentioned writer states its length to be twelve inches, 
the others make it from eight to ten inches. The length of a five months’ 
foetus is usually considered to be from six to seven inches, but Maygrier and 
Sémmering allow as much as ten inches. In forming an opinion, therefore, 
as to the exact age of a child between the fifth and seventh month of uterine 
life, this variation in the estimates, by different authors, should inspire caution 
and reserve. Itis better to acknowledge the impossibility of certifying the 
exact age, than to attempt to give precision to a point incapable of receiving it. 

§ 325. The period mentioned may be regarded as the debatable ground 
relative to the viability of the child. Mr. Whitehead says, that when abor- 
tion takes place before the end of the s¢xth month, it is invariably fatal to the 
offspring, either before birth or in a short time after, and at any period before 
the completion of the full term, it is more or less injurious to its well-being. 
Instances are, however, on record which disprove the correctness of this state- 
ment. Dr. Erbkam, of Berlin, has reported a case in which a foetus only six 
inches long, and weighing eight ounces, was born alive, and survived half an 
hour. It moved its arms and legs, turned its head from side to side, and 
opened its mouth. The action of the heart continued after all other move- 
ments had ceased. The child was shown to the celebrated Miiller, who ex- 
pressed the opinion that it was not more than four months old.(/) <A case, 
which is remarkable, and of great interest, on account of the accuracy with 
which the date of impregnation, and therefore the true age of the child, was 
ascertained, is reported by Dr. Barrows, of Hartford. Mrs. J miscarried 
on the 18th of May; her lochial discharges were profuse and long continued. 
Dr. B. was called to prescribe for her on the 18th of June, when she had in- 
creased vaginal discharge, probably the menstrual flow ; this continued for a 
week or two, before it wholly subsided. She went from home, on the 27th of 
June, to spend some days in the country, and at this time, she first indulged 
in sexual intercourse subsequent to her miscarriage. On the 18th of Novem- 
ber, in consequence of over exertion, she again miscarried. Dr. Barrows ait- 
tended her on this, as on the previous occasion. The ovum was expelled entire. 


(2) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., 1838, p. 244. 
327 


§ 325} CASES OF EARLY VIABILITY. [BOOK II. 


The sac contained at least two pints of fluid. ‘The membranes were not 
-ruptured for some little time, during which the movements of the child were 
active and vigorous. On rupturing the membranes, and exposing the child to 
the air, it instantly gasped, or, perhaps I ought rather to say, uttered a cry so 
loud as to be heard distinctly at a distance of several feet, it being at the same 
time covered with the bedclothes. The cord was tied on its ceasing to pulsate, 
at the end of two or three minutes, then separated, and the child wrapped in 
warm flannels. As it continued to manifest the ordinary appearances of life, 
its condition was watched with much interest and care. It breathed with a 
kind of convulsive gasp at intervals of one or two minutes, for a period of 
forty minutes. The heart beat regularly for forty-five minutes. .... The 
child repeatedly opened its mouth, and thrust forward its tongue.” It mea- 
sured (it was a female) ¢en inches in length, and weighed fourteen ounces. The 
integuments were, for the most part, firm and of a light color; the portion 
covering the abdomen was thin, and of a reddish hue. The hair of the head 
was like down, the rudiments of the nails were plainly discernible, and the iris 
was entirely closed by the membrana pupillaris. The head was tolerably 
firm, but the frontal and parietal bones were imperfect, and widely separated. (m) 
Dating from the first intercourse after the previous miscarriage, the age of this 
child was 144 days, or less than five calendar months. There is nothing in 
its size, weight and development, as reported, inconsistent with the i 
reckoning and the facts related by her physician. 

Another case, in which a living child was born on the 179th day, is inter- 
esting from the fact that the child lived four months, and then died of an 
epidemic disease. When born, it was so feeble that it was not thought possible 
that it could live. Its cry could be heard only at a few yards’ distance; it had 
no nails, its hair was downy, its skin florid and thin, and its extremities imper- 
fectly developed. The bones of the head were soft and easily compressed, and 
the sutures wide. ‘The pupillary membranes were entire. It was placed near 
the fire, in a basket, wrapped in soft cotton. It could not suck, but milk was 
dropped into its mouth through a quill. Forty days after birth it was found 
to be thirteen inches long, and weighed three pounds. The centre of the body 
was nearly an inch above the umbilicus.(n) A somewhat similar case, is that 
of Dr. Barker, of Dumfries, in which the child was born on the 158th day of 
gestation ; it weighed one pound, and measured eleven inches. Three years 
and a half afterwards it was still living, and weighed Pacis Ses pounds and 
a half.(o) 

In the case related in great detail by d’Outrepont, of Bamberg, a child which 
was not more than twenty-seven weeks, or six months old, when it was born, 
was still living at the age of eleven years. It was not larger at that time, 
however, than a boy of eight years.(p) Another curious instance, in which 
the life of a very premature child was preserved, is narrated by Dr. Rodman, 
of Paisley. The child’s uterine age could not have been more than five months, 
- since, three weeks after birth, it weighed only one pound thirteen ounces, and 


(m) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., April, 1853, p. 380. 
(n) Lancet, April, 1852. (0) Med. Times, Sept. and Oct. 1850. 
(p) Henke, Zeitschrift, vol. vi. 

328 


BOOK II.] LIVE BIRTH AT EARLY PERIODS. [$ 827 


measured between eleven and thirteen inches. It survived its birth one year 
and nine months. (q) 

§ 326. Nothing need be said upon the possibility of premature development, 
except that it is not sustained by any authentic facts, and that it is disproved 
by daily experience, which shows that the foetal development is regular and 
progressive, except when retarded or arrested by disease. That a child can 
anticipate, as it were, its maturity, acquiring, e. g., at six or seven months the 
development it obtains usually only at nine, is far more difficult to credit than 
that the mother or her physician should be mistaken in their reckoning. In 
our remarks upon protracted gestation, we have exposed the difficulty, not to 
say impossibility, of fixing the date of fruitful intercourse or of conception, and 
the mistakes which the female is apt to commit by the ordinary manner of 
calculating the duration of pregnancy. Those remarks are equally applicable 
here, and perhaps, indeed, more so; for if it is rare to find the child at the 
close of a seemingly protracted pregnancy over-mature, it is still more contrary 
to experience that a foetus should be a month or more further advanced in its 
development than belongs to the period of uterine life which it has reached. 

§ 327. It is sometimes of importance to determine the momentary life of 
the child, even although the possibility of its surviving is out of the question. 
The question as to what constitutes live birth, although of less importance at 
this time than at the natural term of gestation, has, nevertheless, some bear- 
ing upon civil rights and relations. Every spontaneous movement is an evi- 
dence of life. 'To what degree these must be carried, to constitute evidence 
of life before a court of law, it is not for us to determine. The following 
case will serve, however, to show that a child may be born alive, in this sense, 
in the fourth month: A fcetus was born which weighed exactly nine and a 
half ounces, and measured eight inches in length. On touching the feet and 
hands, the limbs were immediately drawn up and moved about. On blowing 
on the face, the lower part of it was tremulously moved, and the mouth at 
each time opened, and three or four times an attempt to respire or gasp, ac- 
companied by an apparently respiratory movement of the chest, took place. 
The pulsations of the heart through the thin walls of the chest could be readily 
observed. After the umbilical cord was cut, these movements became more 
feeble, and soon ceased. On opening the chest, the situation and appearance 
of the Iungs and other organs were characteristic of its apparent age. The 
lungs, in color and volume, resembled those of an early foetus; and, with the 
exception of one or two ecchymosed spots, no color or other evidence of deve- 
loped air-cells were noticed, all the appearances indicating that no air whatever 
had ever reached the tissue of the lungs. The brain was afterwards minutely 
examined, and also found to be characteristic of the apparent age, as were also 
the other foetal organs. The calculations of the mother corresponded with the 
age given to the feetus. (7) 


(q) Guy’s Med. Jur. p. 180. 
(r) Dr. Keiller. Read before the Edinburgh Obstetrical Society. Ed. Month. Journ. 
Sept. 1854. 
329 


§ 330] SUPERFETATION, [BOOK II. 


Gi Nal ad Wed Onl tg Bik 
SUPERFQ@TATION. 


§ 328. CoNncEPTION during pregnancy is termed superfcetation. The early 
physicians accorded a ready belief to its frequent occurrence; but modern in- 
quiries have led to a more precise and restricted application of the term. 
There are cases of apparent and of real superfcetation. ‘They may all be con- 
veniently considered under the following divisions :— 

1st. Twin pregnancies in which the children, by certain physical peculiari- 
ties, prove that they have had different fathers. 

2d. Parturition of children nearly at the same time, but differing much in 
the degree of their development. 

3d. After the birth of a mature child, a second one equally mature is born, 
after an interval which may amount to four months. 

1st. Under the first division, may be ranged all those cases, of which now 
a great number have been recorded, where women have given birth to twins 
of different colors. In some of these the fact of cohabitation at short intervals 
with men of different colors was admitted by the woman. A case, very fre- 
quently quoted, is that related by Buffon, as having occurred in South Caro- 
lina, in which a white and a mulatto child were born to a white woman, who, 
immediately after having had commerce with her husband, was obliged to 
receive the embraces of a negro. A similar case is related by Dr. Lopez, in 
which the mother was a negro woman, and the twins were, the one black and 
the other mulatto.(s) Dr. Tyler Smith refers to a case occurring in the 
Brazils, where the indigenous race is copper-colored, but where there are 
negroes and whites, in which a creole woman had three children at a birth, of 
three different colors, white, brown, and black, with all the features of the 
several races. (ss) 

§ 329. The same fact has been observed in animals. Mende relates that a 
mare, which had been covered by a stallion, and shortly afterwards by an ass, 
produced at the same birth both a horse and a mule. Dr. Read, of Andover, 
reports a similar case, except that the mare was covered by the horse two or 
three days after the ass. 

§ 330. Up to what period, after one conception, a second impregnation is 
possible, cannot, in the present unsettled state of our knowledge respecting 
the early phenomena of fecundation, be determined with exactness. While 
some eminent physiologists continue to maintain that the ovum is fecundated 
in the ovary itself, more recent researches tend to show that it takes place, in 
normal cases, in the uterus or in the Fallopian tubes, the ova being detached 


(s) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., Oct. 1845, p. 315. For a large number of similar cases, 
vide references in Beck’s Med. Jurisprudence, i. 265; also a case by Dr. Carter, of 


Va., in Phil. Med. Ex., 1849, p. 523, and another by Dr. A. I’. Attaway, of Geo., Am. 
Journ. Med. Sci., July, 1854, p. 290. 


(ss) Lancet, April 1856, p. 388. 
330 


‘ 


BOOK II.] SUPERF@TATION. [§ 381 


at the menstrual periods, and finding their way into the womb, independent of 
fecundation. It will be readily seen, therefore, how many questions must be 
answered before this one can be solved. In addition, the period at which the 
deciduous membrane is formed in the uterus is not known with sufficient pre- 
cision to enable us to judge how soon an efficient obstacle is placed against 
the penetration of the seminal fluid into the uterus, or to an additional im- 
pregnation. Dr. J. M. Duncan denies that the plug of viscid mucus in the 
cervix of the uterus during the early stage of pregnancy, is a sufficient barrier 
against a second impregnation, as he has found it in the non-menstruating 
unimpregnated uterus. He does not, however, prove that in the latter case 
impregnation can take place. He also is led to believe, from an inspection of 
an ovum 77 situ of about eight weeks, that sufficient space exists between the 
decidua vera and reflexa at this time, and an open communication to the Fal- 
lopian tube, to permit impregnation. He believes that the decidua is formed 
by the development of the normal mucous membrane of the uterus, without 
closing the tubes or the cervix uteri.(‘) This was the doctrine of William 
Hunter, and it has received the weighty sanction of Dr. Tyler Smith. In all 
the known cases of undoubted superfcetation, such as those above cited and 
referred to, the time which intervened between the separate acts of coition was 
very short; in fact, where the circumstance has been confessed by the woman, 
it appears that one sexual act followed almost immediately upon the other. 
In a case related by Moseley,(w) a negress brought forth two children at a 
birth, one a negro, the other a mulatto. She confessed that a white man on 
the estate came to her hut one morning before she had risen, and she suffered 
his embraces, almost instantly after her black husband had quitted her. In 
another in which the children were the one black and the other mulatto, the 
negro mother admitted having cohabited during the same night with a negro 
and an European.(v) 

A case of superfcetation by Dr. Taylor, of Miss., forms an exception ap- 
parently to the rule. Here a negress brought forth at one birth a black and 
a mulatto child. The latter appeared to be ‘‘three weeks younger than the 
negro,” but as the woman admitted having cohabited with a white man one 
week after the cessation of the catamenia, and upon a night succeeding an act 
of intercourse with her husband, the case cannot, we think, be viewed differ- 
ently from the preceding.(w) The same may be said of Dr. Attaway’s case, 
before referred to; but in this the date of the conception of the white child 
might have been nearer that of the negro than three days—the interval as- 
signed by the woman. 

§ 331. 2d and 3d. The cases of apparent and pseudo-superfcetation may be 
embraced in the second and third divisions, which will here be considered to- 
gether. They are all of them explicable upon the supposition of unequal 
development of twins; this inequality being due often to some natural defect 
in one placenta or one fcetus, but frequently also to a direct compression 
exercised by one child upon the other. In cases where this compression has 


(t) Ed. Month. Journ., April, 1853. (u) Diseases of Trop. Climates, p. 111. 
(v) Casper’s Wochenschrift, Jan. 8, 1842. 
(w) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., April, 1849, p. 549. 

. dol 


§ 332] SUPERFETATION. [BOOK II. 


been so great as to cause the death of one foetus, it may be easily recognized 
after birth by the appearance of the body. ‘Thus, in a case referred to by Dr. 
Beck,(a) Mr. Ingleby says: “A few weeks ago, on examining a mature pla- 
centa, the expulsion of which was attended with severe hemorrhage, a foetus 
of four or five months, flattened but not putrid, was found within the mem- 
branes, closely adherent to the uterine surface of the mass, and yet a full sized 
living child, in connection with this placenta, had just been expelled.’ Du- 
vernoy(y) also relates an instance in which the mother gave birth to a living 
female child, healthy and mature, and immediately afterwards to a dead feetus 
of about six months, with its head and face extremely flattened and deformed. 
Pouchet(z) gives the history of a most interesting case communicated to him 
‘by Dr. Merrielle. A lady was delivered of a healthy and mature female child, 
_ which was soon followed by the placenta. Her labor pains continued not- 
withstanding, and the next morning she expelled an entire ovum, containing 
another fetus. This fcetus presented all the characters of a child of four 
months; it was seven inches long. Almost every part of its body bore evident 
traces of compression. Its head was flattened transversely to such a degree, 
that the sinciput presented a sharp edge, and at the temporal region its dia- 
meter was not more than six lines. The chest was also very much compressed. 
The upper extremities, and particularly the left hand, were greatly flattened. 
The appearance of the skin showed that the foetus had been a long while dead. 
It was of a pale brown color, and denuded of epidermis over a great part of 
the body. Dr. Streeter related a case to the Westminster Medical Society, in 
which one fcetus was alive at full term, and the other blighted, having ap- 
parently perished at the third month. It had undergone very little decompo- 
sition, and was squeezed quite flat.(@) Dr. Perkins, of New London, in a 
letter to Dr. Porter, May 16, 1840, relates as follows: That he delivered a 
woman of a healthy male child, at full term. The same night she expelled a 
foetus enveloped in its membranes, between four and five months old, entirely 
undecomposed and uninjured, except the head, which was compressed.(b) Dr. 
Lopez presented to the Medical Society of Mobile a specimen of a blighted 
foetus of the third month, discharged with a living child at full term. The 
skull was so completely compressed, that the opposite parietal surfaces were 
in close contact. The whole body, in fact, was distorted and flattened by the 
pressure exercised by the other child upon it. It was not at all decomposed. (c) 

§ 332. Having thus seen the compression which one foetus in a twin 
pregnancy may exercise upon the other, it is not difficult to understand that 
the pressure may be sufficient to retard its growth without actually destroying 


(x) Med. Jur. i. p. 269. 

(y) Note sur une grossesse double parvenue & terme. Strasbourg, 1834. 

(z) Théorie positive de l’ovulation spontanée. Paris, 1847. 

(a) Lancet, Oct. 30, 1841. 

(b) Lopez, Am. Journ., Oct. 1846, where other cases will also be found illustrative 
of this fact. Dr. J. B. Davis gives a case of the unequal development of fetuses in 
the same uterus. A woman, seven months advanced in pregnancy, miscarried with 
twins; one was of seven months’ growth, the other of not more than as many weeks. 
Ohio Med. and Surg. Journ., Sept. 1850. Another case in N. W. Med. and Surg. 
Journ., Nov. 1850, and another in the New Orleans Med. and Surg. Journ., Sept. 1850. 
Consult also Montgomery, op. cit., art. Secondary Ovum. 

(c) Loc. cit. 

02 


BOOK I1.] SUPERF@TATION. [§ 882 


its existence. If this compression becomes at a certain period so great, that 
without destroying the vitality of the foetus, it only permits the blood to reach 
it in an insufficient degree, one twin becomes arrested in its development, while 
the other goes on increasing until its maturity, when it’is expelled. The 
remaining foetus, now relieved from the compression, grows with facility, and 
is born in its turn when it has reached maturity. If, for example, a foetus, in 
consequence of the compression of the placenta, have at nine months a no 
greater development than is usual at five, it follows that after the birth of its 
fellow it must remain four months longer in the womb. Where the placenta 
is common to the two children, this cannot, of course, occur, since the birth of 
one child would render the intra-uterine existence of the other impossible.(d) 
Among the more remarkable cases illustrating the unequal development of 
twins, may be mentioned that communicated to Foderé by Desgranges, at 
Lyons, relative to the wife of Raymond Villard. She was delivered, on the 
20th January, 1780, of a living seven months’ child; but the delivery was not 
accompanied with the usual symptoms: no milk appeared; the lochia were 
wanting, and the abdomen did not diminish in size. Three weeks after the 
delivery, she felt the movement of the foetus, and on the 6th of July, 1780 
(five months and sixteen days after the first birth), she was again delivered of 
a living female child. The milk now appeared, and she was enabléd to nurse 
her offspring.(e) There was an interval of one month in the birth of two 
mature children in a case related by Dr. Irvine.(f) In another case, a woman, 
35 years of age, was confined on the night of the 30th of March, 1848. The 
placenta came away without difficulty. The size of the abdomen remained 
very considerable; the lochia did not flow, and nevertheless the surgeon did 
not conceive the possibility of another child. Dr. Prival, of Bedarrieux, was 
called in, and at once ascertained the presence of a second child. The one 
already born was full-sized, healthy, and took the breast with avidity. The 
mother would not remain in bed; she arose and occupied herself with her 
household cares. Twenty-one days after the birth of the first child, labor- 
pains again came on, and another child was born, as strong and healthy as the 
first. 

Instead, therefore, of attempting to explain those cases, in which, on ac- 
count of the birth of mature children at an interval varying from a few days 
to several months, upon the hypothesis of superfcetation, it appears far more 
easy and rational to believe that they are examples of twin pregnancy, in 
which one foetus has grown at the expense, as it were, of the other, and is first 
expelled; the second remaining until it has acquired the necessary maturity. 
Conclusive evidence of the fact of compression is afforded in those cases of 
double monsters in which the fcetuses differ considerably in size. Such an one, 
it is stated by Dr. Duncan, exists in his pathological collection.(g) 


(d) Vide Pouchet, loc. cit. 

(e) Foderé, vol. i. 484. (f)Med. Times, Dec. 28, 1844. 

(g) Am. Journ., July, 1849, p. 247, from Med. Times, May 26. For other cases, vide 
Med. Times, Dec., 1844; Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1837—case by Dr. Mébus; Beck’s Med. 
Jur. i. p. 266. A similar case, with the exception that the second child was not born 
until forty days after the first, is reported in Month. Journ. of Med., Ed., Ap. 1855, 
from Gaz. des Hépitaux, Dec. 1854. 

330 


§ 384] SUPERFETATION, [BOOK II. 


§ 333. It has been suggested by various authors that superfcetation can 
be explained upon the supposition that the uterus was double; but although 
not a few instances of double uteri are on record, yet, in all, pregnancy, where 
it existed, occurred on one side only.(h) We have succeeded, however, in find- 
ing a remarkable case which has been hitherto strangely overlooked. A 
woman, native of Modena, became pregnantfor the seventh time in 1817. 
Nine months afterwards, she was delivered of a male child, healthy and fully 
developed. The placenta was expelled and the woman recovered her health 
and strength entirely. Still, one-half of the abdomen remained enlarged, and 
the movements of a foetus were distinctly ascertained. One month after her 
last labor, she was again confined of a living male child, also well formed. A 
few years after, she was again pregnant, and bore a child now living. This 
woman died afterwards of apoplexy. On examination, the uterus was found 
to be double, but with a single cervix ;(7) hence this may have been either a 
case of real superfoetation—the children occupying each one horn of the uterus, 
and conceived at the interval of a month—or, on the other hand, it may have 
been really a twin pregnancy, but whether in the same or different cavities does 
not appear. 

The following are the conclusions of Casper upon this subject: 1. The 
great majority of all the cases of alleged superfcetation have their origin in 
fraud or in self-deception. 2. Very many of them are nothing more than 
twin pregnancies. 3. The occasional occurrence of a second conception 
within a few days after a first, cannot be rejected upon scientific grounds. 4. 
It is not to be believed that a new conception can take place in a female who 
is several weeks or months pregnant. 5. The possibility of a double preg- 
nancy in a double uterus is not to be denied.(a) Prof. Kussmaul, of Heidel- 
berg, who has thoroughly examined this subject, concludes that the con- 
dition of pregnancy offers no real hindrance to a second conception within 
the first two or three months. He holds, however, that true superfcetation, 
or the result of the fecundation of separate ova within different menstrual 
periods, if judged of by the cases that are recorded under this title, are simply 
examples of multiple conception, followed by the death or arrested growth of 
one or more of its products. (b) 

§ 334. It may be necessary to state, that where extra uterine pregnancy 
takes place, the uterus may receive a new ovum. Mende(j) gives two cases 
of this kind, and Horn(k) relates a case of coexistent uterine and extra 
uterine pregnancy, in which the woman was safely delivered of the child which 
was contained in the uterus. 


(A) Dr. Oldham (in Guy’s Hosp. Rep. vol. vi. p. 551) gives several instances, one 
of which is particularly remarkable, since not only the uterus, but the vagina also was 
double. “It was divided,” he says, “by a septum of dense organized tissue, suffi- 
ciently loose and elastic to stretch without causing pain, so that both canals were 
equally capacious.’”’ The duplicity of the uterus was acertained beyond a doubt. The 
woman was safely delivered. In the unimpregnated half, menstruation did not occur - 
during pregnancy. 

Another remarkable case of double uterus and vagina is reported by Dr. Kelly, of 
N. York (Am. Journ., Oct. 1852, p. 328). He furnishes references, also to other cases. 

(7) Encyclographie Médicale, Fev. 1849. 

(a) Gericht. Med. ii. 228. (>) Brit. and For. Med. Chir. Rev., Jan. 1860, p. 113. 

(j) Gericht. Med. p. 355. (k) Siebold’s Jour. fiir Geburtshiilfe, 8 Bd. s. 330. 

004 


BOOK II. | ABORTION AND FQTICIDE. [$ 836 


CoH AP DE VV. 
ABGR ELON  ANDEEGTIOCTDE. 


§ 335. Ist. Natural Causes.—The natural causes of the premature expul- 
sion of the foetus from the womb are extremely numerous. They are found 
in certain morbid conditions of the system, either original or dependent upon 
pregnancy—in diseases of the ovum and its appendages, and in a class of 
causes usually called accidental, but which might, perhaps, in reference to the 
present subject, be termed direct or immediate. We refer our readers, for an 
enumeration of the predisposing causes of abortion, to those works on mid- 
wifery which treat directly and at length upon the subject. It is not our 
purpose to dwell upon them here. ‘The consideration of them has, we con- 
ceive, but a slight bearing upon criminal cases, since the object in these is to 
ascertain the employment and mode of action of some medicinal substance, 
or culpable manceuvres, in reference to their tendency to produce the premature 
expulsion of the fetus. In estimating the legal criminality of attempts to 
produce abortion, we should not, without sufficient grounds, impute the 
occurrence of this event to the designs and attempts of the accused party ; 
for however criminal the intention, if the means employed were wholly inade- 
quate to fulfil it, there is no room for the intervention of the law. In this 
connection it should not be forgotten that abortion is an accident of common 
occurrence, to which many women are peculiarly subject, and which may depend 
upon disease of the placenta or foetus, the death of the latter, syphilis, small- 
pox, or other constitutional disease of the mother, or which may be occasioned 
by various causes accidentally producing weakness, or, finally, which, relatively 
to the strength of the female, are violent and sufficient to bring on uterine 
contractions, although innocuous under ordinary circumstances. At the same 
time a natural tendency to abortion would not, we presume, mitigate the crimi- 
nality of the act of procuring it. In truth, abortion can rarely be designedly 
effected, unless by mechanical means, where there is not a predisposition to it; 
hence the violence and fatality of the measures which are sometimes used to 
accomplish it. The cases are, indeed, too familiar to be deserving of special 
record, in which, after the most violent bodily injuries, women have not 
aborted, but carried their children the full time and been safely delivered. Mr. 
Whitehead, for example, mentions the case of a poor woman, in the fourth 
month of pregnancy, who received a severe fracture of the skull, from a blow 
with a hatchet, for which she was under treatment nine weeks. She was 
delivered of a healthy child at the full term of utero-gestation. 

§ 336. 2d. Drugs. (1.) Hrgot.—Most authors assert that there are no 
specific medicinal substances by which abortion can be produced. The only 
drug which has any claim to be considered as specific in its action upon the 
uterus is the ergot of rye. Some writers allege that it is only capable of 

335 


§ 337] SAVIN, TANSY. [BOOK II. 


increasing the energy of the uterine contractions when these have already 
begun, and deny to it the power of originating them. - We need, however, in 
this place, only show that it has this power. Thus, Mr. Whitehead (who by 
no means favors the view of its specific character) states, that in a case under 
his care, where, owing to deformity of the pelvis, it was necessary to get rid 
of the foetus in the fifth month of pregnancy, the ergot alone was employed, 
and at first with desired effect. It was given in three successive pregnancies, 
and in each instance labor-pains came on after eight or ten doses had been 
administered, and expulsion was effected by the end of the third day. Tried 
in a fourth pregnancy in the same person, it failed completely.(/) Hoffman 
has collected the experience of others with this substance. Out of forty-seven 
cases of premature labor in which the ergot was employed, it produced it, 
without the necessity of, or the employment of other means, in thirty-two, 
while in the remaining fifteen cases, it was given in addition to other means.(m) 
Dr. Ramsbotham says : ‘‘ Hgomet ipse tamen permulta vidi exempla, in quibus 
partus prematurus inductus fuit septimo vel octavo graviditatis mense 
peracto, solo secalis cornutt usu, ovult membranis integris servatis, ore utert 
oceluso neque digito, neque ullo alio modo ad patefactionem excitato.’’(n) 
The same author has recently published a valuable paper on the induction of 
premature labor by the ergot, in which, we think, the reader will find conclusive 
evidence of the specific power of this drug. Premature labor was artificially 
induced by it in three successive pregnancies in one patient. A table of fi/ty- 
Jive cases is given in which it was successfully used.(o) Dr. Churchill says: 
“Ergot of rye is now pretty generally supposed to have the power of origi- 
nating uterine contractions.”’(p) Much of the difference of opinion with 
respect to the uterine tendency of ergot depends no doubt upon the inertness 
of certain samples of the drug gathered at the wrong period, since it appears, 
upon good authority, that it should be collected during its stage of formation, 
being powerless afterwards. It is now well ascertained that, independently of 
its exciting uterine contractions, ergot directly affects the life of the foetus by 
a depressing action upon the heart, and thus may indirectly become a cause of 
abortion. Instances of the sort are numerous during epidemics of ergotism, 
or the poisonous effects of ergot produced by eating bread made of flour con- 
taining this product. ‘ 

§ 337. (2.) Savin and oil of tansy are more frequently used than ergot. 
They have both unfortunately a popular reputation as emmenagogues and 
as agents for producing abortion. Whatever good effect their stimulant 
properties may have in cases of amenorrhcea dependent upon feeble develop- 
ment, it is very certain that they have no direct power of instituting uterine 
contractions. Their action as abortives is solely due to their poisonous pro- 
perties, since when given in proper medicinal doses they are merely aromatic 
and stimulant, and may prove emmenagogue, without necessarily exciting 
uterine contractions. In fact, tansy is in common use as an agreeable bitter 


(1) On the Causes and Treatment of Abortion and Sterility. Am. ed. 1848. 

(m) Neue Zeitschrift fiir Geburtskunde, Bd. 23. 

(n) Parturition. London, 1841. Appendix, p. 639. (o) Med. Times, Jan. 1854. 
(p) Syst. of Midwifery, p. 279. See also Shapter, Prov. Med. Journ. April, 1844. 


506 


BOOK II.] TANSY, RUE. [$ 888 


for promoting the appetite. We think, however, that the administration of 
either of these drugs to pregnant women, should always be looked upon with 
suspicion, for we cannot imagine any condition which, at this time, would 
require or justify their employment. In a case, in which probably from one 
to two ounces of the oil of savin had been swallowed, a most violent inflam- 
mation of the stomach was excited, followed by softening and perforation of 
this organ, peritonitis, and death. The uterus was empty; it was of the size 
usual at the third or fourth month of gestation, and, judging from the state 
of the parts and the lochial discharge, the foetus had been expelled, it was 
supposed, from two to three days. Morphia and chloroform had both been 
taken by the unhappy woman, but the violent inflammatory results found at 
the post-mortem examination were, no doubt, properly ascribed to the action 
of the savin.(q) ‘ 

Dr. Lee states that he has known an instance where sixty drops of the oil 
of savin were taken every morning for a week, for the purpose of procuring 
abortion in the sixth month of pregnancy. It brought on violent pain in the 
abdomen and region of the uterus, and the woman died on the third day after 
the delivery of a still-born foetus; on dissection, the uterine organs as well as 
the pelvic viscera generally were found to be in a state of high inflammation. 
Another case is mentioned in which an infusion of savin was taken for a similar 
purpose. It brought on violent and incessant vomiting, extreme pain and 
uterine hemorrhage, and death in a few days.(r) 

Dr. Taylor met with a case in which death was caused by powdered savin— 
abortion having first taken place. Hight ounces of green liquid were found 
in the stomach, which, with the cesophagus and the small intestines, was highly 
inflamed. ‘The poison was identified by observing the minute portions of the 
leaves under the microscope. (s) 

A case of poisoning with oil of tansy is reported by Dr. Dalton, of Boston, 
in which death, after the most violent convulsions, took place at the end of 
three hours and a half; the quantity swallowed was more than an ounce. The 
uterus contained a well-formed foetus about four months old, and there was 
not the least appearance anywhere of the foetus or membranes having suffered 
any disturbance.(¢) In another fatal case of poisoning with this oil, reported 
by Dr. Hildreth, the quantity taken was half an ounce, and death followed in 
less than two hours. Pregnancy of a few weeks’ standing existed, and the drug 
was, as in the former case, undoubtedly taken for the purpose of producing 
abortion, but nothing of the kind took place.(w) 

§ 338. The leaves and unripe fruit of the common rue, most probably, act 
like the foregoing drugs, solely by their irritant properties, which have been 
used with the hope of procuring abortion. The only cases which we have 
met with, where this was successfully induced, are those reported by Dr. 
Hélie. The constitutional symptoms were, in them, very alarming, resembling 
such as are produced by poisons of a narcotico-acrid character. (v) 


(q) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., April, 1851, p. 529. Communicated to Dr. T. R. Beck by 
James H. Salisbury, M. D., of Albany, N. Y. 
(r) Copland’s Med. Dict., Am. ed., art. ‘ Abortion.” 
(s) Med. Gaz. xxxvi. 646. (t) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., Jan. 1852, p. 140. 
(u) Ibid. May, 1835. (v) Ann. d’Hyg. pub. vol. xx. p. ee 
22 


§ 341] VENESECTION : MECHANICAL MEANS. [BOOK II. 


§ 339. Powerful purgative medicines, such as aloes, jalap, croton oil, and 
elaterium, given repeatedly, or in doses capable of setting up violent action of 
the lower bowels, may produce abortion by a secondary action upon the uterus. 
The same may be said of cantharides and turpentine. All of these drugs are 
capable of producing a great degree of active congestion and inflammation in 
the pelvic viscera, and hence the uterus is not always exempt from their action. 
At the same time, they can hardly produce this result without seriously endan- 
gering the mother’s life. It is certain that in the greater number of cases, 
where abortives are criminally employed, the life of the mother is more readily 
sacrificed than that of her offspring. 

§ 340. 3d. Venesection has seldom a tendency to produce abortion. On 

the contrary, there is no remedy more in vogue for warding off a threatened 
abortion than this, and numerous authors testify that pregnant women have 
been bled many times in succession without this result ensuing. 
_ Nevertheless, when pushed to the extent of causing syncope it may have 
that effect. M. Dépaul(w) relates an instance in his own practice, where a 
- woman, apparently suffering with severe headache, in two successive pregnan- 
cies, applied to him for the purpose of being bled. He afterwards discovered 
that the bleedings in these and on one previous occasion had destroyed the 
foetus, and that he thus had ignorantly seconded the intentions of the mother. 
Suction of the nipples by the mouth or by cupping glasses has occasionally 
been resorted to for the production of premature labor.(q@) 

§ 341. 4th. Mechanical means.—In some instances the woman seeks to rid 
herself of her burden, by making use of violent exertion, by direct injury to 
the abdomen, or by the introduction of instruments into the womb. These 
attempts are often unsuccessful when made by the female herself, and even by 
an ignorant accomplice. A tailor’s apprentice attempted to produce abortion 
in his mistress, by thrusting into her vagina the large scissors used in his 
trade, and cutting with them. He wounded the vagina, but failed in his pur- 
pose.(b) Although the use of instruments generally indicates the intervention 
of another person, yet cases are known in which the woman has herself suc- 
ceeded in introducing them. Thus, in a case in this country, a female brought 
on abortion by “probing herself with a piece of whalebone,’ and she declared 
that she had miscarried five times previously by the use of drugs.(~) More 
frequently, however, the abortion is accomplished through the culpable assist- 
ance of persons who make a trade of this nefarious practice. While, for the 
most part, the persons who are ready to degrade their humanity to this occu- 
pation are exceedingly ignorant and wholly unskilled in medical knowledge, 
it cannot be denied that occasionally medical men lend their skill to the 
accomplishment of the woman’s purpose. Such conduct cannot be too strongly 
condemned, and is the more deserving of receiving the punishment awarded for 
the criminal offence in question than are the blundering and reckless attempts 
of those less skilled, and who may, in many instances, be scarcely aware of the 


(w) Traité d’Auscultation Obstetricale, p. 270. 
(a) Scanzoni, Med. Times and Gaz., Oct. 1853. 
(6) Casper’s Gericht. Med. ii. 251. 

(z) New York Journ. of Med. vol. vii. p. 199. 


338 


BOOK I1.] CRIMINAL ABORTION. [§ 341 


probable results of the operation to the mother.(y) In the one case, the prac- 
tice may be carried on for a considerable time with impunity, and hence a 


(7) “ We blush, while we record the fact, that in this country, in our cities and towns, 
in this city, where literature, science, morality, and Christianity are supposed to have 
so much influence ; where all the domestic and social virtues are reported as being in 
full and delightful exercise; even here individuals, male and female, exist, who are 
continually imbruing their hands and consciences in the blood of unborn infants ; yea, 
even medical men are to be found, who, for some trifling pecuniary recompense, will 
poison the fountains of life, or forcibly induce labor, to the certain destruction of the 
foetus, and not unfrequently of its parent. 

“So low, gentlemen, is the moral sense of the community on this subject, so ignorant 
are the greater number of individuals, that even mothers, in many instances, shrink 
not from the commission of this crime, but will voluntarily destroy their own progeny, 
in violation of every natural sentiment, and in opposition to the laws of God and man. 
Perhaps there are few individuals, in extensive practice as obstetricians, who have not 
had frequent applications made to them by the fathers or mothers of unborn children 
(respectable and polite in their general appearance and manners), to destroy the fruit 
of illicit pleasure, under the vain hope of preserving their reputation by this unnatural 
and guilty sacrifice. 

“ Married women, also, from the fear of labor, from indisposition to have the care, the 
expense, or the trouble of children, or some other motive equally trifling and degrading, 
have solicited that the embryo should be destroyed by their medical attendant. And 
when such individuals are informed of the nature of the transaction, there is an ex- 
pression of real or pretended surprise that any one should deem the act improper, 
much more guilty; yea, in spite even of the solemn warning of the physician, they 
will resort to the debased and murderous charlatan, who, for a piece of silver, will 
annihilate the life of the foetus, and endanger even that of its ignorant or guilty mother. 

“This low estimate of the importance of foetal life is by no means restricted to the 
ignorant, or to the lower classes of society. Educated, refined, and fashionable women 
—yea, in many instances, women whose moral character is in other respects without 
reproach, mothers who are devoted, with an ardent and self-denying affection, to the 
children who already constitute their family—are perfectly indifferent respecting the 
foetus in utero. They seem not to realize that the being within them is indeed 
animate—that it is, in verity, a human being, body and spirit; that it is of importance ; 
that its value is inestimable, having reference to this world and the next. Hence they 
in every way neglect its interests. They eat and drink; they walk and ride; they 
will practise no self-restraint, but will indulge every caprice, every passion, utterly 
regardless of the unseen and unloved embryo. They act with as much indifference as 
if the living, intelligent, immortal existence lodged within their organs were of no more 
value than the bread eaten, or the common excretions of the system. Even in cases 
where mothers have suffered from repeated abortions, where foetus after foetus has 
perished through their neglect or carelessness, and where even their own health is 
involved in the issue, even in such cases every obstetrician can bear testimony to the 
great difficulty of inducing our wayward patients to forego certain gratifications, to 
practise certain self-denials, and to adopt efficient means for the salvation of the child. 

“This is not all. We can bear testimony that in some instances the woman who 
has been well educated, who occupies high stations in society, whose influence over 
others is great, and whose character has not been impugned, will deliberately resort to 
any and every measure which may effectually destroy her unborn offspring. Ashamed, 
or afraid, to apply to the charlatan, who sustains his existence by the price of blood, 
dreading, it may be, publicity, she recklessly and boldly adopts measures, however 
severe and dangerous, for the accomplishment of her unnatural, her guilty purpose. 
She will make extra muscular efforts by long, fatiguing walks, by dancing, running, 
jumping, kept up as long as possible; she will swallow the most nauseous, irritating, 
and poisonous drugs; and, in some instances, will actually arm herself with the sur- 
geon’s instrument, and operate upon her own body, that she may be delivered of an 
embryo, for which she has no desire, and whose birth and appearance she dreads. 

“These facts are horrible, but they are too frequent and too true. Often, very often, 
must all the eloquence and all the authority of the practitioner be employed; often he 
must, as it were, grasp the conscience of his weak and erring patient, and let her know, 
in language not to be misunderstood, that she is responsible to her Creator for the life 
of the being within her.”,—On Criminal Abortion; a Lecture introductory to the 
Course on Obstetrics, &c., in the University of Pennsylvania, by Hugh L. Hodge, M. D. 
Philadelphia, 1854. 

In an article upon this subject (Annales d’Hygiéne, 1856, v. 121), M. Tardieu, after 
referring to the crime as one allowed to go unpunished, and as a source of wealth to 


339 


§ 842] MECHANICAL MEANS. [BOOK II. 


larger number of children be secretly sacrificed; in the other, the career is 
usually short or interrupted, for its murderous consequences become too soon 
apparent. 

It is not necessary to describe the manner in which the operation is per- 
formed. The deplorable results of the clumsy manceuvres usually practised 
are sometimes, though rarely, brought to light. An inquest was held at Not- 
tingham in a case of abortion which had been produced by the introduction . 
of a wooden skewer into the uterus. The child’s head had been perforated by 
this instrument; it was four and a half months old. A verdict was rendered, 
in accordance with the surgical evidence, that the woman had died of perito- 
nitis, caused—by the rupture of an abscess in the ovary!(z) A female, a 
single woman, went to the house of the prisoner, and, having informed her of 
her pregnancy, underwent an operation, as described by witness, of having a 
pin thrust up into the womb. This was repeated for several days, and it 
-ended in the delivery of a male child of about six months’ development. The 
child was born alive, but died about five hours afterwards.(a) Dr. Channing 
relates the case of a woman who, believing herself to be pregnant, attempted 
to produce abortion by introducing into the womb a piece of soft wire bent 
upon itself for an inch or more at the further end. She succeeded in thrusting 
the wire into the uterus, but was unable to withdraw it, and, after suffering 
severe pain, she called in medical aid, but the wire could not be removed. Her 
attending physician then cut it off as high up as possible, and six years after- 
wards the wire was still there. In this case the female was not pregnant.(aa) 

§ 342. The operation required is one of an exceedingly delicate and difficult 
nature, and even those who are conversant with the anatomical arrangement 
of the parts interested require to be careful in their manipulations. The ope- 
ration of inducing premature labor in this way has been sometimes attended 
with accidents. Thus, Dr. J. B. 8. Jackson reports an instance in which the 
internal iliac artery was opened by an instrument introduced for the purpose 
of expediting labor.(b) A similar case is recorded, in which the left common 
iliac was punctured. In this case, which was brought to trial, the jury returned 
a verdict that the woman had died of a spontaneous rupture of the artery. (c) 
In France an attempt was made recently to produce abortion by the injection 
of a corrosive and irritating substance into the vagina. 


more than one midwife in New York, says (p. 125): “In common with the magistrates 
and the mortality inspectors of Paris and its environs, Iam convinced that criminal 
abortion constitutes a trade as free as it is immoral. So well is this fact known, that 
houses are openly shown where women may be sure of meeting with the wicked accom- 
plices they require, and which are notorious even beyond the frontiers.” Statistical 
reports, analyzed by Dr. H. R. Storer (N. Amer. Med. and Surg. Journ., 1859), render 
it probable that the prevalence of this crime in the United States and in Europe is 
greater than those who have not examined the subject could conceive to be possible. 
Dr. Walter Channing, of Massachusetts, refers to the difficulty of obtaining a conviction 
for abortion, and adds: “I believe there has never been one in this State, this moral 
State by eminence, and perhaps in none is this crime more rife.” (Boston Med. and 
Surg. Journ., April, 1859, p. 135.) 

(z) Lond. Med. Gazette, xlv. 

(a) Am. Journal, April, 1851, p. 526, from The Queen v. West, Carrington and Kir- 
wan’s Nisi Prius Reports, vol. ii. p. 784. 

(aa) Boston Med. and Surg. Journal, April, 1859, p. 137. 

(>) Dublin Med. Press, Aug. 1848. to. te) Abide 

340 


BOOK I1.] INDUCTION OF PREMATURE LABOR. [$ 344 


§ 343. It is evident that in all these cases of local violence, should death 
result, a careful anatomical inspection would reveal the crime. In case, how- 
ever, the woman survive the operation, a medical examination would probably 
be superfluous. 

We do not recollect to have met with any case of criminal abortion more 
horrible than that reported in one of the English medical journals. (d) 

A man named Asher, known as an “herb doctor,” undertook, for the sum 
of two sovereigns, to procure abortion upon the person of a woman named 
Elizabeth Fletcher, who, in the absence of her husband, had become pregnant. 
The operation was performed upon the woman at his own house, and from 
that moment she began to suffer pain, which increased, and she became 
seriously ill. Asher being called upon to see her, ‘introduced his hand and 
arm into the vagina, and kept them there from five to ten minutes, during the 
whole of which time the woman was in frightful agony.” From this time 
the pain increased greatly in severity, and vomiting commenced. Her death 
ensued in less than a week from the operation. An examination of the body 
was instituted. There were marks of contusions extending from about two 
inches below the umbilicus, on either side, to the symphysis pubis. The 
muscles of the abdomen, at this part, were infiltrated with pus, and coagulated 
blood was found between them. Recent adhesions united the omentum to the 
surface of the intestines, and blood was extravasated in the vicinity of the 
uterus and bladder. The bladder was almost black, and in a state of gan- 
grene. In its posterior wall was a large lacerated opening, and an aperture 
of considerable size in the corresponding part of the anterior wall of the neck 
of the uterus; two-thirds of the neck of the uterus were detached from the 
body of the organ. Through these openings the foetus had escaped from the 
uterus into the bladder, in which latter viscus it was found, together with 
some coagulated blood. This criminal, who is described as a “‘gray-headed 
old man, upwards of sixty years old,’’ and who appears to have had much 
experience in performing these iniquitous operations, was sentenced to trans- 
portation for fourteen years only. 

§ 344. (1.) Premature labor is frequently induced in legitimate medical 
practice, for the purpose of avoiding the risks which in some cases attend 
parturition at term. ‘The pelvis is sometimes so much deformed, that a mature 
child cannot possibly be born alive. The choice, in such cases, lies between 
the Cesarean operation and an artificial premature birth. The proportion of 
children born at seven months that live, is, of course, smaller than if they were 
carried to the end of gestation, and could be delivered; but as, in the cases of 
deformity alluded to, the child’s life must inevitably be sacrificed by birth 
through the natural passages, it becomes a vital question how its life may be 
preserved with the least risk to the mother. The statistics of the results of 
the Cesarean operation give no cheering view of its value; the danger to the 
mother’s life is infinitely greater than in the induction of artificial labor, which, 
in fact, in competent hands is a trifling operation. The average number of 
children saved by this means is rather more than one-half of the cases ope- 


(d) Med. Times and Gazette, March, 1855. 
341 


§ 347] MOLES—HYDATIDS, [BOOK It. 


rated upon. The practice which, when first proposed, awakened some doubts 
as to its morality, has now received the sanction of the highest medical authori- 
ties, and is universally regarded as justifiable and beneficent. Although de- 
formity of the pelvis is usually the motive for the operation, it may be pro- 
perly employed in other cases, as, for example, in women whose children 
habitually die before the term of gestation is reached, or who are suffering 
from diseases the danger of which is much heightened by the continuance of 
pregnancy. Yet the propriety of its employment in the latter case must be 
admitted with some reserve; the sympathetic phenomena of pregnancy are 
often far more alarming in appearance than in reality, and will rarely justify 
any interference with the natural progress of gestation. In all cases, the phy- 
sician should consult with one or more of his colleagues before inducing pre- 
mature labor; in this manner, his humane intentions will not expose him, in 
case of failure, to reproach, suspicion, or prosecution. 

§ 345. (2.) Blows upon the abdomen are often designedly given with the 
view of causing a woman to miscarry. It is impossible to define the degree 
or mode of violence required to effect this purpose. Where uterine hemor- 
rhage occurs shortly after ill-usage of this nature, it is reasonable to attribute 
it, and the abortion which follows, to the violence used. Great circumspection 
is, however, necessary in giving a positive opinion when the hemorrhage pre- 
ceding the miscarriage is not the immediate consequence of the injuries received, 
since a woman may happen to abort from other causes, or she may be near 
her confinement. In such a case, it may be necessary to determine whether 
labor has been spontaneous, or been provoked by the ill treatment. Ordinary 
labor does not commence with free hemorrhage (except in the case of placenta 
preevia), while, on the contrary, that which is brought on by blows upon the 
abdomen does so because the placenta becomes, by this violence, partly or wholly 
detached from the uterus. If the violence has, however, been inflicted upon 
other parts than the abdomen and loins, this criterion cannot be safely relied 
upon, and the dependence of the premature labor upon the injury must be 
established by other means. 

§ 346. 5th. Signs of abortion.—The signs of abortion having taken place, 
are obtained, (1.) From an examination of the object expelled. This is neces- 
sary, in order to determine tis human character and tts probable age. Other 
bodies are expelled from the womb which bear a greater or less resemblance to 
the human embryo, but are not always the products of conception. Most fre- 
quently, however, they are the products of conception, but in a diseased condition. 

-§ 347. The substances called moles, which are not unfrequently met with, 
fall under this denomination. The fleshy mole (also called ‘false germ’’) is 
composed of layers of fibrous matter inclosing a central cavity, in which some- 
times fragments of the embryo can be recognized, but in others it appears to 
have been dissolved in the amniotic liquor. This body is supposed to be a 
hypertrophy of the placental surface of the chorion. The hydatid mole, or 
mole vesiculaire, is certainly a morbid alteration of the placental surface of 
the chorion. Velpeau and Mad. Boivin(e) have given so clear and accurate a 


(e) Nouvelles Recherches sur l’Origine, la Nature, &c., de la méle vesiculaire. 
342 


é 


BOOK I1.] MEMBRANOUS CONCRETIONS. [§ 349 


description of the real character of this pathological product, that there remains 
but little of the mystery which formerly enveloped it. It consists of a dilata- 
tion of the cellular spongioles of the chorion. These increase, until they 
form a mass inclosing the ovum more or less completely. The remains of the 
foetus are sometimes found;(/) at others, again, the disease would seem to 
have originated at so early a period, that the embryo has become dissolved in 
the amniotic fluid. In this case, a trace of umbilical cord is sometimes found. 
These hydatids may remain in the uterus a much longer time than the usual 
duration of pregnancy; and hence, as they are the result of conception, an 
opinion as to their probable age should be given with great caution, lest unjust 
aspersions should be thrown upon the character of the woman. The principal 
obstetrical authorities relate instances of the expulsion of hydatids from the 
uterus at ten, eleven, and fourteen months after conception, and some agree in 
admitting that they may be retained many years. Dr. Montgomery says, that 
he has not met with any instance of such long retention.(g) 

§ 348. In cases of difficult menstruation, there are sometimes expelled sub- 
stances which by some persons might be mistaken for an early ovum. ‘These 
are, in some cases, false membranes, occasionally discharged entire, (h) preserv- 
ing the shape of the uterine cavity; in others, again, they are membranous 
concretions, originating from coagula of blood. ‘The first variety is distin- 
guished from the ovum by the absence of the flocculi of the chorion, to which 
the outer surface of the menstrual membrane, however rough it may be, bears 
no resemblance.(7) In the other, the central cavity is wanting, and no trace 
of umbilical cord or placental surface can be found; besides this, it differs 
from the ovum in shape, being longer, thick in the middle, and pointed at 
either end. Of these productions, Dr. Denman says: “ As the first cases in 
which this membrane was discharged were those of married women, a doubt 
arose in my mind whether it was not really a consequence of early conception, 
but I have lately had the most undoubted proofs that it is sometimes discharged 
by unmarried women, and may be found previous to and without connubial 
communication ; and that the uterus has occasionally, or constantly, in some 
women, the property of forming it at or in the interval between the periods 
of the menstrual discharges. It seems particularly necessary to establish this 
fact, as the appearance of this membrane has more than once given rise to 
erroneous Opinions and unjust aspersions.’’(j) In examining doubtful masses 
expelled from the womb, they should be carefully cleansed and macerated in 
water, to dissolve the coagula. 

§ 349. In conclusion, it may be mentioned that there can be no danger of 
mistaking for ova, the polyp which are sometimes discharged from the uterus, 


(f) Dr. J. B.S. Jackson exhibited to the Society for Medical Improvement in Boston, 
a specimen, showing uterine hydatids connected with the membranes of a four months’ 
foetus. Am. Journ. Med. Sci., April, 1850, p. 359. 

(g) Pregnancy, &c., 2d ed., p. 267. 

(2) Dubois, of Neufchatel, gives the case of a girl who, at every menstrual period, 
expelled a hollow membranous body corresponding exactly with the shape of the uterus. 
Gaz. Méd., 1847, p. 729. 

(2) Churchill, Dis. of Females, p. 103. 

(j) Introduct. to Midwifery, p. 161. 


343 


§ 352] PROBABLE AGE OF THE FETUS. [BOOK II. 


since these are easily recognized by the remains of the pedicle, as well as by 
their structure. 

§ 350. The brief description given above of the various substances which 
may be discharged from the uterus, will suffice, we hope, to show that those 
which are called moles and hydatids are diseases of the appendages of the 
embryo, and that even if no trace of the latter remain, yet the existence of 
these peculiar degenerations places the fact of impregnation beyond question ; 
while, on the other hand, the products of a disordered menstrual function are 
so different in character, as to be recognized as such without difficulty. 

§ 351. The probable age of the ovum, or of the foetus, is ascertained from 
a consideration of the degree of its development. It is impossible to declare 
with positive accuracy the dimensions, weight and degree of development of 
the foetus at any given period of its intra-uterine life. The date of conception 
can never be known with certainty, and even if it could, and the age of the 
foetus be ascertained, yet the weight and length, as well as the development, 
depend upon individual peculiarities. The same variety that is found in the 
bodily proportions of adults, must prevail in the foetus. Hence, the state- 
ments which follow, must be looked upon as averages only. 

§ 852. At the earliest period at which the human embryo can be recognized, 
it is of a somewhat crescentic shape, with the cephalic extremity large and 
rounded; it is a semi-transparent viscid mass, and from the lower portion of 
its concave side the umbilical cord takes its origin. The whole ovum presents 
a loose, shaggy appearance, arising from the tufts of the chorion. <A few 
weeks later, this is confined to only a portion of the surface of the ovum, from 
which the placenta becomes afterwards developed. 

In the course of the fourth and fifth week, the rudiments of the several 
parts of the foetus become distinct. The mouth is the first feature which is 
observed, and is very large, and of a triangular shape; the eyes are like two 
black specks, and the liver occupies the whole of the abdomen. A moving 
point can be seen where the heart is afterwards developed, but the blood is not 
yet ofa red color. 

By the sixth week the forearm and leg are distinct, and the former is de- 
tached from the side, to which it was bound. The rudiments of fingers and 
toes can be discerned. At the evghth week the head forms more than one-third 
of the body, the features are more distinct, but the sex is not yet manifest. 
Red blood is found in the vessels of the cord. | 

At three months the foetus has attained the length of two to two and a half 
inches (Devergie), and the size of the whole ovum is about that of a goose’s 
egg. The fingers are separated, the toes are connected together by a soft sub- 
stance, the soles of the feet are turned inwards, and the genital organs are 
quite distinct, having indeed a size and prominence disproportioned to their 
subsequent development. 

At four months the length is from five to six inches (Devergie, Velpeau), and 
the weight, as given by the best authorities, is very various, ranging from two and 
a half to eight ounces. At this time the pupillary membrane is more distinct 
than before, the skin is rosy but very delicate, and covered with a fine down, 
while the hair of the head is short, and of a silvery white appearance. 

344 


BOOK I1.] SIGNS OF MATURITY AND IMMATURITY. [$ 858 


At five months, the foetus is from six to seven inches long, and weighs from 
five to seven ounces (Devergie). The head forms one-fourth of the body. 
The large intestines contain meconium in their upper portion. Quickening 
takes place usually at the beginning of the fifth month. In case of abortion 
at this period, the foetus usually escapes first through the ruptured membranes, 
these, with the placenta, following it. 

At six months, the head is no longer so disproportioned to the size of the 
body, and the umbilical cord arises a little above the pubis. The length is 
from nine to ten inches, and the weight one pound (Devergie). Fat is found 
in small quantity under the skin; the latter is of a purplish color, especially 
in the palms of the hands and soles of the feet, as well as in the lips and ears. 
The scrotum, however, is of a reddish color ; the testicles are still in the abdo- 
men. In females, the external labia project, but do not conceal the clitoris, 
which is large and prominent. The pupillary membrane is distinct and firm. 
The nails look like folds of skin. The hair is still scanty and short, and of a 
silvery white color. 

At seven months, the foetus is found to have increased in all its proportions. 
It measures in length from twelve to fourteen inches, and weighs from two to 
three pounds. The bones of the head are still yielding on pressure; the fron- 
tal bone consists still of two parts; the ears lie close to the head; the arms 
and legs are bent in the position which they had in the uterus, if the child be 
born alive. At the ecghth month, the length is from sixteen to eighteen inches, 
and the weight three or four pounds. ‘The skin, in color and thickness, is 
more like that of a child at term; it is covered with a fine short hair, and the 
hair of the head is of a darker color.. Sometimes one of the testicles (gene- 
rally the left) has descended into the scrotum ; usually, however, they have not 
passed the abdominal ring. The pupillary membrane begins to disappear 
towards the close of this month. During the ninth month the foetus gradu- 
ally increases its length, until it attains from eighteen to twenty-two inches, 
and in weight on an average about seven pounds. The characteristic marks of 
maturity are considered to be the following :— 

§ 353. The average length of a healthy, mature child is about eighteen 
inches, and its weight from six to seven pounds. Its skin is of a reddish 
white color; the hair is pretty thick and strong; the nails of the fingers per- 
fect, and the ears cartilaginous. The limbs are firm and rounded, and the 
testicles of the males usually are found in the scrotum. According to Moreau, 
the navel string is inserted a few lines below the centre of the body—a state- 
ment which is confirmed by the observations of Dr. Taylor,(%) Ollivier, and 
Elsisser, although opposed to the opinion formerly held, that its point of at- 
tachment at the end of gestation was exactly the centre of the body. It is, 
moreover, firm and elastic. The child breathes and cries immediately after 
birth, unless the third stage of labor has been protracted ; is able to take the 


(k) Med. Jur. p. 285, Am. Ed. Dict. des Sci. Med. Art. Giuf. Henke’s Zeitschrift 
Bd. 42, p. 256. Dr. Elsisser also states, that in the well proportioned adult, the mid- 
dle of the body is not at the navel, but at the rising point of the mons veneris ; a fact 
which, he says, is generally received by artists and confirmed by a measurement 
of the best antiques.—S. Tabelle fiir bildende Kitinstler von Joseph Mattersberger 
(nach Antiken), 1805. 

345 


§ 356] INFANTICIDE. [BOOK IL. 


breast and swallow, and within a few hours passes its urine and meconium. 
The meconium, however, is often not passed for two or three days; and in 
some cases is voided unobserved during birth. The presence of the vernix 
caseosa, & sebaceous secretion upon the skin, is found, according to EHlsasser, 
upon about one-half of newly-born children. 

§ 354. The several signs of ¢mmaturity may be thus stated in general terms. 
The body is small, lean, and flaccid; the skin tender, wrinkled, red, and upon 
the palms and soles, purple; and the lips, ears, and genitals bleed very easily. 
The head is out of all proportion to the body, as is also the skull to the face ; 
the bones of the skull are widely separated by membranous sutures, and very 
movable; the hair of the head is scanty, short, and silvery; the eyelids and 
lashes are downy. The face has an old and painful look; the pupillary mem- 
brane is present, and the ears are thin and membranous. The navel string is 
attached near the pubes; the scrotum is very red, and not much wrinkled; the 
testicles are still in the abdomen; the lips of the vulva stand apart from each 
other, and the disproportionate clitoris protrudes between them.(/) The im- 
mature child, moreover, breathes with difficulty ; its voice is weak and whim- 
pering; it sleeps continually, cannot suck, and shows no desire for food. | 

§ 355. (2.) The signs of abortion, as obtained by an examination of the 
female, are not very certain in their character. It is seldom, indeed, that an ‘ 
examination of the living female is had, and especially at a period early 
enough to afford any valuable indications. When abortion occurs in the early 
months, it leaves but slight and evanescent traces behind it. A relaxed condi- 
tion of the parts, which at the same time are covered with blood proceeding 
from the womb, resembles so closely the condition present during the catame- 
nial flow that, practically, they could hardly be distinguished. The open state 
of the mouth of the womb. may, in some cases, throw light upon the ques- 
tion. All these signs are, however, more distinct in the latter half of preg- 
nancy, and, as the term of gestation approaches, closely resemble the signs of 
“delivery.” (See § 292.) 

We also refer the reader for a consideration of the value of the corpora 
lutea, as indicative of pregnancy, to the chapter on the Signs of Delivery. 
We would merely repeat here, that although there is, in our opinion, 
sufficient evidence of a marked difference between the corpora lutea of preg- 
nancy and those of menstruation, it requires more general assent and more 
complete substantiation to allow positive inferences from their discovery to be 
put forward in criminal, or other important cases, without reserve. 


CHAP TERRA Val. 
INFANTICIDE. 


§ 356. Ist. Characteristics of still-born and living children.—In the fol- 
lowing considerations upon this subject, we shall restrict our remarks to the 


(1) Bock, loc. cit. p. 241. 
346 


BOOK II.] EXAMINATION OF THE FEMALE, [§ 857 


medical testimony required in the determination of questions arising out of the 
doubtful causes of death in new-born children. By this phrase we propose 
to designate those cases in which doubts concerning live birth may fairly be 
entertained. ‘Those which do not require the solution of this question as pre- 
liminary to a judgment upon the fact or the manner of criminal interference, 
cannot, with strict propriety, be classified under the head of Infanticide. The 
degree of criminality of the offence is determined by the period at which it 
was committed, whether before or after birth; but manifestly this point is, at 
a certain period after birth, no longer subject to doubt. The mode of death 
at this time, whether criminal or otherwise, will be determined by the same 
general rules that are applicable in adult life. Hence the first purpose of 
medical investigation in cases of alleged infanticide, is to ascertain whether 
the child was born alive. 

The evidences of the child having died before birth have been sought in the 
cessation of the intra-uterine movements and the sounds of the fcetal heart, 
and in certain changes in the mother, such as a tendency to fainting, nausea 
and vomiting, loss of appetite and foul breath, a dull, pale, and dejected look, 
a sense of pressure upon the bladder and rectum, or of the falling of the con- 
tents of the womb from side to side, or, finally, the discharge of meconium or 
blood or the protrusion of the umbilical cord. But however probable these 
phenomena may render the death of the child they do not demonstrate it. 

More certain signs are furnished by the condition of a child born dead, pro- 
vided its birth have taken place three days or more previous to its expulsion 
from the womb. These will be described in another place. (J/) 

§ 357. In order that the reader may have a clear view of the evidence 
required to establish the fact that a child was born alive, it will be necessary 
to prefix to it a comparative sketch of the still-born child and that which 
is born living. The visceral and other changes which indicate that a child 
has survived its birth, derive all their importance, as evidence, from a contrast 
with the condition and peculiarities of the same organs in the foetus; and the 
degree to which the change has been accomplished, corresponds in general 
with the energy and extent of the new functions. Hence, before we can safely 
determine that a new-born child has been criminally destroyed, we must be 
prepared to show, as a necessary preliminary, and beyond the shadow of a 
doubt, that the essential foetal characteristics no longer exist. 

A child which ts born dead, having perished immediately before its birth, 
will be usually found, in medico-legal cases, owing to the hurry of concealment, 
to be still covered with the sebaceous secretion called vernix caseosa. Its hair 
is closely agglutinated ; its ears lie closely to the head; the eyes are closed, 
and the eyelids when raised do not remain open. The mouth also is closed, 
and a drop of watery blood is often seen trickling from the nostril. The 
thorax, being unexpanded by respiration, appears flat and contracted, and the 
remnant of the umbilical cord has a fresher look than in a child which has 
lived for a few hours. ‘The trachea is flattened, and often contains a viscid 
mucous secretion. Zhe lungs lie in the posterior part of the thorax, and the 
rest of this cavity is often filled with a yellowish fluid of a slightly glutinous 


(il) See § 491, 
347 


§ 359] APPEARANCE OF STILL-BORN CHILDREN. [BOOK Il. 


consistence. They are of a brownish red color, more or less spotted in some 
_ cases, have a granular structure, and do not crepitate upon incision. Their 
length is greater than their breadth, and their edges are rounded. Their abso- 
lute weight is less than after respiration has occurred, since upon their expan- 
sion by this process, an active circulation of blood takes place through them ; 
but their specific gravity is greater, their vesicular structure being undistended 
with air. ) 

§ 358. A child which has been born alive presents the following character- 
istics; the period of survivance, the mode of death, and the time after it, at 
which the examination is made, have of course a considerable influence upon 
these. As a general rule, however, if the body be fresh, the remains of the 
vernix caseosa will be found under the armpits, behind the ears, &c., the hair 
will be dry and clean, the ears not so closely applied to the head as in the still- 
born child, and the eyes remain half open, in spite of all efforts to close them. 
The swelling upon the back of the head which is common in new-born 
children (caput succedaneum), in whom the head has been the presenting part, 
is far more marked in the child which is born alive than in the still-born ; 
provided death has occurred before the expulsive pains of labor have begun. 
In the one case, it also contains a glutinous bloody serum, while in the other, 
the small quantity of liquid effused is colorless. The thorax is higher and 
more arched than in the feetus, and the diaphragm is depressed in a corre- 
sponding degree by the expansion of the lungs. As a general rule, according © 
to Casper, the highest level of the diaphragm will be found between the fourth 
and fifth ribs in still-born infants, and between the sixth and seventh in the living. 

§ 359. The wmbilical cord affords more valuable proof extra-uterine life, as 
well as of the period of its duration, than any other of the external marks. 
It is generally of a bluish pearly-white color, of the thickness of a finger, and 
within twelve to twenty-four hours after birth, loses its polish and becomes 
dry and flaccid. The process of desiccation begins at the severed end, and in the 
course of twenty-four hours reaches to within half an inch of the navel; this 
portion of it still remaining pulpy and of an amber color. About this time 
the skin of the abdomen, around the attachments of the cord, becomes red and 
swollen, and is pushed up around it in the shape of an inverted cone. During 
the second and third day the cord dries gradually away, becomes twisted and 
flattened like a ribbon, while the preparatory stage of separation is seen in the 
suppurative process which attacks the still moist portion by which it remains 
attached to the navel. On the fourth day, the cord is found to have acquired 
a yellowish brown or black color, and in those parts of it not traversed by the 
umbilical vessels has the transparency and appearance of glue. The separation 
takes place more frequently on this than on the third day, but the time of its 
falling off is subject to great variation. According to the observations of Dr. 
Hlsasser,(m) out of one hundred and thirty cases, it occurred— 


On the 4th day in 10 cases, on the 7th day in 16 cases, on the 10th day in 1 case. 
“cc 5th 6e 40 66 14 8th 66 5 “cc 
6c 6th ce 15¥5) (74 74 Sth 66 3 66 


Cicatrization of the navel is generally complete by the fourteenth day. 


(m) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1852, 4 Heft. p. 262. 
348 


— 


oe 


it a 


BOOK II.] SIGNS OF LIVE-BIRTH—UMBILICAL CORD. [$ 861 


§ 360. The process of desiccation above described is not invariable. Occa- 
sionally where the navel string is thick and pulpy, instead of withering and 
drying away, it will putrefy, even in the healthiest children. Elsisser has often 
made this observation in his hospital at Stuttgart, and the fact is fully con- 
firmed by the observations of Sémmering and Osiander.(n) Moreover, the 
process of desiccation is not confined to the cord of living children alone. In 
two still-born children, Elsdsser found the cord still remaining on the fifteenth 
and twenty-eighth day respectively after birth. It had undergone complete 
desiccation into a horny substance, while the bodies of the children were at the 
same time considerably advanced in putrefaction. Pieces of umbilical cord cut 
off and exposed to the open air, at 40° to 60° Fahrenheit, underwent the same 
withering and desiccating process as in the living child, and without the least 
foul smell. These observations may appear to invalidate the statement of 
Billard, which has been generally accepted as correct, viz., that the desiccation 
of the cord is an act of vitality, and consequently cannot and does not occur in 
the still-born child. That they do not, however, materially affect its truth is 
evident, when we reflect that the process in the living child commences imme- 
diately after birth, and is completed generally within three or four days, 
whereas, in these observations, actual desiccation did not commence until much 
later, in one case on the ninth day, and in the other as late as the twentieth 
day. Furthermore, in neither case was there any indication of the cord be- 
coming detached, a process which is alone of no trifling significance, both as 
evidence of life and of its duration. Hence, the withering and desiccation of 
the cord gives a fair presumption that the child has lived and the degree to 
which the process has advanced, a valuable indication of the length of time it 
has survived its birth. 

Several other subordinate signs of live birth may be alluded to before we 
consider those derived from the condition of the lungs. One of these is sug- 
gillation, or a discoloration resembling a bruise, and which has been held to 
be a proof that respiration occurred. But it is now admitted to furnish no 
reliable evidence of life after birth. The same remark is applicable to the dif- 
ference of color, which, it is said, theoretically, must be presented by the blood 
in the opposite cavities of the heart. The absolute or relative weight of the 
liver is also a fallible test. For although it is true that this organ diminishes 
in size in proportion as the lungs assume their function, yet it is impossible by 
its means to determine in any particular case in what degree, if at all, the 
lungs have expanded, because the degree of contraction of the liver, not being 
referable to any fixed standard, can neither be measured nor estimated. The 
discharge of meconium, or of urine, as tests of breathing are also unreliable. 

§ 361. The lungs are the source from which the most reliable proof of live- 
birth is derived. In the child which has perfectly respired, the lungs occupy 
a larger space in the thorax than in the still-born foetus. They fill up, in 
general, its cavity completely, and partly cover and conceal the pericardium. 
Their color is of a pale red, shading into blue on the posterior surface, and 
becoming brighter upon exposure to the air, or else irregular light-red spots 


(n) Uber die Nabelbriiche. Lehrbuch fiir Hebammen. 
| 349 


§ 362] F@TAL CHANNELS.—LUNGS. [BOOK II. 


appear upon a bluish-red ground. This gives them a marbled appearance, a 
’ peculiarity which cannot be given to foetal lungs by inflation. Their edges are 
sharp, here and there curved inwards or projecting in tongue-like processes. 
They feel tough but not solid when handled, and retain slightly the impression 
of the finger. They crepitate also when pressed or cut, and upon incision yield 
a small quantity of frothy blood. They are heavier than the foetal lungs, but 
specifically lighter than water, floating upon it both with the heart and thymus 
gland attached, and also when cut to pieces.. When pressed between the fin- 
gers under water, air bubbles rise from them to the surface. The thorax is 
wider and more arched than in the foetus, and the diaphragm is lower than 
before respiration, its convexity not reaching above the seventh or eighth rib. 
As the conditions thus described belong to lungs which have fully respired, a 
less perfect degree of them may be expected to be found when the respiration 
has been incomplete, and cases may even occur in which very small portions 
only of the pulmonary tissue have been penetrated by air, and consequently 
are capable of floating when subjected to the hydrostatic test. 

The condition of the larynx before and after breathing is not the same. 
In the former case it is narrower, is occupied by mucus, and is closely in’ 
apposition with the epiglottis ; but in the latter this covering no longer closes 
the opening to the larynx. None of these conditions, it will be observed, 
affect the question when the child breathed? They are equally consistent 
with breathing before and after birth. 

§ 362. Certain changes take place in the fetal channels for the circulation 
of the blood, upon the occurrence of respiration. As, however, these changes 
are gradual in their nature, they can hardly with propriety be enumerated 
among the signs of live-birth. They are only considered in this place from 
the fact that they commence at birth, although not perfected until a later 
period. From the cases reported by Elsdsser,(o) it will be seen that the 
obliteration of the foetal channels occurs in a very indeterminate manner. In 
forty-eight out of fifty-two mature stillborn children they were all open except 
in four, in which the foramen ovale was closed. In ninety-two who ‘died in 
the first month, they remained open in two-thirds. Later researches on a 
still more extensive scale by the same indefatigable author prove, as the result 
of the examination of three hundred and seventy cases, the little reliance 
which can be placed on so variable a test. In illustration of this fact, we 
may remark that in one stillborn child the ductus venosus was found closed, 
and in a child which lived only a quarter of an hour, the foramen ovale and 
ductus arteriosus were both closed. On the other hand, in a child thirty-nine 
days old, he found all the foetal channels remaining open. Dr. Norman 
Chevers(p) substantiates this statement by the facts which he has collected 
respecting the frequent contraction and obliteration of the foramen ovale and 
the ductus arteriosus before birth. It is evident that if but one authentic 
case exist in which any of the foetal channels have been found closed at birth, it 
is enough to throw doubt upon any case in which its closure is assigned as a 
proof that the child must have survived its birth. Moreover, the continued 


(0) Henke’s Zeitsch., 1841 and 1852. (p) Med. Gaz. xxxv. and xxxvi. 
350 | 


BOOK II] SIGNS OF IMPERFECT RESPIRATION, [§ 364 


patency of these channels is of still less importance in a medico-legal sense 
than their closure, since the foramen ovale and ductus arteriosus are found 
open in certain cases in adult life. We have ourselves elsewhere brought 
abundant proof of this fact.(q) 

§ 363. Professor Bernt,(7) of Vienna, has endeavored to determine, by 
means of the progressive closure of the foramen ovale and ductus arteriosus, 
the period during which the new-born child has survived, and his views have 
heretofore met with considerable attention, and been adduced as authority. 
Ue says: “1. If the child has lived only a few seconds, the uortal end of the 
duct appears contracted, and the vessel, instead of being cylindrical throughout, 
acquires the form of a truncated cone. 2. If the child has lived for several 
hours or a whole day, the duct becomes again cylindrical, although shortened 
and contracted in diameter. Its size is about equal to that of a goose-quill ; 
it is, therefore, much smaller than its root, and about as large as either of the 
two branches of the pulmonary artery, which have in the mean time become 
increased in size. 38. If the child has lived for several days or a whole week, 
the duct contracts to the diameter of a few lines, about equal to a crow-quill, 
while the two branches of the pulmonary artery are equal in size to a goose- 
quill. 4. The duct is met with, perfectly closed, and quite impervious at a 
much later period, 7. e., after the lapse of a very uncertain number of weeks, 
or even months,” ‘That these phenomena are far from being constant, is 
attested by the experience of other writers(s) as well as by my own. I have 
never succeeded in finding the peculiar condition of the arterial duct, under 
the circumstances described by Professor Bernt. As has been before stated, 
the great irregularity in the process of obliteration, renders any dependence 
upon signs, which are at least neither constant nor well marked, highly 
fallacious. In fact, the alteration in the form and calibre of the foetal chan- 
nels is not noticeable immediately after birth; the closure of the foramen 
ovale, and the obliteration of the several canals, is gradual; they are not 
closed in any determinate order, although, as a general rule, the foramen 
ovale is the last to be obliterated. These signs are, therefore, too inexact to 
be depended upon as proof of respiration having taken place, and have at 
most, only a secondary importance in the question as to the period of sur- 
vivance. 

§ 364. We have now to consider the characteristic marks by which a child 
which has respired imperfectly may be known from one that has not breathed 
at all, and also the pathological and extraneous causes of imperfect respi- 
ration. 

The external aspect of a child which has breathed imperfectly, is not 
strikingly different from that of one which has fully respired. During its 
life, such a child will exhibit signs of feebleness, its cry will be weak and 
whimpering, its color pale, and its movements languid. If the imperfect 
expansion of the lungs be due to compression of the head or neck, owing to 


(q) On Cyanosis. Am. Journ. Med. Sci., July, 1844. 

(r) Das verfahren bei der ger-med. Ausmittelung zweifelhafter Todesarten der 
Neugebornen, von Joseph Bernt. Wien. 1826. Vid. Taylor, Med. Jur. p. 319. 

(s) Vid. Elsisser. Also Taylor, loc. cit. 


351 


§ 366] ATELECTASIS—PNEUMONIA. [BOOK II. 


a tedious labor, or from some obstacle to delivery, the surface will be found of 
a livid hue, especially the face, and the child will gasp for air. In the lungs, 
however, will be found the principal indication of incomplete respiration. 
They will not reach as far forward as the pericardium ; the brownish red color 
of the foetal lungs will be replaced, in part only, by the lighter and clearer 
red due to the presence of respired air, and these aerated portions will be 
found chiefly in the upper lobe of the right lung, owing to the size of the 
bronchial tube which opens into it being larger than that on the left side. 
These portions will float in water, while other parts of the pulmonary sub- 
stance will sink, and the degree of buoyancy of the whole lung will depend 
upon the amount of air contained in it. As a general rule, it may be stated 
that a very small quantity of respired air is sufficient to cause the whole lung 
to float. 

§ 365. The principal pathological cause of imperfect respiration is the 
condition called by Jérg, who first correctly described it, atelectasis. This 
word means defective expansion, and is appropriate, since a portion of the 
lung remains in the foetal condition. We borrow the following accurate 
sketch from the valuable work of Dr. J. F. Meigs, on the Diseases of Children, 
p. 115: “In congenital atelectasis, the parts of the lung most frequently 
affected are the posterior portion and lower edge of the inferior lobes, the 
middie lobe of the right lung, and the languette and lower edge of the upper 
lobes. In some instances, as in one examined by myself, the greater portion 
of the lower lobes of both lungs, while in others still larger portions of these 
organs, have been found to present this condition. The imperfectly expanded 
portions of the lung are of a dark red, or purplish color, and are diminished 
in size, so as to be depressed below the level of the healthy parts. They are 
solid to the touch, and yet they have not lost their cohesive properties, as 
they are neither friable, easily torn, nor readily penetrable by the finger, and 
no air bubbles are seen in the fluid squeezed out by pressure: they sink when 
thrown into water. They, in fact, resemble exactly the fetal lung. The 
most convincing proof of the real nature of this condition, is obtained by the 
inflation of the lung. When this is done, the depressed, hard, and dark- 
colored portions, unless the subject from whom the specimen has been taken 
may have lived long enough to have allowed the different tissues of the lung 
to become adherent, rise to their natural level, become elastic, soft and crepi- 
tating, and change, under the influence of the entering air, from a dark and 
livid tint, to the rosy or pink color of healthy pulmonary tissue.” 

§ 366. The distinction between this condition and that of hepatization of 
the lung from inflammation must at once be evident to the physician. The 
only similarity is found in the increased density of the inflamed lung, in conse- 
quence of which it sinks in water. But we need hardly remind the reader that 
the occurrence of pre-natal or congenital pneumonia is very questionable, and 
that its immediate development after birth must be excessively rare. Should it, 
however, exist, it will not be difficult to distinguish it from atelectasis, except 
perhaps in those cases where a portion of the lung still remaining in the fetal 
condition is attacked with inflammation. Such a case, however, would have 
no importance in a medico-legal point of view, since the phenomena observed 

352 


BOOK II. ] CAUSES OF IMPERFECT RESPIRATION, [S$ 867 


on trial of the hydrostatic test would not be affected by it. Pneumonia attacks 
indifferently all portions of the pulmonary structure, but preferably, perhaps, 
the inferior and lower parts. In atelectasis, the parts affected are usually the 
margins of the lobes, or those portions most remote from, or not so readily 
accessible by, the air. The color of the hepatized portions of the lung is of 
a yellowish or mahogany red, the surface is homogeneous, the contours of the 
vesicles are not visible, the hepatized structure is granular and friable, and, upon 
incision, there exudes from the surface a thin sanguinolent pus.(¢) Finally, 
it cannot be inflated, the vesicular structure having become consolidated by a 
plastic effusion ; whereas, in the case of atelectasis, the lung being merely in 
the foetal condition, readily expands upon the insufflation of air. 

§ 367. The most interesting causes of imperfect respiration are those which 
act by impeding the free access of air to the lungs. They may be divided into 
two classes, according as they act before or after birth. 

The fact that respiration may take place before birth, comes to us attested 
by too respectable authority to be discarded as fabulous. However improbable 
it may seem that a child should breathe and cry while yet in its mother’s 
womb, and however much the establishment of the possible occurrence of this 
phenomenon may perplex the question of infanticide, rendering evidence appa- 
rently the most convincing of no avail, we cannot hesitate to admit that this 
singular fact has been really observed. We find few writers at the present day 
denying it. It is reported that Velpeau has said that ‘‘he believed it, since it 
was asserted by learned and credible men, but that he would not believe it if 
he observed it himself.’”? We subjoin the following cases in illustration. The 
first is related by Mare,(w) as communicated to him by Dr. Henry. ‘The 10th 
of October, 1824, I was desired by M. Jobert to assist him in an accouchement 
in which the pelvis was deformed in such a manner as to interfere with the 
delivery. Madame G was twenty-seven or twenty-eight years of age, and of 
a good constitution. Her two previous pregnancies were unfortunate; in both 
she miscarried. Upon our arrival, we found her in great suffering ; the mem- 
branes had broken about forty-eight hours previously. I found the head of 
the child above the superior strait, the occiput turned to the right iliac fossa. 
The parietal bones alone had descended into the superior strait, and projected 
slightly into the pelvis; the os uteri was open to the extent of two inches. 
The deformity of the pelvis consisted in a very great prominence of the sacro- 
vertebral angle, and absence of curvature in the pubis, so that the antero- 
posterior diameter was diminished one inch, while the transverse was increased 
to the same extent. M. Jobert and I concluded to turn the child; but, how- 
ever, as the head did not appear to be of a large size, we hoped to be able to 
disengage it by means of the forceps. This instrument was applied. At the 
moment that Dr. Jobert commenced to make traction, the foetus cried distinctly 
for a dozen seconds, so as to be heard by all present. The head remaining 
impacted, in spite of all our efforts, the forceps were removed. While we 
were conversing upon the necessity of performing the operation of version of 


(t) Legendre, Maladies de l’Enfance, Paris, 1846; Jacquemier, Accouchemens, vol. ii. 
(uw) Dict. des Sciences Médicales (en 30 vol.), art. Infanticide. 


23 353 


§ 867] VAGITUS UTERINUS. [BOOK Il. 


the child, cries were again heard as distinct as the first, which could only be 
the result of several inspirations. And again, when I introduced my hand to 
search for the feet, in slipping it over the left shoulder, the foetus, for the third 
time, gave vent to several cries, not so loud as the first, but sufficiently so to 
be heard by all the persons present. The delivery was accomplished with a 
great deal of difficulty, and the child breathed no longer; still, as the pulsa- 
tions of the heart were pretty strong, we tried various means to restore it to 
life, and I endeavored to inflate its lungs. Our efforts were, however, of no 
avail, and the circulation ceased after a few minutes. I regret my inability to 
describe the condition of the lungs; but of what importance could it have 
been, as I had already introduced air into them ?” 

Landsberg gives a case of vagitus uterinus which occurred in his own 
practice. The first stage of labor had been unusually protracted, lasting, 
indeed, for nearly a week. At last, however, the membranes broke, and the 
child presented in the first position of the head. ‘‘ At this time I, as well as 
some women standing at the bed-side, heard plainly repeated cries of a child, 
as if one were covered by the bedclothes.”” This was not the case, however; 
the room was searched, to ascertain if, perchance, a cat could be found, and 
finally all convinced themselves that the sounds really came from the yet un- 
delivered child. The labor was brought to a termination by the application 
of the forceps. ‘The child was apparently dead, but soon revived, and is now 
living.’’(v) . 

No mistake could be possible in the following case, reported by Dr. Ken- 
nedy, formerly Master of the Dublin Lying-in Hospital. He says: “I was 
called up one night by an intelligent pupil in the hospital, who informed me 
that a very strange sound was observed to come from a patient in labor, re- 
sembling exactly the whine of a child. On going into the labor-ward, I found 
the nurses and pupils surrounding a patient’s couch, with outstreched necks, 
listening with great intensity and amazement; and on approaching within 
about six feet of the bed, I distinctly heard a low moaning whine, resembling 
the faint and painful cry of a delicate seven months’ child; this became more 
distinct the nearer I approached the patient, and there could be no doubt 
whatever that it came from the abdomen of the woman on the couch, however 
produced. Still skeptical, I applied the stethoscope, when the fact was proved 
beyond a doubt, as not only the cry mentioned, but the labored respiration of 
the fcetus was perfectly audible. A vaginal examination was instituted, and 
the head was found presenting, but high in the pelvis. The parts were only 
partially dilated, although the membranes were ruptured, and the waters had 
drained off shortly before. This woman was not delivered for four hours, and 
the above phenomena were observed by several of the pupils up to the time of 
the child’s birth. The patient’s name was Morell; the date of her delivery, 
2d of December, 1830.” 

‘Two other cases, of more recent occurrence, are related.(w) One of these 


(v) Neue Revision der Lehre von der Athemprobe. Henke’s Zeitsch. Erg. Heft. 
38, 1849. 


(w) Brit. and For. Med. Chir. Rev. Jan. 1850, from Med. Zeitung, Nos. 20 and 30. 
Another case has been still more recently reported by Dr. Kniippel. 1n consequence of 


ao4 


BOOK II] VAGINAL RESPIRATION, [§ 367 


occurred to Dr. Falkenbach, who, during the operation for turning for a cross 
birth, and while the child was undoubtedly within the uterus, heard it ery 
loudly several times, as did other persons in the room. ; 

The other case is of still more importance, and occurred also during an 
attempt at version. The tone of voice was like that of a new-born child, 
only dull, as if it came from a cellar. It continued crying at intervals for 
two or three minutes. After this, delivery progressed rapidly, until the shoul- 
ders arrived in the pelvis, which was rather narrow, while the child was a large 
one. The child was born dead, beyond recovery. Its cries, while in the womb, 
were heard by three other people in the room, as well as by the midwife, who 
was hard of hearing. The chest was examined twenty-four hours afterwards 
and was found to be well expanded. The lungs partly covered the pericar- 
dium. They were removed, in connection with the heart and thymus gland, 
and being placed in a vessel of cold water, swam completely. The lungs were 
of a bright red color, with bluish spots here and there. They crepitated on 
incision, and some foam and a little blood flowed out. When cut under water, 
large air-bubbles rose to the surface: not the smallest portion of the struc- 
ture sank. This last case is, except that in note (w), we believe, the only 
one in which the lungs, in a case of uterine vagitus, have been submitted to the 
hydrostatic test; and hence, from it, we have undoubted proof of the possible 
occurrence of uterine respiration, and an increased probability of the observa- 
tions in the previously related cases having been accurate. 

We have assumed that uterine respiration must be ¢mperfect, a position 
which seems to be contradicted by this case; but we find it stated by the au- 
thor that “the air cells of the periphery had not become completely filled with 
air,’’ a fact which we will not undertake to reconcile with the statement that 
no part of the lungs sank in water. 

The extreme rarity of uterine and vaginal respiration and vagitus is evident 
from the few authentic cases upon record, as well as from the incredulity with 
which the fact has been received by some authors. Moreover, certain obstet- 
ricians of most extensive experience state that they have never witnessed this 
phenomenon, and Baudelocque and Capuron declare that even in cases where 
the face and mouth of the child presented at the vulva, giving a favorable 
opportunity for the access of air, they have never observed it. We are not 
able to define the causes which favor its occurrence in some cases and not in 
others, nor explain how the air could gain access to the lungs in cases like 
those above narrated, and in others which might be referred to. All that can 
be safely asserted is, that this phenomenon never occurs before the rupture of 
the membranes and the dilatation of the mouth of the womb, and that it has 
been observed, as yet, only in tedious labors, or when the hand of the accouch- 
eur has been introduced to assist the delivery. Dr. Beck relates two cases in 
which it was distinctly perceived under this latter contingency. It is not, 
however, a necessary element for its production. 


a cross position, the child was turned, during which operation vagitus was distinctly 
heard. It was, however, born dead. The lungs were of a pale red color, filled the 
chest completely, crepitated on incision, and swam in water. Canstatt’s Jahresbericht 
fiir 1853. Vil. Bd. p. 19. 


395 


§ 369] TESTS OF LIVE-BIRTH. [BOOK II. 


§ 368. Another, and in its practical bearings more important condition, 
under which imperfect respiration may take place before birth, is after the 
delivery of the head, while the body yet remains in the vagina and the womb. 
It is undeniable, that in this position the child often breathes and cries. The 
delivery of the body may be retarded by various circumstances, the principal 
of which are a too great size of the shoulders, a sudden cessation of the ex- 
pulsive pains, and compression of the neck of the child by the umbilical cord. 
The fact, as above stated, is beyond all cavil, and Ritgen, a German obstetri- 
cian of high standing, from the frequency with which he has observed it, con- 
siders it not even exceptional. It will be readily seen how much doubt this 
fact may cast upon the question, whether the child has been born alive. It 
may breathe before it is fully born, and yet, as it is not accounted by the law 
to be born until fully expelled from the mother, fatal violence exercised upon 
it in this situation has been adjudged not to constitute the crime of infanti- 
cide. We shall allude more in detail to this fact under the ‘‘ Causes of death 
in new-born children.” (§ 379 et seq.) In the same place will be found an 
account of those causes of imperfect respiration which act after birth. It 
sometimes happens that after the delivery of the head of the child, and after 
it has breathed and cried, its respiration is impeded, and may be arrested by 
the pressure of the umbilical cord encircling the neck. The cord may be 
wound several times around the neck, so tightly as to render its disengage- 
ment without severing it, impossible, and hence, after the delivery the child 
may be incapable of resuscitation, and, in some rare cases, even bear upon its 
neck the marks of strangulation, and in its lungs the evident signs of its 
having respired. If, under such circumstances, the birth is not witnessed by a 
competent person, suspicions of having inflicted a violent death upon her off- 
spring, may unjustly attach to the mother. (Vid. infra, § 380.) 


2d. Tests of Live-birth. 


§ 369. The most important of the proofs of live-birth, which, from their 
general application, have been called “‘tests,’’ are derived from an examination 
of the absolute and the specific weight of the lungs. Although the data yielded 
by them are said to prove life, they do so only incidentally, by proving respi- 
ration; and although, in criminal practice, it is requisite that the fact of respi- 
ration should be established, yet it is important to bear in mind that there 
may be life without respiration. The circulation may go on, and the child 
may make various muscular movements, after it is separated from the mother, 
without respiring. Sometimes, owing to congenital feebleness or to its being 
in an asphyxiated condition, it makes no effort to breathe; and again, all its 
efforts may be fruitless, from the obstruction of the fauces and larynx with 
viscid mucus. Hence, paradoxical as it may seem, a child may live and die 

without having breathed. In such a ease, the lungs will, of course, reveal no 
trace of respired air.(7) The attempt too strictly to define the essential con- 


(x) This fact was urged as an objection to the hydrostatic test by the Wittemberg 
Faculty (Valentin’s Pand. Med. Leg. p. ii. sec. vii. chap. 12, p. 583, ed. 1701), at the 
very beginning of its application to medical jurisprudence. We have ventured to de- 


356 


BOOK It.] TESTS OF LIVE-BIRTH. [$ 869 


ditions of life has led to some absurd conclusions. In Germany, a distinct 
vocal sound is required by law as the evidence of life. But this appears to be 
modified in practice by the substitution of breathing for vocal sound, and the 
doctrine is accepted that respiration and life are reciprocally evidences of one 
another. According to this doctrine, intra-uterine life is not life in the sense 
of life after breathing. Plants, and those animals which breathe by the skin 
or by gills, do not, according to it, really breathe. But if we admit that 
breathing essentially consists in the act or acts by which the effete circulating 
fluids of a living creature are renovated, we shall see that life is consistent, not 
only with very dissimilar modes, but also with very irregular degrees of that 
renovation. The foetus in utero, while still inclosed in its membranes, has its 
blood renovated by juxtaposition with that contained in the maternal blood- 
vessels, and thus, indirectly but substantially, it breathes through the lungs of 
its mother. Although the mechanism of its respiration is different from that 
which will exist after birth, its essence and effect are the same. Again, even 
in the adult, examples are constantly met with of life without perceptible 
breathing, as in syncope and trance, states in which it is true that life is pro- 
bably sustained by the exchange of the foul air in the lungs with the pure ex- 
ternal air, under those laws which regulate the diffusion of gases. Yet in the 
popular sense there is no respiration, although there is life, and a life which, 
indeed, is generally manifested by the sound, however feeble, of the heart’s pul- 
sation. The new-born child, therefore, although it presents the aspect of 
death, is not necessarily dead; its near approach to lifelessness may even be- 
come the means of saving its life under circumstances which would infallibly 
have produced suffocation and death, had respiration been complete. 

The following may serve as illustrations of the statement just made. Weese 
reports the case of a female who was rapidly delivered of a child in a tub, and 
believing it to be dead, buried it in a sand-pit, where it remained for half an 
hour, but was then disinterred, and restored to life. In another case, at Berlin, 
the child supposed to have been born dead, was buried for the space of an 
hour, but was resuscitated. In a third instance, a child apparently born dead, 
and so considered after an hour vainly spent in efforts to resuscitate it, was 
then abandoned for several hours, after which it was inclosed in a coffin and 
placed in a cold chamber (it was the month of January), near an open win- 
dow. ‘Twenty-three hours after its birth the body was quite cold, but free 
from discoloration or stiffness. Owing to the latter circumstances the heart 
was examined, and being heard to pulsate, renewed attempts at resuscitation 
were made. But finally all signs of life ceased. On dissection the lungs sank 
in water both in mass and in fragments. Another instance is still more re- 
markable, from its result. A woman buried her illegitimate child, which she 
supposed to be stillborn, nine inches under ground, and with the face down- 
wards. It remained thus between four and five hours, when it was exhumed, 
resuscitated, and lived three days.(y) A case nearly identical with this is 


part from the custom of medical writers on this subject in treating of it under this 
head, because the object of the hydrostatic test is to ascertain whether the child has 
breathed, and not to determine the fact of its having lived without respiration. 

(y) Maschka, Prager Vierteljahrs., 1854, iii. s. 


307 


§ 369] TESTS OF LIVE-BIRTH. [BOOK II, 


referred to by Briand, who, however, states that the life of the child was pre- 
served.(z) It is, then, quite possible that life may have existed in spite of 
every reasonable presumption of its absence, founded upon an inspection of the 
child both before and after its certain death. 

If the argument should ever be used in any case of infanticide, that the 
violence was inflicted upon a child which had lived without breathing, it would 
have to be sustained by other testimony or evidence than that of a medical 
expert; since there is no medical proof of extra-uterine life, independent of 
respiration. Hence, the commission of infanticide, by submerging a child in 
water before it has breathed, or the exclusion of air from it, in any other way 
in which no external mark is left, deprives the medical examiner of the means 
of deciding whether the act was committed upon a living child; because, we 
repeat, the lungs remain in the same condition after as before birth, provided 
respiration has not taken place, and in the short interval of existence possible 
under such circumstances, no other change could occur, which could be relied 
upon as an indication of extra-uterine life.(@) It would appear that the effort 
to breathe, although unsuccessful in inflating the lungs, may, nevertheless, 
modify the circulation of the blood so as to leave certain proofs of the fact. 
These, which were first pointed out by Tardieu,(b) are what Casper has de- 
nominated petechial suggillations, and which he describes as capillary extrava- 
sations of blood beneath the pleura and the lining membrane of the aorta 
and the heart. In a case quoted from Hecker, there was prolapse of the cord, 
and the introduction of the hand to effect version of the child having neces- 
sarily compressed the cord, and thereby suspended the circulation through it, 
several inspiratory movements of the child could be distinctly felt. It was not, 
however, born alive, and extravasations like those just described, were disco- 
vered on dissection. Similar observations have been made by Hohl, in cases of 
foot and breast presentation when the head was detained in the uterus or va- 
gina; the inspiratory movements of the chest were frequent and vigorous, the 
children nevertheless were born dead, and the pleura and heart presented the 
ecchymoses referred to, and the lungs sank when placed in water.(c) It may 
naturally be inferred from what has now been stated, that if any cause inter- 
rupts the fcetal circulation during labor, an inspiratory effort will be made, and 
if the mouth and nose of the child are still immersed in liquor amnii, this fluid 
will tend to enter the respiratory passages. Dr. Briesky has published four 
cases,(d) in which the heart of the foetus was heard during labor, but life was 
extinct at birth. In all of them the air-passages were filled with liquor amnii 
more or less tinged with meconium. In the first case the cord had prolapsed, 
as in the example already cited, and had been subjected to pressure, so as 
to favor the inspiration of the liquid; in the remaining three an analogous 
cause within the uterus may be surmised to have existed, but could not be 
demonstrated. In all of these cases extra-uterine life was rendered impossible 
by a physical obstacle in the lungs preventing the access of air to these organs. 


(z) Médecine Légale, 6éme éd., p. 209. (a) Henke’s Lehrbuch, 12th ed., p. 341. 

(b) Annales d’Hygiéne, 2éme sér., iv. 379. 

(c) Gericht. Med. i. 706. (d) Prager Vierteljahrs, 1859, iii. 175. 
308 


BOOK I1.] HYDROSTATIC TEST—PUTREFACTION. L$ 871 


§ 370. (1.) Hydrostatic lung test (Docimasia pulmonum hydrostatica). 
This is an experiment in which the lungs of a new-born child are placed in 
a vessel containing water, in order to judge from their specific gravily whether 
or not the child has breathed.(e) Its first application in medical jurispru- 
dence was made by Dr. Schreyer, of Zeitz, although the principle was known, 
it is said, by Galen. The experiment is conducted in the following manner. 
The lungs are carefully removed from the chest, with the heart attached 
or not, but always in connection with the trachea. They are then placed 
upon the surface of pure water. If they float, the evidence is very clear that 
they contain air, and the higher they float the more perfect has their expan- 
sion been. If, on the contrary, they sink to the bottom, the evidence is equally 
plain that they contain air to a very imperfect extent, if at all. In order, 
however, to judge fairly of their degree of buoyancy, and to ascertain how 
much and what parts of the organs contain air, a further investigation is re- 
quired. The thymus gland, with the heart and pericardium should be removed 
with care, to avoid injuring the pulmonary tissue, after which the lungs should 
be again put in the water. Hach lung should then be tried separately, and 
finally divided into small pieces, and each of these thrown by itself into the 
water, before and after compression between the fingers. By carefully observ- 
ing the results elicited by this experiment, satisfactory proof of the presence 
or absence of air in the lungs may be acquired. At this stage of the inquiry 
no further inference is allowable; we can neither say that the child has lived 
and breathed, because its lungs float on the water, nor deny that it has lived 
if they sink to the bottom of the vessel. And yet this experiment must 
always retain its great importance in cases of presumed infanticide. Re- 
stricted within its proper limits and sources of error properly guarded against, 
there is no medical test so simple and conclusive.(f) As Dr. Taylor remarks, 
“‘the law holds, under the decisions of its expounders, that respiration is only 
one, and not an exclusive proof of life.’ (a) 

§ 371. The objections made to the hydrostatic test are founded upon two 
facts :-— 

ist. That the air which gives buoyancy to the lungs may have been derived 
from other sources than natural respiration ; and, 

2d. That notwithstanding the absence of demonstrable air from these organs, 
the child may have lived. 'The sources from which the air may have been de- 
rived are, Putrefaction, Emphysema, and Artificial Inflation. 

Putrefaction.—At an undetermined stage of the putrefactive process, gas 
is disengaged by the decomposition of the blood contained in the lungs, and 
sometimes in sufficient quantity to give buoyancy to the whole or a portion of 
them. The air thus evolved is, however, not contained in the pulmonary. 
vesicles, but in the cellular tissue, and chiefly between the lobes and on their 
margins. Here it is seen collected in rows of bubbles, much larger than the 
air-vesicles, prominent, and easily disappearing under slight pressure. At the 


(e) Valentin, Pand. Méd. Lég., Par. ii. sec. vii. p. 502. “De infanticidio per-pul- 
monum in aquam project. subsident. elidendo.” 

(f) De usu partium corp. human. lib. xv. cap. 6. 

(a) Med. Jurisp. 6th ed. p. 451. 


359 


§ 372] EMPHYSEMA—ARTIFICIAL INFLATION. [BOOK Il. 


same time, the lungs present other signs of the putrefactive process, in their 
- greenish color, diminished consistence, and fetid odor. The period at which 
the putrefactive vesicles are developed is not accurately known, and is influ- 
enced by circumstances, as, indeed, are all the other incidents of putrefaction. 

It is a fact, however, worthy of remark, that this process is set up later in 
the lungs than in most of the other organs of the child. This fact is attested 
by many writers, and particular stress is laid upon it by Dr. Casper. In four 
cases examined by this author, where the child’s body was already greatly 
decomposed, the lungs retained their firmness and dark brown color, and sank 
in water. In one case the heart and liver were both covered with putrefactive 
vesicles, and swam upon the surface of the water, while the lungs, which were 
firm and brown, sank to the bottom.(b) I have, myself, frequently found the 
lungs of new-born children entirely unchanged in color, consistence, and ap- 
propriate hydrostatic relations, when at the same time the brain was reduced 
to.a mere pulp, the abdomen thoroughly putrescent, and the epidermis peeling 
from the whole body. The striking changes which attend the commencement 
of decomposition in the lungs cannot permit an error on the part of the ex- 
aminer. Should the buoyancy of the lungs be due to putrefaction, by the 
development of spurious air-vesicles upon the pulmonary tissue, the fact may 
be easily recognized, and ascribed to its real cause. Should, however, no signs 
of putrefaction in the lungs be found, and yet these organs float, the objection 
is theoretical merely, and not at all pertinent. The obvious inference is, that 
the objection cannot be urged, when there is no proof of its applicability to 
the case in hand. It is not unnecessary to press these apparently simple 
truths upon the attention of the reader, for every day’s experience in forensic 
medicine attests the false importance attached to irrelevant objections. When 
the above-mentioned changes have supervened in the lungs, they can no longer 
be used in evidence, since the buoyancy of these organs may be due to air 
derived either from decomposition or from respiration. A discrimination be- 
tween the two at this period is manifestly impossible. 

Emphysema was formerly distinguished from putrefaction, as a condition 
giving buoyancy to foetal lungs. It may safely be asserted that no such con- 
dition is found in lungs which have not respired. It is probable that the older 
authors mistook for it the appearances presented by putrefaction. Drs. Cum- 
min and Lecieux(c) speak of a “sort of contusion suffered by the lungs in 
difficult labors, to which they attribute the development of air in large vesicles 
on their surface,”’ while the lungs presented at the time no signs of putrefac- 
tion ; but these observations have not been confirmed by others. Mr. Tay- 
lor(d) says, that in examining the bodies of many still-born children, he has 
never met with any appearance resembling what has been described as a state 
of emphysema, independently of respiration and putrefaction. 

§ 872. The last objection to the inference that the lungs must have respired 
if they float on water, is found in the fact that Arizficial Inflation will cause 


(b) Casper’s ger. Leich. off. 1 and 2 Hundert, Fille 67, 68; 65, 66. 

(c) The Proofs of Infanticide, by Wm. Cummin, M. D., p. 61. Consid. Méd. Lég. 
sur l’Infanticide par Lécieux ; vid. also, Schmitt, loc. cit.; Versuch 32; S. 41 and 212. 

(d) Loe. cit. p. 303, Am. ed. 


360 


BOOK II.] ARTIFICIAL INFLATION, [§ 872 


the lungs to float. If the lungs of a still-born child be fully inflated by, means 
of a tube, they increase rapidly in volume and acquiré a dirty yellowish-red 
color; when the insufflation is discontinued, they immediately collapse, but 
still retain enough air to enable them to float. The effect of strong pressure 
in expelling this air, is, according to my own experience, which corresponds 
very nearly with that of Dr. Guy, almost similar to that in lungs which have 
respired. Nothing short of a strong and continued pressure will cause them 
to sink ; and the compression in the one case is so nearly what is required in 
the other, that the difference is practically unimportant. If, however, an 
attempt be made to introduce air into these organs, in the only manner in 
which it is important to consider its effects, viz., by insufflation through the 
mouth of the child; the greater part of the air passes into the stomach, while 
a very inconsiderable portion, and sometimes none at all, reaches the lungs. 
Mr. Taylor says that he has had several opportunities of examining the lungs 
in children, where inflation had been resorted to, not for the express purpose 
of creating an objection to the hydrostatic test, but with the bona jide inten- 
tion of resuscitating them. In some of these instances a tube had been used, 
in others the mouth. In the first case it-was found, on inspection, that only 
about one-thirteenth part of the structure of the lungs had received air. In 
the second, no part of the lungs had received a trace of air, although inflation 
had been repeatedly resorted to; the air had passed entirely into the abdomen. 
In a third, attempts were made for upwards of half an hour to inflate the 
organs; but, on examination, not a particle of air was found to have pene- 
trated into them. In a fourth, no air had entered the lungs; and in a fifth, 
although a small portion had penetrated into the organs, it was readily forced 
out by compression. In repeatedly performing the experiments upon dead 
children, the results have been very similar; the lungs, after several attempts, 
were found to have received only a small quantity of air.(e) 

On the other hand, Schmitt, of Vienna,(/) has made numerous experiments, 
from which he has drawn the following conclusions :— 

1. That it is possible to inflate the lungs of stillborn or asphyxiated children. 

2. That the insufflation succeeds easily and completely, if done in the proper 
manner, and if there is no mechanical obstruction to the entrance of the air. 

3. That the inflation is imperfect and difficult, and even entirely fails, when 
the respiratory passages are filled with mucus. 

4. That the increase of volume, the spongy texture, the rosy color, and the 
buoyancy of the inflated lungs, vary according to the degree of success of the 
operation. 

5. That lungs, properly inflated, are crepitant, like those which have re- 
spired, and yield frothy blood on incision. 

6. That inflation increases the convexity of the thorax. 

7. That it does not increase the weight of the lungs in a child which has 
not respired, and that, in the great majority of cases, the same relation exists 


(e) Med. Jur. p. 305, Am. ed. 
(f) Neue Versuche und Erfahrungen tiber die Ploucquetische und hydrostatische 
Lungenprobe, Wien, 1806. 


o61 


§ 373] ARTIFICIAL INFLATION—CONCLUSIONS. [BOOK II. 


between the weight of the lungs and the body after insufflation as in the foetus 
- which has never breathed. 

The results obtained by Mr. Jennings(g) are equivalent to those of Schmitt. 

Dr. Elsisser concluded, after a large number of carefully conducted experi- 
ments, that the insufflation of the lungs through and by the mouth is possible. 
We find, however, that he really succeeded only in one instance out of fifty-two 
cases, and in this one case it is stated that the child made six distinct efforts 
to respire.(h) 

Dr. Browne, of King’s College Hospital, endeavored to resuscitate a still- 
born child by artificial respiration, having failed with other means. He closed 
the nostrils with the thumb and forefinger of the left hand, and grasped the 
breast and body of the child with the right. Placing his own mouth upon 
that of the child, he continued to breathe into it for ten minutes, imitating by 
pressure with his hand the natural movements of respiration. He failed, how- 
ever, to revive the child. Upon inspection of the body, the lungs were found 
fully expanded, of a pale red color, buoyant, and frothy upon incision. Cut 
into pieces, however, and subjected to compression, they sank in water. 

Dr. Roth(¢) performed this experiment upon a stillborn female child, twenty- 
four hours after birth. Having previously removed the anterior wall of the 
thorax, in order to observe the changes produced by the insufflation of air by the 
mouth, he saw that upon the first insufflation the lungs began to expand, and 
that they acquired a clear red color in spots upon their surface. By continu- 
ing the inflation, this color spread all over the lungs. At the same time the 
stomach became so distended with air, that he was obliged to discontinue the 
experiment, from the fear that this organ would burst. The difference between 
these lungs and those which had breathed, he states, consisted in the fact that 
their expansion was less, the color of a brighter red, and the buoyancy and 
erepitation less. He succeeded in expelling the air from them by compression, 
and then they sank in water. 

§ 873. Our own opinion upon the possibility of a successful inflation of the 
lungs in situ does not differ from that of the most recent and best authorities 
upon the subject, viz., that the lungs cannot be fully inflated by this means in 
such a manner as to resemble, in their appearance and hydrostatic relations, 
lungs which have perfectly respired. 'Those cases where the resemblance ap- 
pears to have been very close may be explained upon the assumption that the 
child was not completely passive under the experiment, but retained sufficient 
vitality to make, during it, and unperceived by the physician, one or more 
efforts at inspiration. That the lungs of a dead child can be wholly inflated 
in svtu, and made to resemble those which have naturally and fully breathed, 
is, we believe, at variance with the experience of the great majority of those 
who have given their attention to the subject. 

The fact that pressure will expel the air from lungs which have been inflated 
through the mouth, while no compression less than what would destroy com- 


(g) Trans. Prov. Med. and Surg. Association, vol. ii. p. 440. 

(h) Untersuchungen tiber die Verinderungen, &c., durch Athmen in Lufteinblasen, 
Stuttgart, 1853. 

(1) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1850, 4 H. 


362 


BOOK II.] | CAUSES INCREASING THE SPECIFIC GRAVITY. [$ 875 


pletely the pulmonary tissue will avail to force it from those which have fully 
inspired in the natural way, is the chief and most reliable distinction which 
can be made between the two cases. The most reliable test of breathing, 
derived from an examination of the lungs, is, however, that which has been 
given by Briand and by Casper. However successful the inflation of these 
organs may be, their surface will never present the peculiar dark marbling 
described above as a sign of respiration, unless this act have been performed 
by the natural mechanism. The reason of the difference between the appear- 
ances in the two cases is a simple one. Natural respiration is an act which 
tends to create a vacuum in the lungs, and consequently to draw into them 
the blood of the pulmonary arteries, which gives them the comparatively dark 
bluish and marbled aspect alluded to; but artificial respiration, by which air 
is forced into the lungs, tends, by the pressure of that air, to exclude the blood, 
and consequently to render the color of the lungs still lighter than before. 
But in judging of the value of this test, it is important to recollect that its 
applicability is limited to cases in which the distension of the lungs is con- 
siderable. The less they depart from the fcetal state, the less does its value 
become. 

§ 374. It must be admitted, however, without the least reserve, that the 
effects of artificial inflation cannot be distinguished from those of imperfect 
respiration. Although the distension of the stomach and intestines with air 
is an inevitable accident in artificial inflation, it cannot be relied upon as a 
diagnostic sign, since it may be merely a cadaveric phenomenon. Its absence, 
indeed, in a case where it is supposed that these means had been used, would, 
of course, disprove the supposition. A distinction might, perhaps, be hoped 
for from the employment of Ploucquet’s test, since the artificial filling of the 
lungs with air increases their volume alone, without altering their absolute 
weight ; while natural respiration, being attended with a circulation of blood 
through the pulmonary vessels, increases their weight and volume together. 
But it will be seen further on that the results attained by Ploucquet are too 
variable and uncertain to be used where a distinction of so delicate and mo- 
mentous a nature is required. The question can be disposed of only in one 
manner. If other evidence can establish the presumption that artificial infla- 
tion has been attempted, the physician must then be ready to answer whether 
the results of his examination are such as to justify and support this presump- 
tion. But if, on the other hand, no such evidence is offered, we do not see how 
it can be required of the physician to take into consideration the possibility of 
a manceuvre which he knows can be effected only by skilful and careful pro- 
fessional management, and which, moreover, the nature of the alleged crime 
renders in the highest degree improbable. From the prominence usually given 
to this objection to the hydrostatic test, one might be led to suppose, as Mr. 
Taylor justly remarks, ‘‘that every woman tried for child-murder had made 
the praiseworthy attempt to restore a stillborn child, although circumstances 
may show that she had cut its throat, severed its head, or strangled it while 
the circulation was going on.” 

§ 375. Having now éxamined the conditions which will cause the lungs 
of a new-born child to float when submitted to the hydrostatic test, it remains 

363 


§ 875] CAUSES INCREASING THE SPECIFIC GRAVITY. [BOOK II. 


for us to notice briefly those which will cause them to sink and to remain at the 
‘bottom of the vessel, as in the feetal condition. Disease of any kind, which 
increases the density of the pulmonary structure, will cause them to sink, or 
rather that portion of them affected thereby. Pneumonia, or inflammation of 
the lung, so increases the density of pulmonary structure as to cause it to sink 
in water. It is rare, however, that pneumonia occurs congenitally, and it does 
not necessarily involve the whole lung; hence portions of it may be found to 
be buoyant. It has been asserted that a very great congestion of lungs which 
have already respired will destroy their buoyancy, but this fact has been clearly 
disproved.(7) We need hardly say that if the structure of the lungs be so 
diseased that they will sink in water, the cause cannot fail to be evident. 
Reference has been previously made to that condition of imperfect expansion 
of the lung, called atelectasis. Occasionally the lungs contain such a trifling 
amount of air, that it is not sufficient to float the whole of the organ, and life 
and respiration may exist without bringing about the usual changes in the 
pulmonary tissue. We are obliged, moreover, to admit, on the authority of 
credible writers, the fact that life and respiration may be prolonged for a con- 
siderable time, and yet, on post-mortem examination, the lungs, either whole 
or divided, sink in water. Such instances have been met with by trustworthy 
German writers.(£) In two cases which came under Bécker’s observation the 
children were born by the head, and without difficulty. Movements of the 
limbs, the sounds of the heart, and the pulsations of the umbilical arteries 
were perceived, but no act of breathing; and after death, which took place 
speedily, the lungs sank in water even when cut into small pieces. In a third 
case no movements were made by the child, but the heart and the cord pulsated 
for two minutes, and the lungs gave the same results, on being tested, as in 
the previous cases. These results have been strikingly confirmed by the expe- 
rience of Dr. Taylor. He says:(/) ‘‘I may add to these instances two which 
have occurred under my own observation. In one, the case of a mature male 
child, the lungs sank in water, although the child had survived its birth for a 
period of six hours. In the other, the case of a female twin, the child survived 
twenty-four hours, and after death the lungs were divided into thirty pieces, 
but not a single piece floated; showing, therefore, that although life had been 
thus protracted, not one-thirtieth part of the structure of the lungs had re- 
ceived, from respiration, sufficient air to render it buoyant.’”’ Now, although 
these results conflict with general experience, and are not clearly explicable 
upon any known physiological ground, they must be allowed to have their 
weight. Hence, if a child’s lungs sink in water, and no disease be found by 
which the fact can be explained, we cannot infer that the child has not lived, 
nor even that it has not breathed, although the respiration must have been 
exceedingly restricted. Hence, in this case the hydrostatic test can give us no 
positive proof of the non-occurrence of respiration. This certainly is a matter 
of regret; but although it does not always enable us to attain the truth, and 
detect criminality, it does not, on the other hand, cause the life of an innocent 


(j) Vid. Schmitt, Joc. cit. 
(k) Remer, Bernt, Schenck, Osiander, Meckel, Bocker. 
(/) Medical Jurisprudence, Am. ed. p. 300. 

364 


BOOK It. | STATIC TESTS. [$ 377 


person to be placed in jeopardy. It is merely an imperfection in the test, and 
affords no ground for an objection to its application in other cases in which it 
undoubtedly is capable of affording positive and useful knowledge. 

§ 376. (2.) Static tests are founded upon the observation that the lungs of 
children who have breathed are heavier than the foetal lungs. This fact has 
been ascertained by direct experiment, and is attributed to the blood, which, 
as soon as the child makes the first attempt to breathe, enters the lungs. In 
proportion, therefore, to the degree of the pulmonary expansion will be the 
weight of these organs. Now, it is obvious that if a constant average weight 
of the lungs before and after respiration could be ascertained, drawn from 
numbers which fluctuated but slightly, it would afford a useful standard of com- 
parison by which we could judge whether a child had really lived and breathed. 
For if, as was estimated by Daniel, the weight of the lungs after respiration 
was constantly augmented to the amount of two ounces, and this could be 
established as the general rule, there would no longer be any difficulty in 
deciding the knotty question of live birth. Observations, however, have satis- 
factorily shown that no such constant average weight of the lungs exists. 
These organs in some mature stillborn children actually weigh more than in 
those who have enjoyed full and complete respiration, and in this respect the 
difference is not more singular than is the great variation in size and weight 
of the whole body in healthy children born at full time. 

§ 377. The second form of the static test, advocated by Ploucquet in 1782, 
and usually named after him, is quite as uncertain as the foregoing one. It is 
founded on a comparison of the absolute weight of the lungs with the weight 
of the body. Ploucquet having made a few experiments respecting the propor- 
tion existing between them, fixed the average at 1.70 before respiration, and 
at 2.70 after it; in other words, he considered that the lungs, after breathing, 
weighed nearly twice as much as they did before. The repeated and numerous 
observations since made by Jager, Schmitt, Lecieux, Chaussier, Orfila, Taylor, 
Guy, and Beck, have clearly proved that any constant ratio, like that assumed 
by Ploucquet, is illusory and inexact. 

According to Elsisser, the congenital differences in the absolute weight of 
the lungs are far greater than those in the absolute weight of the body. 
Thus, in 68 stillborn mature children, he found the average weight of the 
lungs to be 13 drachms 18 grains. The maximum weight (in perfectly 
normal lungs) was 20 dr. 385 gr. The minimum, 8 dr. 35 gr. Hence the 
difference or variation was 12 drachms, which almost equals the average 
weight. The average weight of the body in these 68 children was 7 lbs., and 
the difference between it and the greatest weight did not amount to one-half 
of the average weight.(m) 

The relative weight of the lungs and body varies in different individuals, 
according to sex, peculiarities of conformation, and other circumstances. 
Almost every author who has experimented with a view of ascertaining a 
fixed average ratio, has adopted a different one from his predecessor, and the 
conclusion appears to be generally admitted that the test is not reliable. In 


(m) Loe. cit. p. 96. 
365 


§ 378] STATIC TESTS.— CONCLUSIONS. [BOOK IL. 


conclusion, we may remark, that if these static tests are not worthy of 
’ dependence in those cases where the child has fully respired, still less are they 
to be relied upon where the function of respiration has been imperfectly esta- 
blished. It is in the latter cases, that, practically, the great difficulty of a 
correct judgment lies; the former are much more satisfactorily determined by 
the hydrostatic test. 

§ 378. The following are the chief points which have now been demon- 
strated :— 

Ist. That although respiration is conclusive evidence of life, it may take 
place previous to birth. 

9d. That life for a brief period is compatible with absence of respiration. 

3d. That none of the mere anatomical proofs of live-birth are satisfactory, 
when taken singly. 

Ath. That even when combined, they fall short of demonstration. 

‘5th. That the result of the hydrostatic test may (in some as yet unexplained 
cases, as where the lungs sink in water although the child has breathed) be 
‘negative in its character. 

6th. That the hydrostatic relations of the lung afford evidence in reference 
to respiration which, especially when confirmed by the static tests, is exposed 
to few real sources of error. 

Tth. That the objections to the hydrostatic test are mainly theoretical. 

8th. That the burden of showing their applicability rests with the objector. 

From an analysis of the evidence furnished by an examination of the lungs 
in the cases which have been considered in the present article, Casper arrives 
at the following conclusions. A child may be regarded as having breathed 
during or after birth, 

1. If the upper surface of the diaphragm is between the fifth and sixth 
ribs. 

2. If the lungs fill the cavity of the chest more or less completely, or at 
least do not require a separation of the incised ribs to render them visible. 

3. If the predominant color of the lungs is not mottled by patches. 

4, If the lungs, on careful trial, are found to float upon water. 

5. If moderate pressure of incised portions of the lungs causes a bloody 
froth to exude.(a) 

It has been proposed to draw certain inferences as to the life of the child 
from the contents of the stomach. If this organ contains milk, starch, or 
sugar, there can be no doubt of its having lived after birth. In other cases 
innutritious substances have been found in it, affording an equally positive 
reason for concluding that the child was born alive. In a case reported by 
Marklin(b) of an infant’s body found in the Rhine, its stomach, intestines, 
and air-passages contained a certain quantity of the sand which the water of 
this river holds in suspension, and, although its lungs were completely empty 
of air, it was concluded that the sand could not possibly have reached the 
organs in which it was found without an active movement of swallowing, and 
therefore not without the child had lived. 


(a) Gericht. Med. i. 767. (b) Casper’s Vierteljahrs. xvi. 26. 
366 


BOOK II.] CAUSES OF DEATH IN THE NEW-BORN CHILD. [$ 380 


3d. Causes of Death in the New-born Child. 


§ 379. These causes are usually divided into accidental and criminal, and 
also into causes of death by commission and by omission. © The necessity, how- 
ever, of constantly keeping in mind the fact, that the imputation of a criminal 
purpose rests upon the explanation given to the marks by which the various 
modes of death can be distinguished from one another, induces us to consider 
them from another point of view—viz., according to the é¢me at which they 
are brought into operation. By this arrangement, the reader will be able to 
see at_a glance that accident and design will often produce the same physical 
results, and will be enabled to obtain a correct view of the cause in proportion 
to the closeness of the apposition in which the effects are placed. For the 
sake of convenience the causes of death in the new-born child may be divided, 
into those which act before or during birth, and those which act after birth. 

§ 380. (1.) Causes of death before or during birth. 

(a.) Compression. of, and by, the umbilical cord.—The umbilical cord 
suffers compression during birth unavoidably in breech presentations, and also 
when it is prolapsed in these and in presentations of the head. In the latter 
case, if the labor be not brought speedily to an end, or the cord replaced, the 
obstacle to the circulation of the blood is such, that the child will soon perish. 
A curious case is referred to by Dr. Elsisser, in which the hand of the child 
was found grasping the cord firmly and holding it against its face. The child 
was nearly asphyxiated, and recovered only after a quarter of an hour. There 
are no distinctive and certain marks proving that death is owing to compression 
of the cord. Great turgescence and lividity of the features, with a congested 
state of the head and thoracic viscera, would, in the absence of any marks of 
violence, afford a fair presumption of it. The converse of this accident happens, 
when the cord becomes the direct instrument of the child’s destruction by 
being wound around its neck.(n) In this case, when death results, it is not 
brought about exactly in the same manner as in strangulation after birth, the 
child having then respired; but ensues, either from an interruption in the 
current in the cord itself, from the tightness with which it is wound around 
the neck, and the stretch put upon it in the latter stage of labor, or 
probably, also, from its constriction of the vessels of the neck, causing con- 
gestion, and even extravasation of blood in the brain.(o) It does not appear 
that this accident occurs only when the cord is of unusual length; in fact, in 
many cases, this circumstance is doubtless that to which the child owes its 
escape, because it is probably wound around the neck but loosely and is not 
rendered tense by the descent of the child. As, however, fatal results occa- 


(n) The average frequency of this complication of labor is, according to Elsisser 
as one to five. Its danger to the child is variously estimated. According to Mayer, 
it was the cause of death in only 18 out of 685 cases in which it occurred, while 
Scanzoni attributes 408 out of 743 cases of still-birth to this cause. Casper, who 
furnishes this statement, alludes to a mode in which it may prove fatal besides those 
given in the text, viz., by causing the child to make inspiratory efforts, and thus draw 
the liquor amnii into its lungs, after the manner already referred to in § 369. 

(0) Casper, Gericht. Med. 343 Fall. 


367 


§ 381] BEFORE OR DURING BIRTH. [BOOK II. 


sionally happen from this cause, and as, in unassisted labors, there is greater 

‘probability of their occurrence, we cannot dispense with a consideration of the 
marks by which it may be distinguished from intentional strangulation before 
birth. The cases in which intentional strangulation may be effected before 
birth, are those in which the head alone is born, while the body is not yet 
expelled. Children are not unfrequently strangled while in this position, and 
it is therefore important to know whether this violence has really been inflicted, 
or whether they may not have perished accidentally by constriction of the 
neck by the umbilical cord. A case is reported by Ritgen, in which a child, 
whose head was born and who had breathed, died of apoplexy, from strangu- 
lation by the umbilical cord.(7) 

§ 381. The statement, that marks similar to those of wilful strangulation 
are often produced in this manner, has, we think, been too readily accepted. 
Instances have indeed been met with, which support this view, but a very large 
and careful experience has shown, that the occurrence is far from being a 
necessary or a common one. Dr. Elsidsser,(o) in his capacity of superintend- 
ent of a large lying-in hospital in Stuttgart, instituted a series of observations 
which have given much greater exactitude to our previous knowledge on this 
subject. 

In the space of seven years, there occurred in that institution 327 cases of 
labor in which the umbilical cord was twisted around the neck. Of this num- 
ber, there was one fold of it around the neck in 228 cases, two folds in 82 
cases, three in 13, and four in 4 cases. Yet, in the whole series, there was not 
a single instance in which the least mark, impression, or ecchymosis was Visi- 
ble. In some cases, the cord was so tightly wound around both neck and body, 
that it was necessary to divide it before birth could be accomplished. Dr. E. 
adds, that in a private practice of twenty-four years (1835) he had never met 
with a case in which any mark was left by the cord. These observations 
establish satisfactorily the great rarity of the occurrence. 

Yet it would be impossible to maintain that no mark ever is left. The 
author quoted above admits it freely, upon the authority of Carus, Wildberg, 
Mende, Albert, and other obstetricians. The marks are described as very 
various in their character ; sometimes being merely furrows in the skin, with- 
out color, and sometimes red or blue stripes crossing each other and oceasion- 
ally extending a short distance over the breast or back. Mr. Foster(p) re- 
ports a case in which the child was born dead, the labor being very tedious. 
The umbilical cord was twisted around the neck, leaving three parallel colored 
depressions. Dr. Déring(q) examined a new-born child found dead, in which 
the navel cord was coiled twice around the thigh, passed across the front of 
the body, and crossing the shoulder blades, formed a tight loop around the 
neck. On the left side of the neck, beginning at the ear, there was a purple 
discoloration of the skin in two directions, viz: towards the nape of the neck 


. (n) Gemein. deutschen Zeitschrift. Bd. I. . 
(0) Henke’s Zeitsch. 1835. Uber Umschlingungen der Nabelschnur um den Hals 


»* der Kinder bei der Geburt, in forensischer Hinsicht. Also, Henke’s Zeitsch. 31 Erg. 
H. 1842. 
(p) Med. Gaz. xxx. vi. 485. (q) Henke’s Zeitsch. Erg. H. 23, p. 29. 
368 = 
“* es 
$e ~*~ 


. 


BOOK II.] STRANGULATION BY THE UMBILICAL CORD. [$ 383 


and towards the breast, corresponding to the parts which were pressed upon 
by the cord. ‘There was no indentation nor ecchymosis, and the death of the 
child was found, upon examination, to be due to violence. Two cases are 
given in the same journal by Dr. Albert(r) in which the cord left a groove 
upon the neck, three or four lines wide, and of a dark blue color. The face in 
both cases was livid and turgid; and in one, in which the child had partially 
breathed, the eyes and tongue protruded, the latter being blue and swollen. 

§ 382. A real ecchymosis, or extravasation of blood under the skin, has 
probably been observed but seldom in accidental strangulation by the umbili- 
cal cord.(s) A livid mark does not always indicate an effusion of blood, but 
is frequently caused by simple congestion—a fact which is proved by its rapid 
disappearance if the child survives.(¢) It would not be safe to assume that the 
existence of ecchymosis disproves the possibility of this accident, because, in 
addition to the possible occasional occurrence of extravasation, it must be re- 
membered that the marks remaining after intentional strangulation are not 
always accompanied by it. Even in hanged persons, an extravasation of 
blood under the mark of the cord is not always found. Nevertheless, if ecchy- 
mosis be found under a deep and discolored mark upon the neck, and at the 
same time there is abrasion of the cuticle or laceration of the skin, such an 
injury cannot possibly be attributed to the umbilical cord. This opinion is 
held by Dr. A. S. Taylor,(w) and is fully substantiated by a large number of 
recorded cases. In order that the reader may form an approximate estimate 
of the proportion of children born dead, in consequence of strangulation by 
the umbilical cord, we may state that Elsisser reports, that out of 318 child- 
ren born with the cord around the neck, three died, or one in 106; Carus 
found one in 43; and Siebold, one in 61 cases. ‘Two points, however, must 
not be forgotten in connection with these data, viz: that they were all cases 
of labor where the best assistance was at hand, and that a certain number of 
the children were born apparently dead, but revived under the use of proper 
restoratives. The mortality in concealed and unassisted deliveries would cer- 
tainly be much greater. Hence a woman, secretly delivered, may be unjustly 
accused of infanticide whose child has perished from a purely accidental, and 
by her, irremediable cause. In fact, the cord may be twisted around the child’s 
neck or body during pregnancy, and its death is thus sometimes accomplished 
before the occurrence of labor.(v) 

§ 383. The child is not unfrequently wilfully strangled before it is completely 
born. When a ligature is found upon its neck, there can of course be no 
longer a question whether the impressions made were due to the umbilical cord. 
The defence is usually that the ligature was placed upon the neck by the 
woman herself, with the object of assisting her delivery. No medical evidence 
can disprove such a statement. If, however, the child has been strangled by 
the hand, whether wilfully or by accident, in attempts at self-delivery, the im- 


(r) Ibid. Bd. 42, p. 207. (s) Elsasser, loc. cit. 1842, p. 7. 

(¢) Windel, Henke’s Zeitsch. Jahrg. 1836, 1 Heft.; Heyfelder, Med. Annal., Heidel- 
berg, 1838, 8. 258; Eichorn, Med. Cor. Bl. bayer, Aertze, 1840, Aug. 8. 

(u) Med. Jur. p. 343. 

(v) Daubert, dissertat. de funiculo umb. fotu circumyvoluto. Gétting. 1808. 
Freyer, de partu diffic. propter funic. umbil. foettis collum obstringentem. Halle, 1765. 


8 24 369 


a” r 


. 2 


§ 386] HEMORRHAGE FROM THE CORD. [BOOK II. 


pressions left will be of a different character from those produced by the con- 
striction by the umbilical cord. A consideration of these will be found under 
the head of Strangulation after birth. We may, however, mention in this 
place, as the chief characteristic, that the indenture or discoloration made by 
the umbilical cord surrounds the neck entirely, which is never the case in death 
from hanging. The mark made by the umbilical cord is moreover broad, the 
depression is cylindrical, and its edges are soft, and it is not excoriated as when 
a string or other hard substance has been used. Moreover, this depression is 
rarely single, as in cases of violence, but oftener double, and occasionally triple, 
nor is it, as in the other case, hardened at the edges, or accompanied by sub- 
cutaneous ecchymosis.(a@) It may be sometimes important to remember that, 
in fat children especially, if the neck be short and the body have been kept or 
found in a cold place, that the fat, becoming congealed in the folds of the skin 
upon the neck, will give rise to furrows, which, to those who may disregard 
the other signs of strangulation, may suggest the suspicion of a ligature having 
been used. (0d) 

§ 384. (b.) Protracted delivery.—The child frequently dies solely in con- 
sequence of the protraction of the labor, and this is especially the case in first 
labors, or where the membranes have broken early in the first stage. In such 
eases, death takes place usually from congestion of the brain, in consequence 
of the compression it suffers. After such tedious labors, the head becomes 
apparently elongated, and over the occiput a tumor forms, often called caput 
succedaneum, caused by a congestion of the vessels of the scalp and an exu- 
dation of bloody serum into the cellular tissue under it. 

§ 885. (¢c.) Debility.—The child may die, also, from constitutional feeble- 
ness, inherited from its parents, or produced by causes acting upon it during 
its intra-uterine existence. It may survive its birth a few hours or days, and 
then perish from inherent debility or the neglect of some trifling precaution, 
which in a healthy child would be of little importance. The inspection of the 
body will often warrant this jadgment when there is no other evidence to show 
the cause of death. 

§ 386. (d.) Hemorrhage from the umbilical cord.—If the body of a new- 
born child present the evidence, in its blanched and waxy hue, and in the pale- 
ness and dryness of the internal organs, particularly of the heart and lungs, of 
a great loss of blood, the hemorrhage will have proceeded, when no wounds 
are found which will otherwise account for it, from the umbilical cord. This 
rule, which is generally admitted, is, however, not applicable when the body 
of the child is already decomposed ; since, during the putrefactive process, ac- 
cording to Casper, the body parts with a considerable portion of its blood. 
The hemorrhage may have been accidental,(c) or permitted with a criminal de- 
sign. In either case, it may arise from laceration of the cord, or from neglect 


(a) Casper, op. cit. i. 804. 

(b) The degree of pressure which the cord may exert during foetal life is illustrated 
by those cases in which deep impressions and consequent malformations of limbs have 
resulted from this cause. Even the amputation of a limb has been observed as an 
effect. Such a case is recorded in Virchow’s Archiv. x. 110, by Dr. Frickhceffer, who 
also cites three analogous instances. 

(c) From an imperfectly applied ligature, or from a morbid condition of the child’s 
blood. See a valuable Report by Dr. J. F. Jenkins, Trans. Am. Med. Assoc. xi. 263. 


379 


BOOK II.] HEMORRHAGE FROM THE CORD. [$ 887 


or omission to tie it. The question of the necessity of tying the umbilical cord, 
although one which we, in common with the majority of writers, would un- 
hesitatingly decide in the affirmative, is not necessary to be discussed in this 
place.(w) As has been very justly remarked by Dr. Beck,(«) the whole ques- 
tion rests upon a simple matter of fact, viz., whether the omission to tie the 
cord has ever been attended with fatal hemorrhage. ‘‘That it has been so, 
cannot be questioned.’’? Dr. Beck quotes cases in illustration from Foderé and 
from Dr. Campbell. Many other examples(y) might be added to these, but 
we do not suppose that the least instructed practitioner would neglect this 
precaution, since even if hemorrhage should not immediately ensue, there is no 
guarantee against its occurring at any time within the first two days. Yet 
Casper, in his long and ample experience, never met with a single instance of 
the sort, although not less than four cases came under his observation in which 
the cord was divided close to the navel, and, as he adds, examples of the cut- 
ting or laceration of the cord at various distances from the body, and without 
death by hemorrhage, are of every day occurrence. (yy) | 

§ 387. Thecord may have been left untied in a first labor, through excusable 
ignorance upon the part of the woman. Such ignorance cannot, however, be 
plausibly urged in subsequent labors. That a woman, in an unassisted labor, 
who had neglected placing a ligature upon the cord, should be convicted of 
infanticide in consequence of the child dying from a neglect of this precaution, 
is of course hardly supposable. 

In many cases, however, of precipitate labor, in positions other than the 
horizontal one, the cord frequently breaks. Hemorrhage, under these circum- 
stances, would not be surprising. The result of observations on this point is, 
that in the great majority of cases it does not take place. In twenty-six cases 
given by Dr. Klein, where the cord was torn off close to the navel, no hemor- 
rhage resulted. In Pyl’s Aufsditze the account of a child is given which had 
been placed in a close box, and covered with wool, where it remained six hours, 
and was taken out perfectly sound and healthy, although its navel string had 
been torn and no ligature applied. In eleven cases reported by Elsiisser, in 
which the child had fallen from the mother, upon the hard ground or pave- 
ment, and the cord was ruptured, no hemorrhage resulted except in two.(z) In 
these, the life of the child was saved by timely help. In two cases, in which 
the cord was ruptured at the navel, a very small quantity of blood escaped. In 
two other cases, in which the cord had been cut and no ligature applied to it, 
no hemorrhage resulted from the omission. One woman is reported to have 
followed the animal instinct, and divided the cord with her teeth.(@) Others 


(w) It is worthy of remark, that it is the habit of the Indian squaws to break the 
cord, and then bind the foetal end with a strip of bark. This fact we have on the 
best authority. (x) Med. Jur. vol. i. p. 511. 

(y) Haller, Elem. Physiol. tome viii. p. 443. Nagele, Salzb. Med. Zeit. 1819, N. 
88, 8.151. Cederschjéld, Med. Chir. Zeit. N. 11, 8. 18l—seven days after birth. 
Klose, Henke’s Zeitsch. Bd. 40,5. 105. Dolscius, ibid. Erg. H. 34, 1845,5. 180. In 
this case the fragment of the cord remaining attached to the child was sixteen inches 
long. The cord has been torn, not cut, by the mother. The child had breathed. 

(yy) Gericht. Med. i. 824. (z) Henke, Zeitsch. Erg. H. 31, p. 38. 

(«) This is not the practice with all the domestic animals, as is erroneously sup- 
posed, but only with the dog, cat, and pig, which, moreover, devour the after-birth. But 
in the horse and in the ruminant animals, the cord is generally broken by the fall of 


37) 


§ 388] HEMORRHAGE FROM THE CORD. [BOOK II. 


broke it in two with the hands. In one case the mother (who had previously 
borne children) was suddenly delivered in the street, in a squatting position. 
The child, which weighed seven pounds, fell upon the pavement. The mother 
immediately broke the cord in two, about four inches from the navel, and without 
tying it, put the child in her apron and ran with it to the hospital. There she 
was delivered of the placenta, with considerable hemorrhage, from which she 
soon, however, recovered. The child showed no signs of loss of blood. The gene- 
ral opinion, undoubtedly, is correct, that a ruptured or lacerated cord will be 
much less apt to bleed, than one which has been divided by a clean incision. 

§ 388. (e.) The length of the umbilical cord is an important element in the 
consideration of those cases in which it has been broken, from delivery taking 
place in the standing position. An example may be cited from Siebold’s 
Journal, vol. XVI. p. 8, where a woman was overtaken by labor and the child 
born, while she was in a standing posture. It fell with its head upon the 
stone floor and sustained no injury. The cord did not give way: it was 
twenty-nine inches long. A similar case by Heyfelder is referred to by 
Elsiisser. (b) 

The usual length of the cord is from eighteen to twenty inches,(c) and the 
average distance of the vulva from the ground, in a woman standing, is ac- 
cording to fifty accurate measurements made in Dr. H.’s hospital, twenty-six 
inches, and in a woman in the squatting posture, one-half or two-thirds of 
- this distance. The distance from the child’s navel to the top of its head, is 
from nine to ten inches. Hence, if we add this to the whole length of the 
umbilical cord, in consequence of the head being the heaviest part of the 
body, it will be seen that the child can fall from twenty-eight to thirty 
inches without putting a strain upon the cord. But this distance will neces- 
sarily be diminished by the unavoidable separation of the limbs during the 
descent of the child, it being clearly impossible that a woman can be de- 
livered in a perfectly erect position. The cord may, however, be unusually 
short or wound round the neck, in which cases, of course, its rupture will 
readily take place. The point at which the cord breaks is, in the great ma- 
jority of cases, near the navel, the distance varying from one to six inches, 
occasionally, however, it occurs at other points. This circumstance admits of 
explanation upon the ground, that the greatest resistance is at the foetal end 
of the cord, the placental portion being more yielding. When the cord does 
not break, the placenta is sometimes dragged out by the weight of the child. 
A curious and important case in which the cord was ruptured while the wo- 
man was in the recumbent posture, is given by Elsasser.(d) The cord was 
unusually short, and the child forcibly expelled, immediately after the rup- 
ture of the membranes. When taken up it cried loudly, and was found to 


the young when the mother is in a standing position, or, when delivered in the recum- 
bent posture, by her suddenly springing up. The rupture occurs in general near to 
the navel. When it is not broken in either of these ways, assistance is usually at 
‘hand to make the separation. (b) Loe. cit. 

(c) Dr. Tyler Smith exhibited to the Westminster Medical Society*(Jan. 12, 1850), 
a funis which, measuring from the attachment at the umbilicus, to its insertion into 
the placenta, was fifty-nine inches and a half in length. In the Boston Med. Surg. 
Journal for July, 1850, one is mentioned which measured sixty-nine inches. 

(d) Henke, Zeitsch. Erg. H. 31, p. 39. 

372 | 


BOOK II.] FRACTURES OF THE SKULL DURING BIRTH. [§ 390 


be bleeding freely from the umbilical cord, which was ruptured about three 
inches from the navel. The cord was from thirteen to fourteen inches long, 
and not thicker than the little finger, although healthy. The woman had 
previously given birth to six children. 

§ 389. (f£) Fractures.—Where fractures are found on the head of a 
new-born child, they may be attributed as well to accidental as to criminal 
causes. If a woman have received, in the latter portion of her pregnancy, 
a violent blow or fall upon the abdomen, the child’s head may be fractured 
by the same force. J. P. Frank relates the case of a woman, six months 
pregnant, who received, on the abdomen, a blow from the butt of a musket, 
in consequence of which she was prematurely delivered.(e) The child’s skull 
was crushed and the navel-cord broken. Another case(f) may be referred to, 
where a woman near her confinement fell upon an angular stone. The skull 
of the child was completely crushed, and the woman herself died. Other in- 
tra-uterine fractures, it may here be stated, are occasionally met with, besides 
those of the head. Dr. Keller has given an account of a fracture of the cla- 
vicle, which was caused by the fall of the mother from a carriage during the 
fourth month of pregnancy. At birth, which took place at term, the evident 
marks of a consolidated fracture, with some deformity were apparent.(a) 
Two other cases of intra-uterine fracture of this bone are related by Mr. John 
Ewens.(b) Basmer relates a case(c) in which the right arm and forearm, and 
both thighs and legs of the foetus, which died immediately after birth, were 
broken. The earthy matter in the bones formed one-third only of their weight 
instead of one-half, as it should have done. Three cases are quoted by Dr. 
Gurlt,(d) from d’Outrepont, Léwenhardt, and Ozajewski, in one of which the 
skull of the foetus was fractured by a shot, in a second by a scythe, and in the 
third, the shoulder-blade was broken by a sickle. In all three cases the chil- 
dren were born dead ; in the first two, immediately after the injury, and in the 
third, at the end of two days. In the first case only did the mother die. In 
all of these cases the mother was of course wounded. © 'The same author cites 
eight cases in which falls or blows experienced by the mother produced frac- 
tures of the bones of the foetus. The accident usually occurred in the latter 
half of pregnancy, and generally the lower limbs were the parts injured. 
Union of bones so broken is stated to be slower than in extra-uterine life ; but 
on this point the evidence is not very clear. Such cases, however, have little 
practical bearing upon the subject; the child is born dead in consequence of 
the injury, and if not putrid, an inspection of the lungs will at once show 
that it has not respired. Hence there can be no question of infanticide. 

§ 390. Again, however, fracture of the skull may occur during labor, in 
consequence of the relative disproportion of the head to the pelvis, or of a de- 
formity in the latter, arising from osseous projections or tumors. The child 


» 

(e) For another similar case by Callenfels, vid. Frébel, Die Nabelschnur in ihrem 
pathol. Verhalten wihrend der Geburt. 

(f) Gaz. des Hop. Nov. 7, 1846. 

(a) N. Amer. Med. Chir. Rev., July, 1859, p. 687. 

(b) Med. Times and Gaz. May, 1860, p. 482; consult also Ibid. Apr. 1860, p. 353. 

(c) Brit. Med. Journ. 1857. ; 

(d) Lehre von den Knochenbriichen, Frankfurt a. Main, 1860, p. 211. 


373 


§ 391] FRACTURES DURING BIRTH. [BOOK It. 


may survive these injuries a sufficient time to breathe,(g) and, indeed, may re- 
cover from them altogether. It becomes necessary, therefore, to take the cir- 
cumstances into consideration, in all cases of fracture of the skull in new-born 
children, that it may have occurred accidentally during labor.(h) Fractures 
produced in this way are certainly of very rare occurrence, for the child’s head 
often sustains extreme compression, both from the uterus and in forceps deli- 
veries, without being injured. They are found most frequently in the parietal 
bones, sometimes in the frontal, and never, as far as we know, in the occipital 
bone. Usually they are mere fissures, unattended with depression and lacera- 
tion of the integuments. Cases, however, are related by Landsberg,(7) and 
by Danyau, and Ollivier d’Angers,(j) in which there was depression. M. 
Lizé mentions the case of a young woman who was three days in labor, and 
who was delivered without instruments after great efforts on her part. The 
child was dead, and the parietal bone of the left side severely fractured. (7 ) 

§ 391. Although respiration may have taken place, the fact being established 
by the hydrostatic test or direct evidence, it will not serve as a criterion of the 
time at which the fracture was produced, since the child may have received it 
during the labor, and yet have survived the injury until after it was born and 
had breathed. In such a case we have nothing left to guide our judgment, 
but an examination of the extent, situation and appearance of the fracture. 
In the majority of cases, in which criminal violence has been used, the fracture 
is stellated, depressed, and the scalp contused and lacerated. It is plain, 
however, that slight fractures, productive of fatal results, may be inflicted by 
violence, and in such cases no reliable distinction can be made between them 
and those which are caused by compression of the head during labor. The 
following will serve as an example of fracture without injury to the integu- 
ments, but still in all probability caused by criminal violence. An inquest 
was held in Islington, before Mr. Wakley, on the body of an infant, whose 
death, there was reason to believe, had been caused through violence wilfully 
inflicted by the mother. Over each orbital ridge, the frontal bone was frac- 
tured horizontally, to the length of about an inch. On the right frontal 
protuberance, the bone had been driven in to the extent of three-quarters of 
an inch, in the form of an acute wedge-like fracture. The parietal bones were 
both fractured vertically, to the length of an inch and a quarter, and there 
were several minor fractures of all the bones forming the superior and lateral 
portions of the skull. There was, with all these fractures, no trace of injury 
to the scalp. No evidence was obtained as to the manner in which they were 
produced. The child had been born alive, and the mother alleged that its 
death was caused by its having fallen into the pan of the water-closet, where 
she asserted she was seated at the moment of its birth. The extent of the 


(g) Klein. (Bemerkungen tiber die bisher angenommenen Folgen, &c., 1817, § 193.) 
The child lived forty-six hours. The parietal bones were fractured, and there was 
extravasation of blood in the brain and spinal canal. 

(h) For cases vid. Deventer, Réderer, Baudelocque. E. v. Siebold (his Journal, xi. 
3), Schworer (Beitrige zur Lehre von der Schidelsbriiche, &c.). Begasse (Preuss. 
Med. Vereinschrift, 1841, No. 37, sec. 181). Mende (Gutachten iiber einen Zweifel- 
haften Fall, &c. H. Z. Bd. 3, sec. 277). Casper (Wochenscrift, 1837, 1840, 1851). 
Osiander, loc. cit. (1) Henke, Zeitsch. 1847. 

(j) Ann. d’Hygiéne, 32, 121. (jj) Lancet, Feb. 1860, p. 180. 

374 


BOOK II.] FRACTURES IN DELIVERY. [§ 3892 


injuries, and the small distance of the alleged fall, disproved the truth of this 
statement. (x) 

The physician should be aware that a defective ossification of the bones of 
the head may be mistaken for a fracture. The distinction is, however, not a 
difficult one. This condition, when observed, is usually found in the parietal 
bones, and consists in an absence of one or more of the osseous spicule, which 
radiate from the central point of ossification. The gap is filled up by a mem- 
brane which unites the bony portions together. The edges of the bone on 
each side of this membrane are thin and bevelled, sometimes shading off in- 
sensibly into it. A fissure, however, which is the result of violence, is indicated, 
on removing the pericranium by a red line, the edges of the bone are jagged 
and bloody, and no membrane intervenes. More or less blood is effused in the 
neighborhood of the fracture, under the scalp and on the dura mater. If no 
bone is lost, the edges of the fracture can be adjusted closely together.(“/) 

§ 392. Fractures which are occasioned by the fall of the child upon the 
ground, when the mother is delivered in a standing, sitting, or kneeling pos- 
ture, are deserving of particular attention in a medico-legal point of view. 
The fractures thus produced present, indeed, no peculiar features by which 
they may be distinguished from others, caused by direct violence, but the pro- 
bability of their being due to this accident becomes often a question of extreme 
delicacy. Landsberg gives a good illustration of this accident in the following 
case :(1) A woman who had already borne children, was taken in labor, as 
she ran from her house which was on fire; the child fell from her upon a heap 
of broken bricks and stones. Fourteen days afterwards there was found upon 
the left parietal bone of the child, a swelling of the size of a pigeon’s egg, 
without any discoloration of the skin, and with slight fluctuation. The frag- 
ments of bone and crepitation could be easily distinguished by pressure of the 
finger upon this spot. The child got well.(m) Numerous other cases might 
be quoted; the curious reader will find many referred to by Henke.(n) Dr. 
Klein collected one hundred and eighty cases of delivery in the erect posture, 
in none of which the head of the child was fractured. It is contrary to reason, 
however, to adduce this as proof (as has been done by some authors) that 
fractures are not occasioned by the accident in question. The instances which 
demonstrate its occurrence are perfectly authentic, and if we were reasoning 
abstractly, it would be far more credible that the fractures should occur under 
the circumstances referred to, than that they should not.(nn) The possibility 


(k) Brit. and For. Med. Rev. April, 1854. 

(kk) The period at which the fontanelles close has been made a subject of inquiry 
by M. Roger (Union Med. Nov. 1859). They generally close between the second and 
third year. In three hundred children, the anterior fontanelle was never found closed 
before the fifteenth month, and never open after the age of three years. 

(1) Henke, Zeitsch. 1847, 3 Heft. 

(m) Dr. Swayne reports a case in which a woman, twenty-nine years of age, in her 
third labor, at full time, bore a child in the erect posture. The umbilical cord was 
torn, and the child, though much bruised, lived to the sixth day, when it died of 
convulsions. ‘The parietal bone was fractured, and a coagulum was found on the 
membranes of the brain. Another case is reported by Casper (Ger. Leichendff.) 
(Assoc. Journ. Oct. 14, 1852, p. 401.) 

(n) Handbuch der Gericht. Med. 12th ed. by Bergmann, 1851. 

(nn) Casper speaks in deservedly severe terms of some writers who, on merely 


375 


§ 394] CAUSES OF DEATH AFTER BIRTH. [BOOK II. 


of the accident may therefore always be taken into consideration, in cases of 
concealed birth, when fractures of the cranium are discovered. Other evidence 
will be of course required to confirm the supposition. 

§ 393. (2.) Causes of death after birth.—The modes in which a new-born 
child may meet its death shortly after birth are very numerous. A child may 
be born with such a degree of malformation or disease as to incapacitate it 
from sustaining life. In all such cases an examination by a competent person 
will be sufficient to expose the reason of death. It must be remembered, how- 
ever, that there is hardly any malformation which necessarily prevents the 
child from existing for a brief period, even though it should at last be fatal 
as a natural consequence. Anencephalous children frequently survive for hours 
and days, and perform most of the animal functions perfectly well. If vio- 
lence should be inflicted upon such an unfortunate being, it may be judged 
according to the ordinary rules; the aim of the physician being only to ascer- 
tain what share the injury had in its death. The question of the degree of 
criminality attached to the destruction of a monstrous child is not, of course, 
within his province. Minor degrees of malformation are not infrequent, 
such as extroversion of the bladder, displacement of the viscera, spina bifida, 
occlusion of the intestine, imperforate rectum, abnormal communications 
between the cavities of the heart, &c.; many of them are remediable, others 
are not inconsistent with the attainment of adult life, and none can interfere 
with the judgment of a medical examiner in any case of infanticide. The 
same remark will apply to congenital diseases. 'Their actual existence can be 
ascertained, and allowance made for any influence they may possibly have 
exerted in causing the child’s death. 

§ 394. (a.) Haposure.—Under this name may be included all those modes 
of death which result from the abandonment of. the child. The new-born child, 
unlike the young of many other animals, speedily perishes if uncared for. It 
requires both warmth and nourishment, and if deprived of either, cannot main- 
tain its existence. The period of time for which a child may survive, exposed 
to hunger and cold, is uncertain. Instances are on record, which show a 
remarkable tenacity of life. A case is related,(o) in which a child, in the middle 
of the night, was thrown out of a window nine feet from the ground. It was 
still attached to the placenta. It fell upon a pavement which was covered with 


theoretical grounds, deny the reality of this accident. He also mentions the following 
instances of delivery under circumstances fitted to occasion it. In one a serving 
woman carrying a heavy burden on her head was seized with labor in the street, and 
the child was seen to fall from her upon the frozen ground. In a second case, both 
child and afterbirth were discharged simultaneously in the presence of witnesses. In 
a third the mother was getting into a high bed, having one foot upon it and one upon 
the steps leading to it, when the child fell from her. In a fourth, a female prisoner 
gave birth to a child which fell upon the floor, while she was dressing and in the 
erect posture. In a fifth, a married lady in her third pregnancy was thus unexpect- 
edly delivered. Finally, a woman expelled her child while seated in a privy, and 
the infant fell upon the firmly frozen substances beneath. With such examples 
before us, concludes Casper, we may safely lay it down as a general law, that sudden 
delivery while the mother is in an erect posture is altogether possible, and that the 
child is susceptible of being wounded in the head, and even mortally. (Gericht. 
Med. i. 811.) For other illustrations, see §§ 402, 403; also, Lond. Times and Gaz. 
Jan. 1860, p. 98. 
(0) Henke’s Zeitsch. Erg. Heft. 31. 


376 


BOOK It.] EXPOSURE. [$ 895 


straw and dung. It remained there, naked and exposed to the night air (in 
the month of April), for three-quarters of an hour. It was then found, and 
lived twenty-four hours afterwards. It had received no injury from the fall. 

A peasant woman delivered herself of a mature child, in the vicinity of a 
wood, on the 18th of August, 1842, and fearing discovery, she concealed it in 
the hollow of a tree, thrusting it, head forwards, into the portion of the cavity 
which led towards the root, so as to exert considerable compression on the 
body, doubling it up, as it were. She then laid two stones of three or four 
pounds’ weight upon its buttocks, and concealed the hole in the tree with a 
larger stone. By a lucky accident, a passer-by, on the 21st, heard its moaning, 
and withdrew it from its prison, covered all over with fir spicule and ants. 
There were numerous contusions and lacerations upon different parts of the 
body. Its respiration, at first very rapid, soon became more tranquil, and, 
although much emaciated, it cried with some vigor, and very readily partook 
of food. Its temperature was normal. Any change of position called forth 
screams, due evidently to the pain of the various excoriations of the surface. 
It continued until the 25th to take nourishment, but the sores on the surface 
put on an ill character, and it died on the 29th. It seems almost incredible 
that life should have been prolonged during the exposure of this naked infant, 
without food, for three days and nights, the temperature of the air varying 
from 50° to 80° Fahr. Probably its close quarters within the tree protected 
it in some measure from cold; but the privation of food ought, according 
to the generally received opinions, to have proved fatal before the period of 
its discovery. Foderé states that danger to life is imminent after twenty- 
four hours; and, at most, that the infant can fast from one to two days 
only.(p) 

§ 395. Cases of such long survivance are, of course, exceedingly rare. The 
judgment of the physician must therefore be founded not only upon an exa- 
mination of the body, but also from concurrent evidence. He must be aware 
of the length of time the child had been exposed, and the temperature of the 
locality in which it was found, before he can rely with confidence upon the 
signs of death from cold. These signs are far from being positive, unless the 
child has been actually frozen. In this case the skin will be found of a pur- 
plish color, the hands and feetgswollen, the nails blue, and the face of a bright 
red color. The brain is greatly congested, and the lungs and right cavities of 
the heart contain more blood than usual. When the body is brought into a 
warm place, it putrefies rapidly. The same remarks will apply in cases where 
death is supposed to have resulted from starvation. It is necessary to know 
approximately how long the child has been deprived of nutriment, before the 
absence of food from the stomach, and the general signs of death from this 
cause, can warrant the opinion that the child has perished for want of food. 
The signs usually given are, a shrivelled and wasted body, a pale and wrinkled 
countenance, expressive of suffering, and a dry, tough, and yellowish skin. 
The mouth, tongue, and fauces are dry, the stomach and intestines enpty— 
the surface of the former inflamed in points, the latter distended with air— 


(p) Brit. and For, Med.-Chir. Rev. Jan. 1850, from Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1847, 3 H. 
377 


§ 396] ACCIDENTAL SUFFOCATION. [BOOK Il. 


the heart flaccid, and the great vessels containing but little blood.(g) It is 
evident that a child may be given unsuitable food, or in insufficient quantities, 
with a view of destroying its life. Such a fact can hardly come under the 
cognizance of the physician in a criminal ease, except in reference to the gene- 
ral effects of such treatment. 

§ 396. (b.) Suffocation.—This word is used here to signify any means by 
which access of air to the lungs is cut off. It includes, therefore, death by 
smothering, heavy pressure on the chest, strangling, and drowning, as well as 
the purely accidental modes of death immediately after delivery. The general 
signs of suffocation are the same in these various cases; but if wounds have 
been inflicted upon the child, causing hemorrhage, or if it has lost blood from 
the navel cord, the signs alluded to will mostly disappear. They consist in 
congestion of the brain, but particularly of the lungs and right side of the 
heart, which are filled with dark blood. 

Besides these appearances, which are common to asphyxia in the adult and 
in the child, there are in the latter, often observed, numberless sanguineous 
extravasations very much like petechie, in the pia mater, upon the pleura, 
surface of the heart, and the aorta. These have been carefully described by 
Casper and by Mr. Canton, of London, as occurring in children which have 
been overlain, or which have been intentionally suffocated. All the cases upon 
which these observations were founded, were subjects of judicial inquiry. 

The accidental causes of suffocation are present after delivery. Frequently 
the woman, being either unconscious or unable to help herself, neglects to 
remove the child from the pool often made by the discharges in the bed. Lying 
in this, with its mouth downward, the child will perish from want of attention. 
Again, the membranes may interpose between its mouth and the air, or its 
mouth be so filled with viscid mucus, that unless some little help is given it, 
it may easily be suffocated. Children are often designedly or accidentally 
smothered under the bedclothes, in boxes, &c. 

The following is a curious example of accidental suffocation of an infant. 
Mr. Llewellyn, surgeon, found the child dead; the tongue protruded, the face 
was very livid, and it had all the appearance of having been suffocated. He 
questioned the mother, and she told him she had dreamt that a mad bull was 
attacking her, and had squeezed up the child to protect it, and when she awoke, 
as she found the child cold, she called her husband. The child had been pro- 
perly taken care of. The parents had three other children, were very indus- 
trious people, and kind to their children. The child was lying on her arm, 
and its death might very probably have occurred as she described it.(7) 

If much pressure have been made upon them, the body and head will be 
found flattened, the eyes and lips remain half open, blood flows from the nose, 
the tongue protrudes, frothy mucus is present at the corners of the mouth, 
and the excrements have been voided. The limbs are generally extended, the 
skin is not uniform in color, and presents here and there violet ecchymoses, the 
lips look blackish, and the nails livid. : 


(q) Bock, p. 257. 
(r) Brit. and For. Med. Chir. Review, Jan. 1855, p. 292. 


378 


BOOK II. | STRANGULATION, [3 398 


§ 397. Sometimes the child is suffocated by stopping its mouth with foreign 
substances. Hence the necessity in every case presenting signs of suffocation, 
of closely examining the mouth and fauces, although, indeed, instances are 
not wanting where all traces have been carefully removed previously. <A 
very interesting case is reported, in which the child was immersed living in 
a pot of ashes. The woman’s confession confirmed the result of the medical 
examination, which showed that the child had been gradually asphyxiated. 
The ashes were found in the nostrils, mouth, fauces, and pharynx. There 
were none in the windpipe.(s) <A case is reported by Dr. Littlejohn, in which 
the child was suffocated by dough forced into its pharynx and larynx; and 
another is quoted by the same writer, in which a plug of newspaper had been 
used to produce suffocation.(ss) Another case,(¢) instructive in this connec- 
tion, is also of interest from the uncertainty whether or not the child was living 
when the outrage was inflicted upon it. A child was found, in which the 
fauces, the upper portion of the cesophagus, the larynx, and the trachea, were 
tightly packed with a coarse greenish-black sand. At the same time the 
child’s lungs evinced no sign of respiration, and sank to the bottom of the 
water when subjected to the hydrostatic test. While it is difficult to imagine for 
what purpose, if the child were already dead, the substance found so tightly 
wedged into the entrance of the respiratory passages and throat could have been 
forced there, it is no less strange that such an act of violence could have been 
perpetrated upon a living child, without its lungs showing signs of, at least, 
imperfect respiration. The case unfortunately remains without solution; but 
in whichever light it may be viewed—whether as an unaccountable act of vio- 
lence after death, or an unique case of successful prevention of respiration— 
it cannot fail of being of great interest to the medical jurist. A child may 
also be destroyed by being exposed to noxious vapors, as those of burning 
charcoal or sulphur, the exhalations of privies, &c., and no trace will remain 
of the cause of its death, except, in some cases, the odor of the deleterious 
gas or vapor which destroyed its life. Cases bearing upon this point will be 
found in § 369. 

§ 398. (¢.) Strangling.—The marks of strangulation differ according to 
the means by which the violence is effected. As a general rule, more violence 
being used than is necessary to accomplish the purpose, distinct marks of a 
cord or of the fingers, with abrasion of the skin, will be met with. These 
marks will be irregular in shape and size, being either spots, furrows, or inden- 
tations, red or livid in color, with sometimes subcutaneous extravasation. In 
the absence of these signs, we may be at a loss to explain the manner in which 
suffocation was accomplished. But even if the marks spoken of exist, it may 
be alleged that they were produced accidentally by the umbilical cord, as we 
have before explained (§ 382), or, as some authors affirm, by the efforts of the 
woman to assist herself in her delivery. Such an idle assumption will frustrate 
the best medical evidence, if received, since the physician can only determine 
whether the marks are those of strangulation or not; he can seldom decide 


(s) Ann. d’Hygiéne 47, p. 460, 1852. 
(ss) Edinb. Med. Journal, i. 521. 
(t) Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, 1852, H. 2. 


379 


§ 400] DROWNING. [BOOK II. 


with certainty how they were made, and much less whether before or after 
complete birth and respiration. It is sometimes necessary to know whether 
the marks of strangulation could not have been produced after death. This, 
upon good authority,(w) may be answered in the affirmative, if the body be 
still warm when the constricting force is applied. The question as to whether 
the umbilical cord had been severed before the strangling was attempted, is of 
no importance in a medical point of view, since this circumstance will not in 
any manner affect the signs of the mode of death, and respiration may have 
been perfectly well established long before the cord is cut. 

A case is related in the Lancet,(v) where a child, with the placenta attached 
to it, was buried in the ground, and covered one inch and a half deep with 
earth. It was found that at least half an hour had elapsed since the earth 
had covered the child, and yet when it was taken up, respiration was still 
going on. 

§ 399. (d.) Drowning.—The signs of death by drowning in the new-born 
child, do not differ from those found in the adult, and elsewhere fully considered. 
Generally, however, children which are found dead in the water, have been 
thrown into it, for the purpose of concealing the body, after they have already 
perished by natural or criminal means. Hence it is not often that the peculiar 
signs of death by drowning will be met with, but in all cases where children 
are found dead in the water, search should be made for traces of other violent 
injury, and it should be especially noted whether respiration has occurred. If — 
marks of violence are found upon the body, particularly fractures, they must 
be carefully examined for the purpose of ascertaining, if possible, whether they 
could have been accidentally produced by substances in the water, or whether 
they were not rather due to criminal violence, and inflicted during life. Such 
a question will very naturally arise, when, for instance, a large stone is found 
in the bag in which the child has been thrown into the water. <A case of this 
kind has been reported in Henke’s Zeitschrift. The general rules elsewhere 
detailed, by which a distinction may be made between wounds inflicted before 
or after death, are applicable here. If, for instance, there be found, under a 
contused wound of the scalp, an extravasation of blood; if, moreover, one or 
more fractures be found, and blood effused upon the cerebral membranes below 
them, the inference will be reasonable, that they must have been produced 
during the life of the child. These signs will not be affected by the submer- 
sion unless putrefaction has taken place. 

§ 400. (e.) Wounds.—The general distinctions between wounds inflicted 
before and after death, are considered in the chapter on Wounps, Book V. 
Part IJ. The remarks there made, are equally applicable in the case of new- 
born children.(vv) Wounds inflicted upon them being very rapidly fatal, the 


ee Casper’s Wochenschrift, 1837; Ollivier (d’Angers) Ann. d’Hyg. vol. xxix. 
p- ; 

(v) Am. edit. 1850, p. 513. 

(vv) Wounds found upon a child may have been inflicted in utero, just as the frac- 
tures are which have already been referred to. Mr. Lynch (Brit. Med. Journ. and 
Abeille Méd. xv. 95) reports the case of a child born dead at the eighth month with 
a contused wound of the back, looking as if the skin and muscles had been violently 
torn from the occiput to the sacrum, and also as if the part had begun to heal. A 
week before the mother had met with a fall upon a piece cf wood. In another case, 


380 


BOOK II.] WOUNDS IN THE NEW-BORN CHILD. [$ 400 


signs which show that they were made during life, drawn from the ensuing 
inflammation, rarely come under notice. The character of the blood effused 
is, however, a diagnostic sign of great value. If this is found coagulated, 
there can be little doubt that the child was living when it received the injury ; 
but if, on the contrary, blood be found extravasated under the wound, or 
effused around it, and still remaining liquid, we may be equally sure that the 
wound was made shortly after death, and while the body was still warm. A 
recent observation by Ollivier d’ Angers, will illustrate this fact. In this case the 
child was murdered before it had breathed, but while the circulation was still 
going on, as was proved by the examination of numerous wounds made by a 
cutting instrument in the back of the throat, as well as of other injuries. 
Coagula were found upon the orifices of the wounds. An incised wound may 
be accidentally inflicted upon a child by the knife or scissors, in severing the 
umbilical cord. When this happens, it will generally be found that the fingers 
or toes, or some part of the limbs, which have been suddenly elevated by the 
child at the moment of the incision, are injured. Where there is any suspi- 
cion of the wound having been produced in this way, the physician must care- 
fully examine the situation, extent, and shape of it, and assure himself that 
the cord has really been cut, before assenting to the probability of this expla- 
nation. A peculiar mode by which the new-born child is often destroyed, is 
the introduction of pointed instruments, such as pins or knitting-needles, into 
the fontanelles, the ears, the nose, and between the vertebrae. In a superficial 
examination, these injuries may be overlooked. Hence, in doubtful cases, atten- 
tion should be carefully given to this point. By dissecting out the suspected 
portion of skin, and stretching it against the light, the finest puncture can be 
detected. Sometimes a multiplicity of wounds is inflicted. The following 
cases will serve as examples. A young woman becoming pregnant, concealed 
her situation with great care. Her parents could not prevail upon her to ac- 
knowledge it, but it was finally ascertained by a midwife. She was confined 
alone. She seized a pocket-knife, thrust the blade into the child’s head, back, 
abdomen and limbs, cut off its head, and concealed the bleeding fragments 
under her paillasse. She was soon discovered, and at first denied the crime. 
Afterwards she brought the knife to the mayor, and made no attempt to es- 
cape, but confessed the act, and ascribed it to despair at having been aband- 
oned by her lover.(w) 

A still more inhuman example of infanticide is reported by Prof. Toul- 
mouche.(#) It was proved that Severine L had borne an illegitimate 
child, of which no traces could be found. The girl, who at first obstinately 
denied the charge, finally confessed the crime, and indicated to the medical 
officers the place where she had concealed its remains. She said that she had 


reported by Dr. Finnell, there existed a penetrating wound of the leg which he attri- 
buted to a stab in the abdomen below the umbilicus, received by the mother a week 
before her confinement, which was brought on by her injury. Immediately after the 
infliction of the wound, a gush of water followed by blood had taken place from the 
uterus. (New York Journ. of Med. Jan. 1860, p. 99.) A very remarkable case of 
foetal wound is published in Med.-Chir. Trans. xxxii. 59, and several others of ex- 
treme interest are referred to by Dr. Montgomery, Signs and Symptoms of Pregnancy, 
2d ed. p. 684. 
(w) Ann. d’Hyg. 1851. ; (xy Ann. d’Hyg. July, he 
38 


§ 402] UNCONSCIOUS DELIVERY. [BOOK II. 


been delivered at night, had suffocated her child, then cut it into pieces, the 
better to conceal it in the chamber vessel, which she then carried into the gar- 
den, and threw the contents into a dung-heap. With some difficulty the frag- 
ments were nearly all recovered, and placed in apposition. The head, thorax, 
and abdomen had been all separated from each other by a cutting instrument. 
The head was dreadfully mangled, the arms were cut off from the chest, and 
the forearms from them again, and many of the fingers also were separated. 
In like manner, the lower extremities were dissevered. The genital organs 
were separated completely. The lungs were of a rosy color, crepitant, and 
weighed two and a half ounces, with the heart and thymus attached. Being 
put into water, they floated, even after being subjected to enormous pressure. 
A portion, after being placed under a weight of 60 kilogrammes (132 lbs.), still 
swam. The heart and the bloodvessels were entirely empty of blood, and the 
substance of the former was very pale. From these, and the signs which indi- 
cated the maturity of the child, it was justly concluded that it was at term, had 
lived and breathed, and that its death was caused by the wounds inflicted upon 
it by a cutting instrument. Siebold(y) also witnessed a case somewhat like 
the foregoing, in which the mother, actuated by the usual motive, viz., fear of 
abandonment, destroyed her new-born child by cutting off its head. In this 
case, also, the hydrostatic test clearly proved that the child had fully breathed. 

§ 401. (f.) Dislocation.—There have been examples of infanticide by dis- 
location of the neck. The discovery of the luxation requires no unusual skill in’ 
post-mortem examinations.(z) As the existence of other dislocations in child- 
ren found dead, may give rise to a suspicion of criminal violence, it should be 
_ known that intra-uterine dislocations are occasionally met with. Dr. J. B. 8. 
Jackson has described a complete upward dislocation of the head of the thigh 
bone, and a partial dislocation of the knee-joint, in an acephalous feetus weigh- 
ing two pounds and two ounces. (zz) 

§ 402. (g.) Unconscious delivery.—It is frequently alleged, in defence of 
women charged with infanticide, that the rapidity of their labor, and the sen- 
‘sations attending it, were such, that they were not sufficiently conscious, at the 
moment of the expulsion of the child, to save it from danger. This defence 
is often made in those cases where the dead body of the child is found in a 
privy-well, or water-closet. Although, in many cases, the proof of delivery 
having taken place in the manner described, depends upon other evidence than 
that required of the physician, yet there are questions which he will be called 
upon to answer, relative to the probability of the occurrence, which will de- 
mand very careful reflection. At first sight, the fact may appear highly im- 
probable, that a woman should possibly mistake the convulsive pains of labor 
for the ordinary sensation of a call to stool, or that any labor, however easy 
or rapid, could be accomplished without her being fully conscious of it. With 
due allowance for cases of wilful deception and of purposed wrong to the child, 
there remains sufficient evidence to show the possibility of unconscious delivery 
in this sense. As the child’s head descends into the pelvis, the mother is often 


(y) Henke’s Zeitsch. 1845, p. 157. 

(z) For a case in point, see Orftila, Med. Leg. vol. ii. p. 109, 

(zz) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. March, 1860, p. 127. 
382 


BOOK II. ] RAPID DELIVERY. [$ 403 


seized with an irrepressible desire to evacuate the bowels, and nothing.is more 
common than for this evacuation to take place, in spite of all efforts to restrain 
it, at the very moment that the child is expelled. Hence, it is quite intelligible, 
that a woman in labor in the absence of proper advice, may seat herself upon the 
privy hole, or the night-stool, at precisely the most critical moment for the child. 
By a forcible pain, favored by a very yielding condition of the parts, the head 
may be abruptly expelled; the cord may break with the fall of the child, which 
may perish miserably, either by the injury received in its fall, or stifled with 
the filth into which it is plunged. The mother, exhausted and terrified, may 
be unable to prevent this catastrophe. Cases of this kind are related, of mar- 
ried woman and of others, where there was no attempt to conceal the birth, 
and no suspicion of criminal intentions.(@) An English lady in India was preg- 
nant at full term with her second child. She experienced a very slight sensa- 
tion, as if her bowels were about to be relieved; a feeling as if something had 
touched her body followed, and caused her to ask the attendant to lift the bed- 
clothes, when to the surprise and alarm of both, the child was found entirely 
extruded. It was but slightly undersized.(aa) An equally striking case in 
which the escape of the child from the maternal parts was mistaken for an 
evacuation of the bowels, is reported by Ammeuille.(b) While a want of 
knowledge of the phenomena of labor, may plausibly account for the event-in 
a woman with her first child, yet the greater rigidity of the parts, and the 
slower progress of the delivery in this case, render its occurrence far more un- 
likely than in those who have already borne children. It is said, that if the 
cord be found broken, instead of cut, it will confirm the story; but this cir- 
cumstance is not conclusive, since it may have been broken by the hands of the 
mother, and the child afterwards thrown into the privy for concealmeat. In 
most cases, our opinion can be founded only upon the traces of blood at and 
near the alleged scene of labor, and upon the absence of conflicting testimony. 
The concealment of the fact of having given birth to a child will throw just 
doubt upon the woman’s veracity, since, if the delivery were accidental, the 
natural presumption is, that the mother would have sought for immediate 
assistance. 

Other forms of unconscious delivery do not possess the same practical 
interest as the foregoing. Women may be delivered in a state of insensibility, 
and, according to Dr. Montgomery, even during deep natural sleep: in such 
eases, the child may perish from want of attention, and in some one of the 
various ways before alluded to.(0d) 

§ 403. Delivery may also be so rapid, although the mother is aware of 
being in labor, that she is unable to guard against an accident to the child. 
Mrs. B., of Quebec, aged thirty, married, and pregnant with her first child, 
was seized during the night with labor pains. After bearing them for a long 


(a) For cases illustrative of this fact, vid. Henke’s Abhandlungen, Bd. i. S. 49 ff. 
2te Aufil.; Dr. Schnitzer (Med. Zietung d. ver. f. Heilk. in Preussen, 1839) ; Fleisch- 
mann (Henke’s Zeitsch. 1839, 2 H.); Dr. Beck (Ed. Med. Jur. p. 317, note) ; Ricker 
(Henke’s Zeitsch. 1843, 3 H. p. 197). Also note to § 392. 

(aa) Dr. G. Smith, Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. Oct. 1857, p. 554. 

(6) L’Union Méd. ; and Phila. Med. and Surg. Reporter, March, 1860, p. 501. 

(bb) See Rawson, Lancet, 1841; Schultze Ann. d’Hyg. v. 33, p. 216. 

383 


$ 404] POISONING. [BOOK II. 


while, she requested a woman to give her some warm water to “set over,’’ to 
_ relieve what she described as a great pressure at the lower part of her bowels. 
She had hardly seated herself upon the edge of a rather high chair, when a 
severe bearing-down pain seized her, and before any assistance could be afforded 
(although one or two women were in the room), the child was forcibly ex- 
pelled, and fell, head foremost, on the floor, being killed upon the spot. When 
the physician arrived, about twenty minutes after delivery, the child, although 
dead, was still attached by the cord to the placenta, which came away shortly 
after the infant. In another instance, the wife of a clergyman, in labor with 
her second child, but not suffering from any pain, was suddenly seized with a 
strong bearing-down pain, and got up with the intention of walking into an 
adjoining room. Before she had proceeded more than a few yards, another 
pain threw the infant upon the carpet. The cord was ruptured near the 
umbilicus, but fortunately did not bleed from the foetal portion. The child 
was not injured. A similar case is related by Dr. Larkin, of Wrentham, 
Mass., except that the cord was so long, that it was not broken. The mother 
broke it in two, and succeeded in reaching her bed-room, although much 
exhausted from hemorrhage. Both mother and child recovered. (c) 

§ 404. (h.) Potsoning.—This form of infanticide is extremely rare. Dr. 
'Paylor states, that the earliest age at which he has known a trial to take place 
for the murder of a child by poison, was two months. In this case, a quantity 
of arsenic was given to the child, and it died in three hours and a quarter after 
its administration. (d) 

More recently, a woman destroyed her child, which was only one day old, 
by arsenic. She was tried, and acquitted upon the plea of puerperal insanity, 
although the evidence certainly did not warrant such a verdict. Mr. Justice 
Cresswell, at the close of his charge to the jury, “‘read the whole of the 
evidence, and at the close remarked that he was bound to tell them that there 
was undoubtedly no direct proof that the prisoner was otherwise than in her 
perfect senses, as no person saw her laboring under delusion or insanity.” (e) 

The defence in this case should suggest to the medical expert the reflection, 
that however palpable the fact of criminal agency may, in a case of infanticide, 
appear to him, and however complete may be the proof of the child having 
both lived and breathed, he can never be exempt from the mortification of 
hearing objections urged, entirely foreign to the case, and a defence set up 
which has merely an imaginary basis. 

§ 405. (8.) General Considerations.—The reader will not fail to perceive, 
that in the considerations upon infanticide now presented, the author has not 
taken up all the objections which are usually urged against the various points 
in the medical evidence; to have done so, would not merely have unduly 
lengthened the chapter, but have presented the subject under an aspect of 
obscurity and difficulty which it really does not in itself possess. It has 
appeared to him that the simplest and most perspienous mode of presenting 
the subject, was one in which it should be entirely divested of the trivial and 


(c) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1846, quoted from various sources. 
(d) R. v. South, Norf. Aut. Circ. 1834. 
(e) Ed. Monthly Journ. Sept. 1852. 


O84 


BOOK I1.] CONCLUSION. [$ 405 


irrelevant objections which are often thrown around it, and which are by no 
means essential for a correct understanding of it. 

The discussion of this subject may be appropriately concluded by some 
general considerations. In every case of suspected infanticide the following 
questions, says Boécker, arise:— 

. Did the death occur in a natural manner ? 

. Could it have been prevented by proper precautions ? 

. Is the mother guilty of not having employed them ? 

. Was it caused by violence on the part of the mother? 

. If traces of violence exist upon the child, did the mother inflict them ? 

It must be admitted, however, that medical testimony alone is not compe- 
tent in all cases to solve these questions, which can only be answered by a 
careful comparison of all the circumstances of each case. 

It is a fundamental principle laid down by Henke that death by violence is 
by no means to be inferred from the fact that the child was born alive. Even 
where marks of death by violence exist, it does not follow that the child was 
murdered, In the former case it may have perished in consequence of some 
disease incompatible with its life, or have been suffocated by the caul upon its 
face, or by its lying in a pool of blood and water, or in a mass of feces, or 
under a limb of the mother while in a state of exhaustion or unconsciousness; 
or, in consequence of there being no help at hand, or of the unwillingness of 
the mother to betray her condition, the child may be suffocated, or may 
perish from exposure to cold, &c. While, says Casper, we refuse to be imposed 
upon by the ‘‘impudent lies’? which women do not hesitate to tell to conceal 
their guilt, we should not forget that the dangers to new-born children 
are very numerous, and that, without any criminal intent upon the mother’s 
part, the child may perish from any of the causes just mentioned, from an 
injury to the head, from constriction of the navel-cord or hemorrhage following 
its rupture, from falling into the privy or a close stool, &c. Even apparent 
marks of violence must be cautiously interpreted. Prints of finger-nails 
upon the head and face of the child may have been made by the efforts of the 
mother to extract the child after the birth of its head, and even a dislocation 
of the neck, under the circumstances, must be regarded as within the limits of 
possibility. But if the marks referred to should be accompanied by others 
which can only be explained by intentional violence, then the former must 
be more seriously interpreted. Yet it must not be forgotten that many marks 
of accidental injury are with difficulty to be distinguished from such as are 
feloniously inflicted. Care should also be taken not to confound these with 
marks which may have been made after death in recovering the body from 
cesspools, privies, and similar places, or which are merely signs of the voracity 
of fishes, hogs, rats, &c. In fine, the duty of the medical jurist, called upon 
to investigate cases like those under consideration, should be to preserve the 
strictest impartiality, to avoid being biassed by his sympathy with the misfor- 
tunes of the accused, upon the one hand, or, on the other, by his abhorrence of 
her imputed crime, and to endeavor to give its just weight, and no more, to 
every circumstance which the investigation brings to light. — 

29 389 


= 


or em Co bo 


1st. 


2d. 


Ist. 
2d. 
3d. 
Ath. 


5th. 
6th. 
7th. 


BOOK IIl. 


QUESTIONS ARISING OUT OF THE 
DIFFERENCE OF SEX. 


ANALY TIGA TABLE: 


CHAPTER I. 
DOUBTFUL SEX: 


. MALE HERMAPHRODITES, § 408. 

. FEMALE HERMAPHRODITES, § 409. 

. REAL HERMAPHRODITES, § 410. 

. ABSENCE OF SEXUAL ORGANS, § 412. 


CHAPTER II. 
SEXUAL DISABILITY. 


STERILITY, § 415. 
(1.) Removable causes of sterility, § 415. 
(2.) Incurable causes of sterility, § 416. 
Imporence, § 419. 
(1.) Congenital absence of the testes, § 419. 
(2.) Castration, § 420. 
(3.) Diseases of the testes, § 421. 
(4.) Defect in size and malformation of the penis, § 422. 
(5.) Obstruction from large hydroceles or herniz, § 423. 
(6.) Local relaxation, § 423. 
(7.) Causes of a psychical character, § 424. 
(8.) Want of age, § 424. 


CO AP Prive I 
RAPE. 


RAPE UPON CHILDREN, § 427. 
RAPE UPON ADULT FEMALES, § 438. 
RAPE UPON PERSONS UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF ETHER OR CHLOROFORM, § 4435. 
PHYSICAL EVIDENCE OF RAPE, § 445. 
(1.) Condition of the hymen, § 446. 
(a.) It is not always destroyed by the first connection, § 447. 
(b.) It may be lost from other causes than coition, § 448. 
(2.) Seminal stains, § 450. 
(a.) Microscopical examination of semen, § 451. 


(d.) Chemical relations of semen, § 453. 
FEIGNED RAPE, § 454. . 


RAPE BY FEMALES, § 455. 
PapERAsty—Sopomy, § 456. 


386 


BOOK III. ] DOUBTFUL SEX. [$ 407 


8th. LEGAL RELATIONS OF RAPE, § 457. 
(1.) Submission of prosecutrix, § 457. 
(a.) From artificial stupefaction, § 458. 
(0.) From ignorance of the nature of the act, § 460. 
(c.) From mistake of person, § 464. 
(d.) From fear, § 465. 
(2.) Prior want of character of prosecutrix, § 466. 
(3.) Subsequent suppression of fact by prosecutrix, § 468. 
(4.) Extent to which coition was carried, § 469. 
(5.) Want of age of defendant, § 472. 
(6.) Want of sexual capacity of defendant, § 472. 


CHAPTER I. 
DOUBTFUL SEX. 


§ 406. The word hermaphroditism, which at one time was used to describe 
the union of the organs of both sexes in one individual, is now generally 
applied to all those cases in which doubts exist concerning the real sex, in 
consequence of some aberration from the normal type of the genital organs. 
The word can no longer be used in its original acceptation, for most certainly 
there is no authentic case of self-impregnation recorded, nor even of the asso- 
‘ciation of the generative functions of both sexes in one person. The cause of ~ 
these deviations from the usual form may be found in the earlier stages of 
embryonic development; but an exposition of the present state of medical 
knowledge relative to the processes of faulty evolution would here be out of 
place. : 

§ 407. The practical question which we have to determine is, how far is it 
possible to discriminate the true sex of a living person? The solution of it 
is attended with no little difficulty, and in some cases is indeed impossible. 
The physician will be chiefly embarrassed in the case of children, since the 
important indications derivable from the general as well as local sexual deve- 
lopment will be wanting. It should not be forgotten that even after death a 
positive opinion is, in some cases of hermaphroditism, hardly warranted by 
the most careful anatomical inspection. The male and female sexual organs, 
imperfect in development although distinctive in character, may be so evenly 
distributed that it will not be possible:to know which predominate. Or, on 
the other hand, the traces of sexual organs may be so indistinct, that we can . 
give them no appropriate sexual name. Hence the reader will perceive how 
much more excusable is reserve in pronouncing an opinion upon the sex of a 
living person, the essential generative organs being concealed from our ob- 
servation. We can only hope to approximate to the truth, by observing 
whether there is not some regularity in the freaks of nature, and thus discover, 
if possible, some uniform correspondence between the visible deviations and 
those which are hidden from our view. With this object, the cases of herma- 
phroditism may be divided into the apparent and real, besides which there is 
a certain number in which literally no sexual organs exist. In the cases of 
apparent or false hermaphroditism, either the male or female character pre- 
dominates, but the former by much the more frequently. 

387 


§ 409] FALSE HERMAPHRODITISM—MALE. [BOOK III. 


§ 408. Ist. Male Hermaphrodites.—In these the only anomaly is external, 
the internal organs having their natural conformation and development. The 
penis exists, more or less developed, with an urethra either normal or opening 
at variable distances between the glans and the pubis—a condition which is 
called hypospadias. The scrotum is divided or cleft, and thus presents a re- 
semblance to the vulva, but neither nymphe or vagina are found, although 
not unfrequently there is a shallow depression or cul de sac between these false 
labia, which is lined with a delicate skin and bears no very distant resem- 
blance to the vaginal entrance. ‘The testes are found on each side of the 
divided scrotum. The history of a supposed female named Marie Rosine 
Gottliche is related, who had been in the practice of cohabitation with the 
male sex. Her genital organs were formed in the manner here described.(@) 
Nigele gives a case of twins who were considered as female until their seven- 
teenth year. At this time it was discovered that they were male, the penis 
being imperforate, and the divided scrotum resembling a vulva, but containing 
a, testis on each side.(b) The case of Adelaide Préville, who lived in the mar- 
ried state for a long time and on good terms with her husband, is related in 
full by St. Hilaire, with a number of other cases which will also fall under 
_the above general description.(c¢) Persons with these malformations are not 
necessarily impotent, except where the urethra opens at or near the base of 
the penis. In consequence of the position of this orifice, the semen cannot 
be ejaculated into the vagina, but escapes along the sides of the cleft in the 
scrotum. Impregnation may, however, take place, if the urethra opens far 
enough forward to allow of the inclusion of its orifice within the vagina, and 
instances of impregnation by persons affected with a considerable degree of 
hypospadias are upon record. Sometimes the only deficiency observable in 
this class, is the absence of the testes from their usual location. This condi- 
tion is liable to be mistaken for another, but far more important deviation 
from the natural type in the internal organs of generation (mentioned further 
on), since in both, the scrotum is empty. But, in this case, the testes are not 
really deficient but have remained in the abdomen, instead of descending as is 
usual in the ninth month of feetal existence. In the case of persons in this 
condition, the power of procreation is unaffected, provided the testes are heal- 
thy. (Vid. Imporence.) This anatomical defect is very rare. Siebold states 
that of 37,000 recruits in Wiirtemberg, only twenty-four were found in whom 
the testes had not descended .(d) 

§ 409. 2d. Female Hermaphrodites.—By far the greater mumber of these, 
owe the doubts concerning their sex to an unusual size of the clitoris. Com- 
monly associated with this circumstance, are an unfeminine appearance, more 
or less beard, and a rough and masculine voice and manner; although the sexual 
desires of these persons are violent, they are usually barren. The usual length 
of the clitoris in the adult female is about half an inch, but Remer mentions 
having seen a clitoris an inch long in a girl seven years of age, and Home,(e) 
one of two inches long and as thick as the thumb, in a negress twenty-four 


(a) Casper’s Wochensehrift, 1833, No. 3. (6) Siebold’s Handbuch, p. 95. 
(c) Hist. des Anomalies, t. ii. p. 53. (d) Handbuch, p. 82. 
(e) Philos. Trans., 1799, p. 163. 

388 


bs 


BOOK III.] FALSE HERMAPHRODITISM—FEMALE. [$ 409 


years old. In addition to this hypertrophied condition of the clitoris, an imper- 

fect urethra with one or more openings is often found, and, at the same time, a 

constriction of the vagina to such a degree that it becomes almost imperfo- 
rate. Such was the anatomical condition in Marie Lefort; she had menstru- 
ated regularly from the age of eight years until her death at thirty; the ex- 
istence of a uterus was clearly established. Her voice was masculine, and she 
had a thick and strong beard.(f) Sir Astley Cooper examined the body of 
a charwoman, aged eighty-six years, who presented these deviations. He says, 

she differed from other women in the magnitude and length of the clitoris, in 
the absence of the external orifice of the vagina, which began in the urethra 
itself, and in the imperfect development of the ovaries.(g) A woman twenty- 
five years of age, on account of her notorious commerce with both sexes, was 
placed under strict police supervision. Resorting to masturbation, her health 
became so much impaired that she died in the course of sixteen months. The 
external genitals were found to have their natural conformation, with the ex- 
ception of the clitoris, which was three and a half inches long and three inches 
in circumference, and imperforate, except at the base. The uterus and one 
ovary were rudimentary, and the general conformation of the breasts was mas- 
culine, although, owing to the occurrence of a trifling periodical discharge, 

she was considered to be a woman. It was proved that this person had been 
guilty of the most astonishing and unnatural excesses with young people of: 
both sexes.(h) A child described by Mr. E. Smith, may be placed in the same 
class, as all the female organs were complete; the only anomaly being that 
the urethra opened in two places, and the clitoris bore some resemblance to 
the penis.(¢)~ In a black female subject, dissected by Dr. Jno. Neill, the cli- 
toris was five inches long and one inch in diameter, and resembled a penis, ex- 
cept that it was not traversed by a perfect urethra. The perineal opening was 
not larger in diameter than a catheter of average size, and the vagina was 
extremely narrow. On one side of the penis existed what appeared to be a 
scrotum, but which contained an irreducible omental hernia. This gave the 
feel of a testicle, but no true glandular structure or excretory tube could be 
detected. The internal organs were completely female, although not com- 
pletely developed. The general habitus was feminine.(j) A very similar 
case is reported by Dr. F. L. Parker.(z) The subject of it was of the negro 

race, was regarded as. a man, bred as a cooper, and had been married as 

aman. The genital organs were exclusively those of a female, except the 
clitoris which measured, after death, an inch and three-quarters externally, and 

in its entire length five inches. <A perfectly analogous example in which the 

clitoris was from two to three inches in length, is reported by Dr. J. Mason 

Warren. The subject was of Irish birth, bore a man’s name, and had a mas- 


(f) St. Hilaire Hist. des Anomalies, t. ii. p. 74. 

(g) History of a supposed Hermaphrodite, by Robt. Merry, Surgeon. Guy’s Hosp. 
Rep., Oct. 1840. 

(h) Henke’s Zeitschrift, Bd. 44, S. 183, by Albert, of Euerdorf. 

(7) Lond. Med Gaz, vol. xxxili. 

(j) Quarterly Summary of Trans. Coll. Phys. Philad., N. 8., vol. i. No. 3. 

(k) Charleston Med. Jour. Jan. 1859, p. 57. 


389 


» 


§ 410] ; REAL iter nora [BOOK III. 


culine appearance.(@) Dr. Bainbridge has reported the case of a female 
whose clitoris was five inches in length and of the diameter of the quiescent 
penis of an adult. This malformation was discovered while the woman was 
in labor.(6) Mr. Wells has described the case of the person in whom the gene- 
ral external organs were those of a hypospadic male; but there were no testes, 
and a small uterus and one ovary existed.(c) The case related by Dr. 
Mayer, of Bonn, which gave rise to much discussion, and which is usually 
classed among the cases of mixed sex, may with more reason, we think, be 
placed under this head. The only male organs were a (so called) penis, which 
was only two inches long, imperforate and partly concealed under the mons 
veneris. On the other hand, the orifice of the urethra was situated as in the 
female, there was a large vagina, a uterus with its appendages, and a defective 
ovarium on one side, and (what is called) a withered testis on the other. We 
cannot avoid holding some doubts concerning this last mentioned organ. 
From the absence of any account of the seminal tubes, deferent vessels, or 
seminal vesicles and the evidently rudimentary nature of this body, it might 
as properly have been termed an ovary. This supposition would, moreover, 
have been favored by its position. However this may be, it is evident that 
the female character greatly predominated. When twenty years of age, this 
person menstruated on three different occasions. A certain number of cases 
are recorded in which a prolapsed uterus, or an extroverted bladder has grossly 
imitated the male organ, but these cases are so easy of detection, and have so 
little claim to be classified with permanent anomalies of evolution in the sexual 
organs, that it is not necessary to dwell upon them. (d) | 

§ 410. 3d. Real Hermaphrodites.—Not a few authors have doubted the 
existence of persons entitled to this designation, but there can, at the present 
day, be no- question of the fact. It is, of course, not meant that the union 
of the functions of both sexes in one individual ever occurs, but merely that 
the essential generative organs of both may coexist.(dd) It will be seen from 
the following cases that this abnormal condition is found in different de- 
grees.(e) The first we will mention is the case observed by Petit, and com- 
municated to the French Academy in 1820. The subject was a soldier who 
died of a wound at the age of twenty-two years. The penis was normal, the 
scrotum empty, the testes small and soft, occupying the position of the ovaries, 
but provided with epididymis and vasa deferentia. The seminal vesicles and 
prostate gland likewise were present. The uterus opened into the urethra at 
the neck of the bladder ; the vagina was absent. It is stated that the Fallopian 
tubes were found, but they were probably in an imperfect condition. 


(a) Am. Jour. of Med. Sci., Jan. 1860, p. 123. 

(6) Lond. Times and Gaz., Jan. 1860, p. 45. 

(c) Ibid., Feb. 1860, p. 177. 

(d) For cases exemplifying these deceptions, vid. Saviard (Rec. d’Obs. Chirurg. p. 
150). Home (Philos. Trans. for 1799). (Hd. Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. i. p. 54.) 
St. Hilaire (Hist. des Anomal. t. i. pp. 272-277.) 

(dd) There is, however, no case recorded in which two testicles, and two ovaries, 
the essential indices of sexuality, existed in the same persons. 

(e) A very remarkable case occurring in the 17th century is recorded by Dr. 
Thomas Allen (Philos. Trans. Abr. i. 24), and another, scarcely less so, is that of 
Hubert, who died 1767 (Dict. de Méd. xxi. 104). 


390 


‘ iw ad 
BOOK III.] Wau HERMAPHRODITES. [$ 410 


A more recent case, described by two of the most eminent pathologists of Ger- 
many, Kiwisch and Kolliker, is of great interest. The individual died at the 
age of 33 years. The external genitals were, a perfectly normal penis, with 
a rugose but empty scrotum. ‘The uterus was perfect, somewhat longer than 
usual, but in its ordinary position. The vagina was rudimentary, and opened 
into the prostatic portion of the urethra. The Fallopian tubes were 32 inches 
long, with imperfectly developed fimbrie. The round ligaments had their 
usual position and attachments. In place of the ovaries were found testes, 
provided each with an epididymis and a deferent duct which led to the inguinal 
ring, and turning to the uterus, followed its sides and finally opened into the 
prostate gland. This latter body was of normal size; on each side of it were 
vesiculee seminales.(2) MM. Bouillaud and Manec have reported a case in 
which the person attained the age of sixty-two years, and had lived and 
been married as a man. The general appearance was feminine, with the 
exception of the beard. The external organs consisted only of a penis with 
the orifice of the urethra at the base of the gland. A loose fold of skin 
occupied the place of the scrotum. The internal organs were, however, com- 
pletely feminine, with the exception of the prostate gland, which occupied its 
usual position. The vagina opened into the membranous portion of the 
urethra. It is not stated whether the menstrual function was performed. (m) 
A curious and well described case is that of Ackermann.(n) An imperforate 
penis, a vulva containing a normal testis on each side, a common vagino- 
urethral canal, and vasa deferentia opening on either side of the os uteri, but 
entering the walls of the uterus at the points whence usually spring the Fallo- 
pian tubes. Perhaps the most remarkable case of double sex is that examined 
by Dr. Horace A. Ackley, Professor of Surgery in the Cleveland Med. Col- 
lege, and reported by Dr. George Blackman.(0) The person from whom the 
parts were removed was about twenty-six years of age, and had been employed 


(/) Kiwisch (Klinische Vortraege Abth. II. Prag. 1849). This thoroughly authen- 
ticated fact of the coexistence of the prostate and uterus in one individual, is a serious 
blow to the cultivators of transcendental anatomy, who have maintained its impossi- 
bility. Weber, Leuckardt, and many other authors consider the prostate gland to be 
a rudimentary uterus, or rather the analogue of this organ in the female. Another 
example of the coexistence of these two organs, in a person 60 years of age, is fur- 
nished by Lauger. The uterus was attached to the upper part of the prostate gland, 
and there were two testicles (Archives Gén. de Méd., 5eme sér. viii. 720). An 
equally marked case (Hemaphroditismus lateralis) of the coexistence of an ovary and a 
testicle in a new-born child is recorded by Meyer, of Zurich (Virchow’s Archiv. xi. 420). 

(m) Journ. univ. et hebdom. de Méd. t. x. p. 467. 

(n) Infantis Androgyni historia et iconographia. Jena, 1805. 

(0) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., July, 1853, p. 63. Another singular case exemplifying 
the condition called lateral hermaphroditism, has been reported by Dr. Banon. The 
penis was of the usual size in the adult, and imperforate, although subject to erections. 
Beneath were the external female parts nearly perfect ; the orifice of the urethra was 
placed as in the female, the vagina was rudimentary, but was provided with a hymen, 
the prostate was absent; the uterus was small, but well formed. There was one testis 
and one ovary, the vas deferens opened into the uterus. This individual had never 
menstruated, preferred manly exercises, and in conformation presented a curious inter- 
mingling of the characteristics of both sexes. Am. Journ. Med. Sci., July, 1852, from 
Dublin Med. Press; or fuller, Dublin Quart. Journ., Aug. 1852, p. 66. The somewhat 
similar case of Angelique Courtois, Follin. Gas. des Hép., Dec. 1851, is more particu- 
larly interesting, from the fact that the single, well formed, and undoubted testis had 
no excretory duct, but lay under a pervious and fimbriated Fallopian tube. There 
Were no ovaries, seminal vesicles, or prostate. 


391 


§ 411] REAL HERMAPHRODITES, [BOOK II. 


asa servant. ‘The history of this individual, as furnished by Prof. Ackley, 
is briefly as follows: Stature large; external conformation, with the exception 
of the hips, male; beard moderate; habits solitary, and had a dislike to 
women; menstruation, per penis, monthly; this was always attended with 
much suffering, and during one of these menstrual periods he died from cerebral 
congestion. After death, the body found its way to the Cleveland Medical 
College.’’ Upon dissection the disposition of the sexual organs was the fol- 
lowing: ‘“ The penis was large, the scrotum empty, a perfect uterus with per- 
vious Fallopian tubes and ovaries, testes on each side above the ovaries and 
excretory ducts leading from them, a vagina opening into the neck of the 
bladder and a prostate gland.’’? ‘The inner surface of the vagina was reddened, 
and its cavity contained what was supposed to be menstrual blood.(p) This 
statement was afterwards supported by an examination of the parts made by 
Dr. W. L. Burnett, of Boston. 

§ 411. The necessity, however, of the most minute and conscientious exami- 
nation of such remarkable cases as this has since become apparent, for we find 
that the internal sexual organs were not so distinctive as represented. Dr. J. 
B. 8S. Jackson, of Boston, in addressing the Society for Medical Improvement 
on this subject, stated that he had been permitted by Prof. Ackley to examine 
the specimen. He found no trace of the os tince, but the uterus passed insen- 
sibly into the vagina. This last was extremely small, measuring in the smallest 
part, on the inner surface, not more than four or five lines in circumference. 
Dr. J. found some thickening of the tissues about where the ovaries should be, 
but it was ill-defined and slight; ‘‘and it would not have been thought of, 
except in connection with the present question.”? Upon one side an incision 
was made into this questionable part; but nothing like a Graafian vesicle was 
seen, nothing but a loose cellular, or fibro-cellular, tissue. The size and struc- 
ture of the testicles, so far as examined, were quite normal, and, it is said, that 
there was an epididymis, although the existence of a vas deferens was not 


(p) Other cases of menstruation through the penis, or from an orifice at its base 
when imperforate, are on record. One is reported by Dr. Harris, of Virginia, and 
another by Dr. Barry of Connecticut, in which it was necessary to determine the sex 
on account of a denial of the person’s right to vote (Am. Journ. Med. Sci. 1847, July). 
Prof. Simpson, of Edinburgh, states, that he has been informed, on credible authority, 
of two instances where, in males,(?) the menstrual discharge was perfectly regular in 
its occurrence and considerable in quantity. One of these persons was seventeen 
years of age, the other had been married for several years, and his wife had no chil- 
dren. (Art. Hermaphroditism, Cyc. of Anat. and Physiol.) Dr. Blackman saw in 
the Northern Hospital at Liverpool, a sailor from the American merchantman Rappa- 
hannock. He says: ‘This person was about thirty years of age, and with the excep- 
tion of the breasts, which were large, had the general appearance of a male. The 
penis, however, was short, and the scrotum somewhat cleft, so as to resemble in some 
respects the external labia of the female. At the time of my examination menstrual 
blood was passing through the penis, and we believe this was a regular monthly 
occurrence. (Am. Journ. Med. Sci., July, 1853.) A case apparently similar in ana- 
tomical conditions to that of Suydam, above referred to, is reported by Dr. Coste, of 
Marseilles. His patient was 21 years of age, the penis was of the size of a boy’s of 
12. or 14 years, it was imperforate and the urethra opened at its base. The menses 
flowed from this orifice at regular periods. There was no external orifice of the vagina, 
the perineum was covered with hair, the labia majora were rudimentary, and on the 
right side there was a body like a testicle. The habitus was feminine, and there was 
no beard. An operation was performed to make an artificial vagina, and eight months 
afterwards she was married.—Med. Zeitschrift fiir Geburtzkunde von Busch, §-c., 1836. 
Bd. 4, H. 2, p. 267. 


392 


BOOK III. ] ABSENCE OF SEXUAL ORGANS, ETC. [$ 414 


clearly ascertained, The vesicule seminales were not found, and the prostate 
gland, Dr. Jackson says, had not been demonstrated.(q) 

§ 412. 4th. Absence of sexual organs.—Siebold states that he has in his 
museum a child with no external genitals. Notwithstanding this, two testicles 
were found in the abdomen. This case is related in full in Faber’s ‘‘ Duorwm 
monstrorum humanorum descriptio anatomica.”’ He also refers to another 
case of a child, three years old, in whom no internal generative organs were 
found, and externally only an urethral orifice.(7) 

§ 413. The foregoing enumeration of anomalous conditions of the sexual 
organs will suffice, we think, to convince the reader, upon careful examination, 
that the determination of sex in a living person presenting any of those which 
are external, is attended with much difficulty, in consequence of the absence of 
a uniform correspondence between the outward and inward defects. It will 
also be seen from some of the cases, that reliance cannot be placed upon the 
general conformation of the individual nor upon the tastes and habits, since 
experience shows that the indications derived from them are often fallacious. 
Practically, therefore, the question must often remain unresolved, or be deter- 
mined solely by the sexual predominance in the external organs alone. It 
may be observed, however, that the rarity of real duplicity of sex, or of the 
complete absence of the sexual organs, compared with the ordinary cases of 
presumed hermaphroditism, from the penis being imperforate, the testes not 
descended or the clitoris excessively developed, is so extreme, that the question 
will, in its legal relations, seldom require elucidation. 

§ 414. In conclusion, we cannot forbear referring to an instance(s) in 
which an operation was performed with the object of depriving a child “of 
that portion of the genital apparatus which, if permitted to remain until the 
age of puberty, would be sure to be followed by sexual desire, and which 
might thus conduce to the establishment of a matrimonial connection.” The 
child was three years old, had been considered a girl until the age of two 
years, when she began to evince the tastes, disposition, and feelings of the 
other sex; she rejected dolls and similar articles of amusement, and became 
fond of boyish sports. ‘There was neither a penis nor a vagina; but, instead 
of the former, there was a small clitoris, and instead of the latter, a superficial 
depression, or cul de sac, covered with mucous membrane, and devoid of every- 
thing like an aperture or inlet. The urethra occupied the usual situation(¢) 


(q) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., Oct. 1853. For other cases vid. Beck’s Med. Jurispru- 
dence, and St. Hilaire’s Histoire des Anomalies, t. ii. p. 99. 

(rv) For similar cases sid. Str6m in Svenska Lakaré-Saellskapets Handlingar, Bd. i. 
H. 1. Also in Am. Journ. Med. Sci. vol. ii. Also in Henke’s Zeitschrift, Bd. 44, § 185. 
A still-born seven-months’ child had no external genitals. A very singular example 
of this malformation is published by Goschler (Prager Vierteljahrs, 1859, iii. 89). It 
was presented by a man twenty-seven years old. There was no penis, but the mons 
veneris and scrotum were perfect, and behind the latter and just in advance of the 
anus, was a small opening which gave exit to the urine, and to sperm also when an 
erectile fleshy excrescence upon its edge became excited by friction. 

(s) Case of Hermaphroditism, Involving the Operation of Castration, and Illustrating 
a New Principle in Judicial Medicine. By S. D. Gross, M. D., Professor of Surgery in 
the Medical Department of the University of Louisville. 

(t) Whether this was the usual situation in the male or female does not appear; it 
was probably the latter. 

393 


§ 415] CAUSES OF STERILITY. [BOOK III. 


and appeared to be entirely natural ; the nymph were remarkably diminutive; 
but the labia were well developed, and contained each a well formed testis, 
quite as large and consistent as this organ generally is at the same age in 
boys.”? After mature consideration an operation was resolved upon and the 
testes removed. They, as well as the spermatic cords, are described as being 
perfectly formed in every respect. Three years after the operation the dis- 
position and habits of the child had undergone a material change, and she took 
delight in all feminine occupations. The author proposes this example as a 
precedent in similar cases. We sincerely hope that it may not be followed. 
The operation removes merely the external, and in cases like this the very 
distinct evidence of sex, and hence only adds to the doubts of the rightful 
sexual character. It does not necessarily extinguish the sexual instinct, nor 
deprive the person of ‘his only incentive to matrimony,” and, finally, in no 
way relieves him from the odium or aversion with which the malevolent or 
ignorant may regard him. 


CHAPTER II. 
SHAUGAY DISABIEITY: 


§ 415. Ist. Sterility.—The causes of sterility are numerous. Many of 
them are known and some of them are curable; but there are also many alto- 
gether beyond the power of medical science to discover or remedy. Among 
the removable causes of sterility may be first mentioned an ¢mperforate hymen. 
This membrane is sometimes quite thick, dense, and fibrous in its structure, 
opposing a complete obstacle to the passage of the catamenia, and rendering 
impregnation impossible.(w) It.is remedied by incision and gradual dilatation. 
If the hymen be not, however, completely imperforate, impregnation may occur. 
Of this fact examples are recorded by Baudelocque, Nysten and others. A 
more recent case is furnished by Dr. Howard Smith.(v) The vagina may be, 
congenitally, extremely narrow, or have become occluded from inflammation 
and its consequences. The mouth of the womb is also subject to the same 
accident, and this, in connection with a narrowing of the upper portion of the 
vagina, is supposed to be a frequent cause of sterility. In all these cases, 
however, a cure is possible. 

Menstrual irregularity, displacements of the uterus, with extreme irritability 
of this organ, prolapsus, intra-uterine tumors, such as polypi, are frequent 
causes of sterility, but are, also, generally under the control of the physician. 
Some authors have stated that uterine cancer is a certain cause of sterility ; 
this opinion is, however, not sustained by facts, numerous instances being re- 
corded of impregnation in this disease. Dr. Lever mentions several cases. 


Siebold says that he has, in his pathological collection, a cancerous uterus 
containing a seven months’ child. 


(u) For cases, see Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. xxi. 552. 
(v) New Orleans Med. News, June, 1858. 


394 


BOOK III.] MALFORMATION. [$ 416 


§ 416. Of the absolute and incurable causes of sterility, those depending 
upon malformation are the only ones of practical importance. An imperfect 
development of the sexual organs has been frequently described. The follow- 
ing are some of the more striking cases :— 

Dr. Meigs relates a case of entire absence of the vagina, the external sexual 
organs being perfectly natural. An incision was made, by Dr. Randolph, 
three inches and a half in depth, but he could find no vagina.(w) Dr. Oldham 
reports the case of a servant girl, whose health had been delicate for some 
time. ‘‘She had not menstruated, suffered periodical pains in the pelvis, or 
any vicarious bleeding. She had a dull, inanimate, and rather timid look, 
with the voice and articulation of a delicate female. Her mind was apathetic, 
and she was sexually indifferent. The chest was flat, and the mammary glands 
scarcely developed. The pelvis was well formed. The mons veneris, external 
labia, nymphee and clitoris were normally developed, and the first covered 
abundantly with hair. The situation of the orifice of the vagina was occupied 
by a raised raphe of mucous membrane, but there was no aperture.” A ca- 
theter being introduced into the bladder, and the finger into the rectum, no 
solid intervening structure and no trace of uterus could be discovered.(v.) In 
the case of a married woman, who died at the age of seventy, the internal 
organs were but slightly developed, and a shallow depression represented the 
vagina. On inspection from within the pelvis, this organ was found to be 
totally wanting. Rudimentary ovaries existed in the abdomen, and rudiment- 
ary separate halves of the uterus were found in the pelvis.(y) Two other 
examples, in all probability, of the same malformation are reported, the one 
by Dr. J. M. Warren,(z) and the other by Dr. C. Coates.(a) Troschel 
relates the case of two sisters in whom the uterus was wanting.(b) Siebold 
examined a woman, twenty years of age, in whom the vagina was like that of 
a new-born child; no uterus could be discovered by an examination per 
rectum.(¢) Dr. Riittel had under his care a woman twenty-seven years old, 
of small stature. The external genitals were like those of a child of nine or 
ten years of age; the vagina was smooth, very narrow, and hardly two inches 
long; the mouth of the uterus hardly perceptible, and the uterus itself of the 
size and shape of an olive. The breasts were undeveloped.(d) A curious 
case is quoted by Siebold, in which, although there were no external sexual 
organs whatever, nevertheless the woman became pregnant. The impregna- 


(w) Velpeau’s Midwifery, p. 114. (x) Guy’s Hosp. Rep. vol. vi. p. 362. 

(y) Edinb. Month. Journ., N. §., vii. 230. 

(z) Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ., May, 1857, p. 297. 

(a) Times and Gaz., July, 1858, p. 6. 

(6) Rust’s Magazin, Bd. 37, 8. 163; Gaz. Méd., 1851, p. 9, by Dr. Zeihl, of Nurem- 
berg. Total absence of uterus in a woman fifty-seven years of age, observed after 
death. Dr. Meigs relates two cases of total absence of uterus, but with otherwise 
perfect sexual development, in his own practice.—Treat. on Obstet. p. 131. Dr. G. 
S. Crawford gives another case of absence of uterus.—N. W. Med. and Surg. Journ., 
Nov. 1850. Dr. Cummings found the uterus half an inch long, and the ovaries mere 
lines, in a woman who had never menstruated.—Ed. Month. Journ., Sept. 1854, p. 
275. Dr. Chew, of Baltimore, observed a case in which the uterus was absent. The 
woman was twenty-two years of age, and had never menstruated.—Am. Journ. Med. 
Sci. 1840, p. 39. 

(c) Handbuch, p. 91. (d) Henke’s Zeitsch. Bd. 47, S. 250, 

399 


§ 417] PRECOCIOUS DEVELOPMENT. [BOOK III. 


tion was effected through the rectum, in which a small orifice communicated 
with the vagina. At the approach of labor, this opening was widened by the 
knife, and the woman was delivered of a child which lived six hours.(e) Mr. 
Hunt related to the Medical Society of London, the case of a lady, aged thirty, 
of refined mind and feminine development, who consulted him for stricture of 
the rectum. The meatus urinarius was more capacious than usual, and there 
was no vaginal aperture, the perineum being continued from the anus to the 
meatus. No trace of the fundus uteri or of ovaries could be felt by the rectum. 
The clitoris and labia were normal, the mamme well developed, and sexual 
feeling was admitted to exist, probably in its normal degree. She had never 
menstruated, nor had there been any vicarious discharge or periodical incon- 
venience. Dr. Murphy mentioned a case in which the vagina terminated in a 
cul de sac, and there was no sign of an uterus. The woman was handsome 
and well formed.(/) A most curious, and we believe unique case is that re- 
corded by Morgagni (67eme lettre, § 7), of a woman whose vagina opened in 
the abdomen above the umbilicus, and who became pregnant, and was delivered 
of a living child by a cutting operation from which she recovered. 

Finally, there are some causes of sterility which are relative in their nature. 
Such a disproportion between the genital organs of the two sexes as to render 
intercourse extremely painful to the female, may be taken as an example. 
Other causes, of a psychical nature, are sometimes as operative as the physical 
impediments before spoken of. For the most part they are exceedingly in- 
tangible in their nature. In the causes celébres an amusing instance of want 
of sexual harmony is given by Pitaval. Two gentlemen of rank, very much 
of the same age and personal appearance, were both married to wives who 
proved unfruitful after several years of marriage. The two couples at last 
determined to proceed to a celebrated watering place, in the hope of deriving 
some benefit from the change and the use of the springs. On the way, they 
put up at an inn and retired for the night. But the two wives had preceded 
their husbands to bed, and each of the latter mistook his friend’s room for his 
own. In consequence of the mistake, both of the ladies proved with child. 

§ 417. The functions of menstruation and reproduction are generally co- 
incident. Hence, as a general rule, a female is not susceptible of impregna- 
tion before the catamenia have appeared nor after they have ceased. Like all 
other physiological rules, these will be found to have exceptions. Many in- 
stances are on record in which women who had never menstruated have become 
mothers.(g) Cases of precocious menstruation are also numerous, and many 
of them well attested. 

Mr. Whitmore relates an interesting instance of precocious development in 
a female child. The catamenia appeared a few days after birth, and returned 
at regular intervals of three weeks and two or three days until her death, at 
the age of four years. The development at this age was equal to that usual 
at ten or eleven. The mammee were unusually large; the mons veneris was 


(e) Handbuch, p. 88. (f) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci., July, 1852, p. 275. 
(g) Vid. Whitehead on Abortion, &c., p. 223; also Capuron, Méd. Lég. des Accouche- 
mens, 96. 


396 


BOOK III.] PRECOCIOUS DEVELOPMENT. [$ 418 


covered with hair, and the development of the genitals was considerable. It 
is stated that she manifested at her monthly periods the reserve usual to wo- 
men at such times.(h) Dr. Charles Wilson, of Pennsylvania, met with a child 
five years old who had menstruated irregularly from the fifth month of her 
life. She was of the usual stature of children of her age, but very stout and 
fat. Her breasts were about the size of a well developed adult virgin’s, and 
the pudendum was thinly covered with black hair.(7) 

Velpeau quotes the case of a young girl, in the Havana, whose menses ap- 
peared at the age of 18 months, and continued regularly afterwards. The 
child, moreover, exhibited in her development all the characteristics of puberty. 
A. girl at New Orleans was born in 1837 with her breasts developed and the 
mons veneris covered with hair. Her catamenia appeared at the age of three 
years, and continued to return every month thereafter. A case is mentioned 
in the Lancet where menstruation commenced at the age of two years.(/) 
Another is reported where it began in the tenth year; the girl became preg- 
nant between the eleventh and twelfth, and bore a child.(%) A similar case is 
reported by Dr. J. B. Walker, in which menstruation commenced at the age 
of eleven and a half years, and the girl was delivered of a child when only 
twelve years and eight months of age.(/) Riittel refers to a case by Haller, 
where a girl of nine years of age became pregnant; and D’Outrepont met 
with others of pregnancy at the ages of nine and thirteen.(m) Another in- 
stance may be added in which menstruation commenced in the first year and 
pregnancy in the ninth. The girl was delivered of.a child weighing seven and 
three-quarter pounds. The case occurred in Kentucky, and is reported by Dr. 
Rowlett.(n) Mr. Smart has given an account of a girl who was born at 
Manchester, Eng., and began to menstruate at the age of three years and six 
months, and continued regularly to do so until the date of the observation, 
when she was four years and five months old. She had then the aspect of a 
woman of small stature, a full bust, prominent breasts and nipples, and hair 
an inch long upon the pubes.(o) 

§ 418. The usual period for the cessation of the menses and, consequently, 
the capacity for child-bearing, is from 45 to 50 years; but cases could easily 
be multiplied showing that occasionally they continue even to the age of 75 
years. Indeed, a case is quoted by Orfila in which they continued until the 
99th year. This woman menstruated first at the age of 20, bore her first child 
at 47, and her seventh and last at 60.(p) 

Many of the cases in which menstruation in old women is reported, are 
probably apocryphal—hemorrhage proceeding from some disorganized tissue 
being mistaken for it. Nevertheless, many of these instances of late menstru- 
ation and pregnancy are genuine. When the monthly periods continue to 
return after the ordinary time for their cessation, the female remains suscepti- 
ble of impregnation, but she will rarely be capable of conceiving after this 


(h) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., Oct. 1845, p. 430, from Ed. Month. Journ. of Med. 

(i) Philada. Med. Exam., Dec. 1853, p. 746. 

(j) Jan. 29, 1848. (k) Lond. Med. Gaz., Nov. 1849. 

(/) Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ., Sept. 9, 1846. (m) Henke’s Zeitsch. 1844. 

(n) Transylvania Journ. vol. vii. p. 447. 

(o) Times and Gaz., July, 1858, p. 98. (p) Méd. Lég. 4éme. ed. aus 
5) 


§ 419] IMPOTENCE. 7 [BOOK III. 


function has ceased. The only case we have met with is one quoted by Dr. 
Taylor, from the Lancet, in which a lady became pregnant between eight and 
nine months after the final cessation of the discharge. In this case, however, 
the lady was only 44, and consequently had not arrived at the usual season 
for its cessation. The discharge had, it is stated, been decreasing gradually 
for nearly two years before it entirely ceased. If this function continues, how- 
ever, the woman is liable to conceive. Dr. Riittel observed in twelve women 
that they bore their last children between the ages of 45 and 50. He refers 
to a case in Schmidt’s Jahrbuch in which a woman who was married at 19 
did not bear a child until she was 50 years old.(7) Ottinger and Cederschjéld 
met with cases of parturition and menstruation at the ages of 50 and 53; and 
Nevermann(&) found, out of 1000 cases, that 436 children were born by fe- 
males at the following ages: 101 at 41, 113 at 42, 70 at 43, 58 at 44, 48 at 
45, 12 at 46, 13 at 47, 8 at 48, 6 at 49, 9 at 50, 1 at 52, 1 at 53, and one at 
54 years. From these facts, it is evident that the ordinary limits of the func- 
tion of gestation are occasionally anticipated or transcended. Note must be 
taken of these rare exceptions in estimating the probabilities in any doubtful 
case. 

§ 419. 2d. Impotence.—By this word is here meant the want of procreative 
power in the male, whether arising from a faulty condition of the external or 
internal organs of generation, or from any moral or physical causes. The 
causes of impotence are extremely numerous, and often obscure. Some of 
them are remediable by art and time; others are permanent, and incurable. 
They may be conveniently examined by a division into those which depend 
upon the secreting portion of the generative apparatus, and those which 
depend upon some deviation of the copulative portion from its normal con- 
dition. 

(1.) Congenital absence of the testes.—The only satisfactory example of 
this defect, is a case related by Dr. Fisher, of Boston, in the twenty-third 
volume of the American Journal of Medical Sciences. The post-mortem 
examination was minute and careful. All of the accessary parts of the seminal 
apparatus were present, except the testes. The penis was undeveloped, and 
the individual, who was forty-five years of age, had never experienced any 
amorous desires. There were a few scanty hairs upon the pubes, but there 
was no beard; yet the constitution was vigorous, and the habits of the person 
active. It is seldom, however, that this deficiency can be safely asserted during 
life, for although the scrotum be empty, yet the testicles may have been retained 
in the abdomen. While in this situation, they may be rudimentary and defec- 
tive, or not; for experience has shown that some crypsorchides have been 
remarkable for their sexual powers. One of the most remarkable cases of 
premature sexual development coinciding with non-descent of the testes,-and 
reported by Dr. Lopez, of Mobile, in American Journal of Medical Sciences, 
- 1843, p. 500, is that of a mulatto boy, aged three years, ten months and fifteen 
days. His weight was eighty-two pounds; height, four feet and half an inch; 
width around chest, twenty-seven and a half inches; thigh, nineteen inches ; 


(j) Henke’s Zeitsch., 1844, p. 251. (k) Ibid. 
398 


BOOK III. ] INFLUENCE OF CASTRATION, [$ 420 


head, twenty-two inches; length of penis at rest, four; circumference, three 
and a half: testes not descended ; has whiskers, and hairy axilla; and lifts a 
man of one hundred and forty pounds. The habit of body, scantiness of beard, 
and feminine voice, are not always safe indications of the absence of the testes, or 
of their defective condition, should they have been retained within the abdomen 
or in the inguinal canal. Our opinion in these cases should be very guarded, 
since the organs upon whose condition it is required cannot be inspected. In 
some cases, one testis only has descended; but if it be not diseased, the indivi- 
dual will be quite capable of fulfilling his conjugal duties. The rarity, how- 
ever, of either of these conditions, may be judged from the fact, that in 10,800 
recruits, Dr. Marshall found only eleven in whom a single testis had descended, 
and one where both were retained in the abdomen. | 

§ 420. (2.) Castration.—lIf one testis only be lost, whether by accident, 
disease, or extirpation, the virile powers will not be impaired, unless the re- 
maining one be imperfect or diseased. But if the individual have lost both of 
these organs, he becomes, of course, incurably impotent. Yet it is a question 
of some medico-legal interest, whether impotence is an immediate result. <A 
man who was castrated by Sir Astley Cooper, stated that he retained the 
sensation of emission for twelve months, and the power of copulation, at rare 
intervals, for ten years, after the operation. Otto found the vesicule seminales 
still full of semen in a man who died nine months after he had castrated him- 
self.(7) Ricord mentions the case of a man who was castrated on account of 
disease of both testes; he was also affected with a tumor of the cerebellum. 
He had, nevertheless, erections, and the most violent sexual desires.(m) Krah- 
mer relates that a man who had excised both testicles with a razor, had an 
involuntary emission of semen on the eleventh night after the operation.(mm) 
Some of the older authors(n) assert the possibility of fruitful intercourse after 
the loss of the testes, giving instances in illustration of it. It is also asserted, 
upon the authority of Aristotle,(o) Varro,(p) Sanchez,(q) and others, that 
animals have been known to be capable of propagation soon after they have 
been castrated. That the fact is authentic as regards animals may be admitted, 
without giving assent to the possibility of a like transaction upon the part of 
man. It is conceivable that an animal might attempt sexual intercourse im- 
mediately after castration ; but the case has yet to arise in which the question 
of paternity would hang upon the decision as to the possibility of a man being 
capable of the same attempt. 

For how long a time, then, after castration, can the faculty of generation 
be retained? We believe that this question has yet to be answered. The 
cases cited above do not solve it. The erectile faculty of the penis is re- 
tained in eunuchs, if they have been castrated after the age of puberty, and 


(1) Handb. der Pathol. Anat. p. 344. 

(m) Bull. de 1’Acad. de Méd. 1851, p. 687. 

(mm) Handbuch d. ger. Med. 1851, 8S. 276. 

(n) Venette, Leipzig, 1698 ; Nic. Fontan, Obs. rar. Amstelod. 1641. 

(o) Historia Animal. lib. i. cap. 4; lib. ii. 13. 

(p) Re Rustica, lib. ii. cap. 5, “de quibusdam bovibus admirandum scriptum inyeni, 
exemtis testibus, si statim adnosseris concipere.” 

(qg) Sanchez, de Matrimonio, Lugdun. Batay. 1669. 6 

399 


§ 422] DISEASES OF THE TESTES. [BOOK III. 


is in itself alone, or when attended with sexual desire, not indicative of pro- 
creative power. Nor is the sensation of emission, or even the actual extrusion 
of a liquid having some of the sensible qualities of the semen, sufficient evi- 
dence of it. Unless a microscopic examination reveal the presence of sperma- 
tozoa, which alone are characteristic of the fruitful semen, there can be no 
certainty that the secretion is more than the liquor prostaticus, or a mucous 
discharge. The observation of Otto is, therefore, not complete. As for those 
instances in which pregnancy is said to have resulted from the cohabitation 
with their wives of husbands who had sustained the loss of which we are 
speaking, it is a matter of regret that the connection in them between cause 
and effect is not susceptible of demonstration. 

§ 421. (3.) Diseases of the testes.—These are numerous, but usually implicate 
one of the organs only: hence, as has been said before, if the remaining tes- 
ticle be not affected, or if, indeed, as is sometimes the case, only a part of the 
structure is destroyed, the person will not be rendered impotent. It will not 
be necessary for us to dwell upon the special diseases to which the testis and 
its appendages are liable. A safe opinion, in cases of alleged impotence from 
disease of the testes, can rarely be given, since it is impossible to know to what 
extent the true glandular structure is affected. The physician will probably 
be compelled to judge from the same facts which are equally open to others. 
In addition, however, to the diseases arising from inflammation and morbid 
growths, which are the most c38mmon, the testis is liable to become atrophied, 
from various causes. Thus, large double hernie are said to have produced im- 
potence by pressure, and the same is asserted of hydrocele. One or both testes 
may be attacked in the course of cynanche parotidza, or mumps, and 
waste away in consequence. Atrophy of the testicle, and impotence, may 
sometimes be produced by mechanical injury to the spine or to the occiput. 
Both Larrey and Hennen mention cases in which, from blows with a sabre 
upon the occipital protuberance, impotence resulted. Dr. Fisher,(r) of Bos- 
ton, had a case in which the loss of virile power was only temporary, after an 
injury of a similar character. Larrey states that many of the soldiers in the 
French expedition to Egypt became impotent from atrophy of the testes, which 
he ascribed to the use of date-brandy sophisticated with solanum capsicum or 
pseudo capsicum. ‘. 

§ 422. In some cases, the inability to procreate, arises from some defect in 
the copulative organ. — 

(4.) Defect in size and malformation of the penis.—The general rule may 
be laid down, that if the organ be of sufficient size to be introduced within 
the entrance of the vagina, fecundation may be the result. Hence, except the 
penis be congenitally absent, or have been removed close to the pubis, the per- 
son is not necessarily incapable. In case of hypospadias or epispadias, 7. e.,. 
where the orifice of the urethra is either below or above the organ, at some 
point of its length, the individual may become a father, if the orifice can be 
brought within the female parts. Cases proving this fact satisfactorily, are’ 
reported by Foderé, Belloc, Kopp, and others ;(s) in some of which instances 


(7) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. vol. xxiii. (s) Beck’s Med. Jur. vol. i. 


400 


BOOK III. | MECHANICAL CAUSES. [$ 4238 


the malformation was transmitted to the children. A very interesting case of 
this nature is reported by Traxel.(ss) An unmarried woman, at her confine- 
ment, deposed that for three years she had not cohabited with a man, but only 
with a female whose sexual organs bore some resemblance to those of the 
male. On examination, this person was found to present the following pecu- 
liarities. A scrotum was divided in the middle, and on either side contained 
a testicle. Between its two halves there was a fissure lined with a mucous 
membrane, and presenting at its upper angle and below the penis the orifice of 
the urethra. The penis was short, thick, and imperforate, and, along its under 
surface, in the natural position of the urethra, was a deep furrow extending 
from its root to its extremity. The new-born child presented the same mal- 
formation precisely. In this case it is evident that during coition the open 
urethral furrow was transformed into a canal by the apposition of the vaginal 
membrane, and conveyed the semen to the uterus. The person hitherto re- 
garded as a woman was judicially ordered to assume man’s clothing, provide 
for the support of the child, and declared capable of contracting marriage. 
This defect is also, in some cases, curable by an operation. Examples of bifid 
penis,(¢) and cases in which this organ had an unnatural attachment to the 
abdomen(w) and to the scrotum,(v) are to be regarded rather as medical curi- 
osities, than as likely to give rise to practical difficulty in legal relations. The 
same may be said of an excessive size of the penis. 

§ 423. (5.) Obstruction from large hydroceles, or hernix.—This is some- 
times an effectual hindrance to copulation, if voluminous. A case is related 
where a man of fifty-one years of age, who had been affected with a scrotal 
hernia for nine years, was nevertheless able to beget children, since, in the 
horizontal position, the tumor became a third smaller, and allowed the pro- 
trusion of the penis.(w) An interesting case is related in Henke’s Zeitschrift, 
in which the paternity of a child was attributed by the mother to a married 
man of sixty years of age. It was represented, in his defence, that he was 
affected with a double scrotal hernia of ten ‘years’ standing, which rendered 
the sexual act impossible, since the penis was almost entirely concealed by the 
immense tumor, measuring in circumference 18% inches. A very careful ex- 
amination and report was made by the official surgeons; they declared that 
this state of the parts did not hinder the act of coition, since the tumor was 
of such a yielding nature as to allow, by proper manipulation, of the sufficient 
protrusion of the organ. (2) 

(6.) Local relaxation. —Constitutional causes often impair the sexual 
power, not only by rendering the seminal secretion inactive, but by destroying 
the ability to copulate. Excessive abuse of venery, and the vice of mastur- 
bation, are the most frequent causes of that local relaxation which often con- 


(ss) Prager Vierteljahrs., 1856, 4tes Bd. Anal. p. 103. 

(t) Ephem. Nat. Curios. Dec. 1, Ann. 1, Obs. 110, Dec. 3, Obs. 77; Sixtus D. de 
diffusione genitalium, singulari penis bifidi observatione illustrat; Kopp. Jahrbuch, 
vii. p. 386. The preparation is in the Anatomical Cabinet in Wiirzburg. 

(u) Schurig, Spermatologie, p. 134. 

(v) Cheselden’s Anatomy, p. 314; Brand. Ed. Encycloped. Art. Hermaphrodites. 

(w) Pyl’s Aufsiitze, Sammlung viii. s. 204. 

(x) Band 44, s. 379. 

26 401 


§ 424] . WANT OF AGE. [BOOK IIt. 


stitutes an insuperable obstacle to sexual intercourse. If impotence be ever 
caused by the use of colchicum, nitre, camphor, dulcamara, and other drugs, 
as is alleged, the defect will be, most probably, only of a temporary nature. 

§ 424. (7.) Psychical causes.—These are, in some cases, hardly explicable 
by the individual himself. Cases are on record in which, notwithstanding the 
existence of proper sexual feelings on the part of the husband, he has been 


unable to accomplish that part of the act which is essential to impregna- 


tion. Devergie relates a case of this kind.(y) Another one is given by Dr. 
Strecker.(z) In both cases, the husbands had the sensation and the know- 
ledge of emission with other women. In one of these cases, this circumstance 
was attributable to indifference on the part of the female. Generally, where 
relative impotence exists, it will depend, in the absence of physical causes, upon 
some prejudice or passion. Excessive sexual desire will sometimes defeat its 
own end; and on the other hand, too great timidity, or disgust and aversion, 
may prove causes of impotence. We need hardly add, that they are often but 
temporary in their nature. 

(8.) Want of age.—The seminal secretion is established at the age of 
puberty, which is about the fifteenth year in temperate climates, and ceases at 
no determinate period. The establishment of this secretion is marked by 
familiar changes, both local and general. The genital organs become deve- 
loped, hair appears upon the pubes and under the axillee, the beard becomes 
apparent, the voice more grave, and the muscular system developed. Curious 
instances have been reported, in which there has been unusual sexual precocity. 
The most astonishing of these, is one related of Professor Stone, of Washing- 
ton.(a) The child was only four years old; he was four feet and a quarter 
of an inch in height, and weighed nearly seventy pounds. His bones and 
muscles were developed in an extraordinary degree, his voice was grave, and 
the pubes was covered with a luxuriant growth of hair. The penis measured, 
in a semi-flaccid state, four and a quarter inches in length, and when perfectly 
flaccid three anda half inches. The prepuce was short, leaving exposed a 
perfectly formed glans penis. The papille of the corona glandis were salient, 
and exquisitely sensitive. In the scrotum were two firm, apparently well- 
developed testicles, perhaps rather under the average size of those organs in 
the adult. The spermatic cords were distinct, and, under the finger, gave the 
impression of perfect organs. His father having observed “during the night, 
when he had slept with him for the first time, a constant erection of the penis, 
accompanied by a nickering, like an excited stallion,’’ consulted Dr. Stone 
concerning him. The boy was said to be extremely fond of embracing the 
opposite sex, and on one occasion, when in a bed with a near relative, a married 
lady, the latter was aroused by finding him closely clasped to her back, and 
her night-dress saturated with a very different and glutinous material from 
that she expected, as she supposed he had emptied his bladder upon her. 
The reporter had no opportunity of examining the secretion with the micro- 
scope. ' 


(y) Méd. Légale, Nullité de Marriage. 

(z) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1840, 1 H. p. 223. 

(a) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci. Oct. 1852. 
402 


«® 


BOOK III. | RAPE. [$ 426 


Dr. Riittel observed a case in which a girl of fourteen became pregnant by 
a boy of the same age. 

M. Ruelle, of Cambria, has recorded an example of precocious virility. A 
child three and a half years of age, muscular and strong as one of eight, had 
all his male organs of the full adult size, with long black hair on the pubes, and, 
under excitement, discharged semen four or five times daily. He had also a 
full male voice, and dark short hair on the cheek and upper lip.(d) 

§ 425. Old age is usually attended with impotence, but there is no fixed period 
at which, either medically or legally, a man must cease to be capable of beget- 
ting children. Mr. Curling has found the spermatozoa in the semen of men at 
sixty, seventy, and even eighty-seven years of age, and Casper in a man of 
sixty-nine. Parr is said to have become a father at the age of 140 years; and 
quite a sufficient number of instances are known, to determine the fact of the 
occasional retention of virility much beyond the age: of sixty years. The pre- 
servation of this faculty coincides with a vigor and haleness of constitution 
which is the lot of but few aged men. 


CHAPTER ITI. 
7 
RAPHE. 


§ 426. Medical evidence in cases of rape, is seriously affected by circum- 
stances over which the physician can have no control. One of the most im- 
portant of these is the want of an examination at a sufficiently early period 
to afford useful results. In genuine cases, where rape has been really attempted, 
the local marks of violence are often extremely insignificant, and consequently 
soon disappear. <A slight contusion of the genitals, a laceration of the hymen, 
or a trifling discharge of blood, are the sole indications of the transaction, and 
may, within forty-eight hours, be no longer present. Hence, it is seldom pos- 
sible for the medical examiner to make any useful note of “the marks of vio- 
lence upon the person, the disorder of the clothing,’”’ &c., which are usually pre- 
scribed by authors. The dress has been smoothed or changed, the marks of 
injury have disappeared, and all that remains is perhaps a suspicious stain 
upon a chemise, alleged to have been worn at the time of the assault. It is 
stated by a celebrated author, who has had much experience of such cases 
(Casper), that in fifty-eight cases which he had been required to examine, the 
time that had elapsed from the alleged commission of the rape varied from 
three weeks to one year. In connection with the injuries above alluded to, 
the victim of rape, particularly if young and a virgin, often manifests by her 
manner of walking, 7. e. by keeping the limbs separated, that she suffers pain 
in the genitals. She is also apt to complain of pain in passing her urine or 
in going to stool. These signs are naturally most conspicuous immediately 
after the act of violence, and, apart from aggravating causes, may be expected 
to decline from day to day. 


(b) Brit. and For. Med. Rev. Jan. 1844, p. 277. 
403 


§ 480] RAPE UPON CHILDREN—HYMEN. [BOOK III. 


§ 427. Ist. Rape upon Children.—We propose in the present article to 
refer a good deal to the experience of Casper, believing that the subject will be 
more profitably illustrated by authentic cases, than by theoretical discussions. 
There is no subject upon which it is more necessary for the physician to be 
guarded in his opinion than this; since he may be designedly entrapped into 
an admission, entirely at variance with his real view of the case. 

Thus—a tradesman of irreproachable character was accused by a woman of 
having violated her daughter, who was but eleven years of age, and of having 
communicated to her a gonorrhea. The child was of a very scrofulous con- 
stitution. The labia majora were separated and flaccid, the clitoris unu- 
sually developed, the entrance of the vagina inflamed, and painful to the 
touch, and the hymen obviously stretched. There was also a copious urethral 
discharge. The opinion given by Dr. Casper was, that a complete penetration 
had not taken place, but efforts by the male organ, affected with gonorrhea, 
had been made to effect it. The further progress of the case showed the truth 
of this opinion but not of the accusation, for the defendant was found perfectly 
free from disease, and the cross-examination developed the fact, that the 
mother, after having fruitlessly endeavored to extort money from the trades- 
man, had delivered the child to her own paramour, a journeyman living in the 
same house, whom she knew to be affected with gonorrhea. She then threat- 
ened to denounce the tradesman, unless he gave her money. 

§ 428. In thirteen cases of alleged rape on children from two and a half 
years to fourteen, he found, upon examination, nothing whatever to support 
the accusation, as the sexual parts were in a perfectly natural condition. Yet 
-many of these cases had been previously examined by physicians, and were 
provided with certificates attesting various degrees of injury. In two cases 
the accused parties were also said to exhibit unmistakable traces of the pre- 
vious existence of chancres. Dr. Casper ascertained that the children were 
wholly uninjured, and that the presumed venereal cicatrices were perfectly 
natural appearances. 

§ 429. It is also important to know, that it is by no means easy to ascertain 
the condition of the hymen, especially in children, who present a majority of 
the cases. There are two reasons for this. 1st. Where the outrage has been 
really committed, the tender parts of the child become so sensitive in conse- 
quence of their inflamed and swollen condition, that they will not bear the 
slightest touch, much less a separation of the labia; the child becomes so 
uncontrollable, that it is often necessary to give up entirely the examination 
without attaining the desired end, and this repeatedly, if the physician happen 
to be inexperienced, or unless an aneesthetic is administered. 

§ 430. The second reason is based upon the variety of structure presented 
bythe hymen. It is not always crescentic, but frequently is attached all round 
to the vagina, having a circular hole in the centre. This free edge is some- 
times swollen and loose, and is then particularly deceptive. It varies a great 
deal in thickness and firmness. Its place of insertion also varies, it being 
sometimes attached near the entrance of the vagina, and at others so far back 
that it is found with difficulty, especially under the circumstances before referred 

404 


BOOK III.| MARKS OF VIOLENCE. [$ 482 


to. “For these reasons,” says Casper, ‘‘the cases are explicable, which I 
have so frequently met with, where a previous medical or surgical examiner 
had certified that the hymen was absent, when I myself have afterwards found 
it entirely uninjured.”’(c) 

Tn order to have a clear understanding of medical evidence in cases of rape, 
the subject may properly be considered under the divisions of, lst. Rape upon 
Children. 2d. Rape upon Adults. We here refer, however, only to the 
outrage upon persons of the female sex, the crime in a contrary sense will be 
considered hereafter. 

§ 431. Ist. The frequency of attempted rape upon children has been lately 
shown by Casper. Of one hundred and eleven cases of rape which he had 
examined up to the close of 1856, seventy-eight were children under twelve 
years of age, and seventeen between the ages of twelve and fourteen. It is 
probable that very nearly the same proportion might be observed in other 
places if proper statistical inquiry were made. This frequency may be 
accounted for by the comparative ease with which a child’s resistance may be 
overcome, and by its entire ignorance of the nature and consequences of the 
sexual act. We may also mention here, that the author above quoted refers 
it, as well as the superadded disgrace and misery of venereal infection, to the 
prevalent superstition among the lower classes in his country, that connection 
with a pure virgin will cure a person affected with this disease, and hence, for 
the sake of certainty, the youngest children are chosen as victims of this 
revolting crime.(d@) Casper found syphilitic gonorrhcea in thirteen girls from 
five to fourteen years of age. One of them, aged only five years, had more- 
over venereal warts, and in a child of three years of age he found a primary 
chancre. 

§ 432. The traces left after an attempt at sexual connection by an adult 
with a girl under the age of puberty, vary somewhat with the age, but more 
still with the degree of violence and the frequency of its repetition. <A full 
and complete connection between an adult male and a child under twelve years 
of age, is, on the first attempt, manifestly impossible; repeated efforts, how- 
ever, will produce such a dilatation of the parts, as to render it finally prac- 
ticable. A case, where the vagina of a child, seven years of age, became by 
degrees sufficiently dilated to admit the adult male organ completely, is men- 
tioned in Canstatt’s Jahresbericht for 1851. But in the majority of cases the 
penetration is but partial, and in some cases the chief injury has been inflicted 
by the use of the finger. The truth of this statement is shown by the fre- 


(c) Casper, loc. cit. 

(d) The supposition exists in other countries. Mr. Wilde, of Dublin (Med. Times 
and Gaz. Sept. 10,1853), says: “A delusion prevails very extensively among the 
lower orders in Ireland, to the effect that a man can get rid of an obstinate gonorrhea, 
which has ‘ foiled the doctors’ by having connection with a virgin, and as the easiest 
mode of effecting that object, a child of tender years is selected.” He states also that 
he had been informed by Dr. Montgomery that he knew a case in which a servant 
woman, affected with gonorrhea, induced a child to have connection with her, in the 
hope of thus curing herself. From the work of Duchesne on the prostitution of Algiers, 
we learn that “the Arabs believe that the syphilis may be transmitted to a negro 
female, the individual thus transmitting it becoming free from the disease.’ 


405 


§ 432] CASES. [BOOK III. 


quently uninjured condition of the hymen. In fifty-one cases of rape upon 
children, many of them under fourteen, complicated with syphilis, Casper 
found the hymen destroyed only seven times in those between nine and four- 
teen years, and twice slightly torn in children of nine and ten years of age. 
In all the remaining cases, viz., four-fifths of the whole number, it was entirely 
uninjured. 

The usual marks of violence left after the attempt upon children, are a 
swollen condition of the labia-majora, together with an inflamed and painful 
state of the vaginal entrance, and a secretion from these parts of a muco- 
purulent discharge. There is also pain in urination and defecation. 

This condition may be illustrated by a case where a child ten years of age 
was assaulted by a man aged thirty-eight; the following signs were found 
immediately afterwards. The nymphe swollen, of a dark red color, and very 
painful, the hymen torn into three parts, the vaginal entrance free, but of a 
deep red color as far as the attachment of the hymen. The child was feverish 
and had pain in and after urination. Spots of blood were found on the under 
garment. In the course of a week the hymen was healed, but not united, the 
swelling subsided, but there remained a muco-purulent discharge for about two 
weeks.(e) A yet fuller illustration is presented by the case of a child under 
seven years of age ravished by an adult. It is reported by Dr. McKinlay. (ee) 
At the upper part of the cleft of the buttocks, behind and above the anus, 
the skin was besmeared with dried blood. The vagina was lacerated in various 
directions. One laceration extended down to the verge of the anus, laying 
bare the rectum, and others upwards and laterally. In the cavity produced 
by the laceration was some fecal matter which had escaped from the rectum 
through an opening an inch in length, and situated three-quarters of an inch 
from the verge of the anus. The child gradually recovered in spite of these 
frightful injuries. 

If gonorrhcea or syphilis have been communicated, there may be, in addition 
to these marks of injury, an urethral discharge, chancres, condylomata, and, if 
sufficient time have elapsed, buboes and constitutional symptoms. We subjoin 
here a few cases, showing the appearances we may expect to find in children, 
upon whom rape has been attempted. 

X., a man of leisure, was accused of having repeatedly misused three sisters, 
Agnes, aged 12, Clara, 11, and Antonia, 8. In all three the hymen was. 
destroyed; in the two elder, the vaginal canal uncommonly widened for their 
age, but not in the youngest. The opinion given was, therefore, that all three 
of the children had been deflowered, but that it was probable that the youngest 
had been masturbated with the finger. The evidence of the children, and some | 
witnesses, gave all the details of this filthy transaction. Several more cases 
of an exactly similar character are given ; we will, therefore, not repeat them. 
In the following case the whole proceeding was seen. Ottilia, aged ten years, 
still retained her hymen, although this was inflamed and relaxed. The vaginal 
entrance was dilated, irritated, and very sensitive. An old man of not less. 


(e) Keller. Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift. V. Band. 1 H. 1854. 
(ee) Br. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev., Oct. 1859, p. 535. <A very similar case, which 
ended fatally, is reported by Mr. Colles, Med. Times and Gaz. June, 1860, p. 560. 
406 


BOOK III. | CASES. [$ 4383 


than sixty-five years, had, it was said, often abused the child, having first 
enticed her by the present of a silver penny. On the last occasion, when he 
was discovered, the act took place in a barn, and a witness observed it through 
the chinks of the wall. The opinion of Dr. Casper, founded merely upon the 
condition of the child, was that a complete penetration had not taken place. 
A journeyman baker, affected with gonorrhoea, was accused of rape upon a 
child seven years of age, of healthy constitution. The child, examined one month 
afterwards, was found to have the hymen uninjured, but had gonorrhea, and 
the mucous membrane of the vaginal entrance in an inflamed condition. Hence 
the opinion was given that the condition of the child was due to an attempted, 
but not completed, coition by a man affected with gonorrhea. Hight other 
similar cases are given. Another instructive case is the following. The girl 
was fourteen years of age. The labia-majora were relaxed and inelastic, and did 
not cover the vaginal entrance as they do in the virgin state. The orifice of 
the vagina was dilated, particularly in the lower portion. The opening of the 
hymen, which was itself not destroyed, was unusually large, and the vaginal 
mucous membrane very red and inflamed. The hymen and clitoris were swollen, 
and there was also gonorrhea. The defendant, a bookbinder, who was charged 
with having frequently had connection with the young girl, as well as others 
who visited his shop to buy writing materials, represented that he had merely 
used manipulations with his hand. Dr. Casper, in reply to the question put 
by the judge, stated that “it was improbable that the defendant had merely 
manipulated with the hand, since the dilation of the vagina was adverse to 
this opinion, and that masturbation merely could not induce so much inflam- 
mation, nor the urethral gonorrhcea which was present. Hence it was to be 
presumed that the defendant had at least endeavored to introduce his organ 
into the vagina.’”? ‘A case happened in London in 1858, and is related by Dr. 
Taylor,(/) of a girl of seven years, violated by a boy under seventeen years of 
age. There was complete destruction of the hymen, and slight laceration of the 
perineum, but no other marks of violence. Very profuse bleeding had satu- 
rated the girl’s clothing, but no trace of blood was found upon the boy’s clothes 
or person; and it was inferred, therefore, that the bleeding was an after effect, 
and a result of oozing from small bloodvessels. Had not the proof of the 
crime been complete on other grounds, this circumstance would have rendered 
its commission by the accused improbable. 

§ 433. A case of genuine rape, with syphilitic infection, gave rise to an 
indictment against a journeyman hatter, who had abused his master’s daughter 
in the most shameful manner. ‘The girl was only eight years of age, her 
private parts were very much dilated, and the mucous membrane, particularly 
at the entrance, very red and painful to the touch. The hymen was destroyed, 
and she had a virulent gonorrhea.’”’ Dr. Casper gave his opinion, ‘That 
there was no room for doubt that an impure coition had taken place, and been 
really consummated. It was afterwards discovered that the accused was 
affected with gonorrhea. But on account of his obstinate denial of the charge, 
and his endeavor to escape conviction by assigning other reasons for the infec- 


(f) Med. Jurisp. 6th ed. p. 697. 
407 


§ 435] TRANSMISSION OF SYPHILIS AND GONORRH@A. [BOOK IIt. 


tion, the judge proposed the question, if the common use of an unclean cham- 
ber utensil could possibly be the means of conveying the gonorrhcal disease. 
The answer was, that this was possible, but that such an origin of the disease 
could not properly be assumed in this case, on account of the destruction of 
the hymen, and the dilatation of the vaginal canal. 

§ 434. There can be no doubt of the occasional transmission of gonorrhea 
by other means than sexual intercourse ; but it is important for the physician 
to keep in mind the fact, that in the case of children at least, the presumption 
is entirely in favor of the ordinary mode of infection, unless the signs of vio- 
lence before enumerated do not exist. Dr. Ryan,( ff) nevertheless, examined 
two children who were infected with gonorrhea by using a sponge belonging 
to a servant girl who had the disease. Mr. Hamilton(g) has published a case, 
in which a girl six years of age was infected with syphilis by a boy of nineteen. 
The contagious matter was carried by the fingers. In Henke’s Zeitschrift for 
1850,(h) the details of a judicial examination of a somewhat similar case, 
where also the virus was conveyed by the finger, are given by Dr. Henrich, of 
Mayence. 

§ 435. Leucorrhea and gangrenous inflammation of the vulva are diseases 
which often arise spontaneously in young children, especially of the poorer class, 
and are due to bad diet, uncleanliness, scrofulous taint, and epidemic influences. 
In the minds of anxious relatives they may awaken suspicions of violence with 
intent to commit rape, and sometimes form the occasion for criminal prosecu- 
tions against innocent persons, for the sake of gain. | 

Leucorrhea may be easily mistaken for gonorrhea, for the discharge in the 
two diseases is nearly similar, and the local symptoms so much alike as to 
render a positive opinion, in legal cases, rather hazardous. And yet, it is 
apparent, that the truth of the accusation may depend upon the determination 
of this difference alone. A case in point is furnished by Capuron.(rh) A 
little girl had a whitish and very acrid discharge from the vulva; the labia 
majora and mons veneris were red, swollen, and painful; there were several 
ulcers, with a secretion like that from the vagina. The parents regarded the 
affection as syphilitic, and believed that their child had been deflowered; but 
Capuron recognized the symptoms as belonging to a catarrhal affection which 
then prevailed in Paris, and by means of an appropriate regimen speedily 
effected a cure. 

According to Churchill,(z) ‘“‘The commencement of the disease (infantile 
leucorrhcea) is marked by local uneasiness, itching and scalding on making 
water ; the mucous membrane is found inflamed and swollen, but for some time 
there is no discharge. * * At a more advanced stage there is observed a thin, 
colorless, mucous discharge, which slowly becomes more copious, thicker, and 
of a white or yellowish color. It is often of an acrid character, and causes a 
circle of inflammation, and sometimes of excoriation of the skin at the margin 


(ff) Lond. Med. Gaz. vol. xlvii. p. 744. 

(g) Dublin Med. Press, vol. xx. No. 511, 1848. 
(h) Erg. Heft 41. 

(hh) Briand, Méd. lég. Game éd. p. 77. 

(7) Dis. of Females, p. 35. 


408 


BOOK III. ] LEUCORRH@A AND GANGRENE OF VULVA. [$ 436 


of the vulva. If the labia be separated, the mucous membrane will be found 
more vascular, and of a deeper color than usual; but in very few cases does 
this extend up the vagina. * * Under ordinary circumstances the disease is 
neither very tedious, nor very obstinate, and after running a certain course, it 
terminates in resolution.” 

This description, with the exception of the last sentence, would answer 
equally well for gonorrhea, the only reliable point of difference being the 
obstinacy and indefinite course of the latter. 

In the case before referred to in Henke’s Zeitschrift,(7) the virulent cha- 
racter of the discharge from the private parts was settled by the unmistakable 
gonorrhceal ophthalmia which the child brought on by touching her eyes 
with her soiled fingers. As the existence of gonorrhea in a child, in the vast 
majority of cases, presupposes a criminal attempt, the proof of the former is 
merged in the proof of rape. 

§ 436. Where, however, there is found lewcorrhea, 7. e., a simple mucous 
vaginal discharge, without any signs of violence, such as contusions, lacera- 
tions, dilatation of the orifice of the vagina, or injury of the adjoining parts, 
it may still be doubtful whether these marks of violence have not existed 
previously and disappeared, or whether it has had a spontaneous origin. 
This is a question which can only be answered from a knowledge of the time 
elapsed since the alleged injury. Where it results from mechanical violence, 
the discharge is at first mixed with blood, owing to the laceration and disten- 
sion of the parts, and afterwards changes its character, becoming thick and 
yellow or thin and albuminous, according to the degree of inflammation and 
the influence of treatment, but is not as copious as where the disease is of 
spontaneous origin. But the leucorrhcea of children is never bloody, and, of 
course, no marks of mechanical distension or of laceration will be found at 
any period of the disease. In conclusion, it may be remarked that the leucor- 
rhea of children is quite a rare affection, so much so that no mention is made 
of it by some of the best authorities. 

Mr. Kesteven, of London, in the Medical Gazette for February 28, 1851, 
has recorded a case and attached thereto some practical and useful observa- 
tions, from which the following is an extract. With reference to the physical 
indications of chastity, the medical opinion upon which, he says, may be 
divided into two classes, the public and private, the former, or the most fre- 
quent, ‘are those in which vaginal discharges in young children are mistaken 
by the parents or friends for the evidences of sexual intercourse by elder male 
persons having gonorrhea or syphilis. Such cases have frequently occurred 
to myself, as they have to others; and, although now better understood by 
the profession than formerly, yet so strong is often the notion entertained by 
the public with regard to these cases, that it is not unfrequently extremely 
difficult to persuade parents that we have merely to deal with the results of 
ordinary disease, and not with those of violence. This notion, in several 
cases that have come under my notice, has unfortunately been confirmed by 
hasty and erroneous opinions, given by surgeons on the mere representation 


(j) Erg. H. No. 41. 
409 


§ 436] CASES. [BOOK IIL. 


of the friends, without a proper examination having been made. Jé is 
scarcely possible to speak too severely of such culpable and wilful tgno- 
‘‘rance. Within the last few weeks, a child of nine years of age was brought 
to me, upon whom it was suspected that violence had been inflicted. A careful 
examination afforded evidence that the case was simply one of vaginitis. 
There was complete absence of any indication of violence, for although it can 
scarcely be believed to be possible that sexual entrance into the vagina of an 
infant could, under any circumstances, be perpetrated ; yet in the atiempt, much 
contusion of the young and delicate soft parts must have ensued, had it been 
made. The parents were satisfied, and an individual unjustly suspected was 
forthwith released from so odious an imputation.” 

‘““This disease,’’ says Mr. Wilde, ‘although denominated by Churchill and 
other modern writers upon the diseases of children, leucorrhea infantilis, 
is better designated by the term vaginitis, for it is of a much more inflam- 
matory character than either leucorrhcea or gonorrhea, at least, as these two 
diseases present themselves in the adult female; and the discharge is much 
more profuse in the former, and much more purulent in the latter. This dis- 
charge proceeds principally from the vagina, although the external parts are 
generally bathed with it when we come to examine them, in the same way as 
the surface of the glans and the inside of the prepuce are usually covered with 
discharge, in persons laboring under gonorrhcea, particularly where the fore- 
skin is abundant. The redness and swelling of the labia, clitoris, and orifice 
of the vagina, are generally very great, and the hue of the former is somewhat 
purplish. Not being acquainted with the appearance of gonorrhcea in chil- 
dren under ten years of age, I cannot say whether the inflammatory symptoms 
are equal in appearance to those now described. ‘The disease is, I believe, 
usually painless in the first instance; and it is only when excoriation has 
taken place from the irritation of the discharge, and that the urine passing 
over the abraded surface produces some degree of soreness, that any complaint 
is made. After some time, the period varying according to the virulence of 
the disease, and the state of cleanliness or the contrary in which the child is 
kept, the discharge excoriates the labia both on their external and internal 
surfaces, the fourchette, perineum, the margin of the anus, and all that portion 
of the integument of the thighs washed by the discharge, or which come in 
contact when moved one upon another. In fat children, the amount and 
extent of excoriation, which presents much the character of an eczematous 
eruption, is always greater than in those who are thin, or have been in any 
way wasted by previous ill health. The extent of this eruption is generally 
very well marked by a defined eczematous margin, extending from the puden- 
dum, in a crescentic form, over the thighs, and sometimes into the cleft of the 
nates. The character of this eruption, its defined margin and extent, may 
possibly, to a practised and unprejudiced eye, serve to distinguish this disease 
from the results either of violence or the mechanical irritation produced by the 
‘friction of the penis’ between the thighs and external labia, as was endeavored . 
to be proved by the crown in the late trials in Green Street. With respect to 
the discharge, it is generally of a very acrid nature, and is the cause of the 
excoriation and eruption upon the true skin; and, unless the disease has been 

410 


BOOK II. | CASES. [$ 486 


discovered by accident in an earlier stage (such as by observation of the child’s 
linen, or by the chance of some second party seeing the child), the two cireum- 
stances which first attract attention are, the difficulty of walking, or the pain 
in making water; but the date of the discovery varies from a few days to 
several weeks, according to the violence of the affection, or the care and 
attention bestowed by the mothers on their children. For the same reasons, 
the duration of the disease will vary from a fortnight to six weeks or two 
months. The age at which this vaginitis is most frequent is from four to ten, 
but it may appear earlier.’ 

The following notice of the disease is taken from a paper by Mr. Wilde, of 
Dublin, in the Medical Times and Gazette, Sept. 1853. This paper is en- 
titled a “History of the recent Epidemic of Infantile Leucorrhea, with an 
Account of Five Cases of alleged Felonious Assaults recently tried in Dublin.” 
He says: “Considerable excitement has prevailed among all classes in Dublin 
during the last month, owing to the circumstance of no less than three cases 
of felonious assaults upon children under ten years of age having been brought 
forward by the crown at the late commission before the Chief Justices. * * * 
So impressed were those members of the profession in Dublin who were ac- 
quainted with the circumstances of the cases, that Professors Cusack, Beatty, 
and Geoghegan, and Drs. Churchill, Hughes, Hatchell, and Speedy, all came 
forward in court, gratuitously, to tender their evidence in what they considered 
the cause of truth, science, and humanity. Most practical physicians and 
surgeons, particularly those attached to public institutions, or who are well 
acquainted with the diseases of the lower classes, know perfectly well that 
vaginal discharges, attended with inflammation of the external parts and an 
eczematous excoriation of the labia and the adjacent portion of the thighs, 
are not uncommon affections in girls aged from four or five to ten years.’ 
Mr. Wilde gives some curious and instructive details of the manner in which 
the charge of rape is got up in some of these cases. We will give one as a 
specimen. ‘The first of these cases was that of Margaret Walsh, a child 
aged nine and a half years, in whom the disease presented a very virulent 
form when it was discovered by her stepmother, who, however, acknowledged 
that she had remarked her walking lame for several weeks before. 'There 
was considerable swelling and inflammation of the parts, and a most profuse 
purulent discharge. Upon the discovery of the disease by the stepmother, 
she at once accused the child of impropriety, and demanded the name of the 
person who had diseased her. Upon the child’s denying all knowledge of 
such, she was forthwith ‘soundly flogged,’ and repetitions of the puriishment 
promised until she confessed. It came out at the investigation that the mother 
took down the cross from the mantel-piece, and threatened her therewith—a 
very impressive mode of adjuration among the lower order of Irish. The 
neighboring women interfered, and by threats and promises endeavored to 
extort an acknowledgment, but without effect. Names of different persons 
were then suggested, but still the child said she could not remember any of 
them having offended her. Finally, an elder sister, who was present during 
one of these scenes of torture, reminded the child of an old pensioner named 
Barber (who resided in a distant part of the city, but who was formerly a 

411 


§ 487] CASES. [BOOK III. 


neighbor of hers) having given her a bit of sugar some months before, when 
they lived in his neighborhood. This she acknowledged, and then arose the 
accusation.”? 'The man was arrested, committed for trial, and sent to prison. 
The child stated that the prisoner took her into the open hall of a house 
adjoining his own, and entered into a detail of the transaction, which it is not 
necessary to quote. The medical evidence showed that the prisoner was not 
in any way diseased. ‘After a few words from Chief Justice Monahan, the 
jury at once acquitted the prisoner, who was discharged, with, however, that 
suspicion against his character which, among persons of his own class, is not 
easily eradicated, while the unhappy child was stigmatized as a young prosti- 
tute, who had acquired gonorrhcea when little more than nine years of age !’’(q) 

§ 437. The gangrenous inflammation of the vulva, to which we have referred 
as giving rise to suspicion of rape, is a still rarer disease than leucorrhea. It 
is due, generally, to some unknown epidemic influence, or occurs as the sequel 
of certain prostrating diseases—as measles, or scarlet and typhus fever. Vel- 
peau says it commences with a grayish, red, or blackish vesicle, which ulcerates 
and then sinks below the level of the surrounding tissues, which assume a 
dusky red color. The mortification gradually extends on every side, and the 
labia become covered with a sanious and fetid discharge. The whole constitu- 
tion suffers terribly, and without the prompt use of energetic remedies many 


(g) The following testimony by Mr. Cusack in one of Mr. Wilde’s cases will further 
establish this point: “I examined the two children (Cosgrave, the prosecutrix, and 
Delmere) ; both were affected with the same complaint. They were filthy, and had a_ 
discharge from the pudendum. There was a crust surrounding the parts upon the 
true skin, which arose from the deposits from the discharge. This child had not the 
slightest mark of violence; and it was simply a case of a disease which all medical 
men have met with, and which is very common among children who are strumous, or 
badly cared. for, or who have been in contact with each other. It is usually found in 
low life, but sometimes it is found in the better walks of life, where children have 
suffered from other complaints tending to weaken the constitution; and, I confess, I 
was horror-stricken at the time to hear that the prisoner at the bar was accused of 
such a crime. Iwas as convinced as I am of my existence that there was no violence 
offered or attempted upon this child, and that this was a common disease which is 
universally known to the profession. I conversed with Sir Astley Cooper on this very 
subject, and I entirely concur with what appears in his lectures, that numbers have 
suffered unjustly from such charges as the present being fabricated by the mothers of 
children.”’ ‘This evidence,” says Mr. Wilde, “which was given in a very decided 
and energetic manner, seemed to produce a considerable sensation in court; on which 
the Lord Chief Justice and the crown counsel cross-examined the witness to a consider- 
able extent, in order to show that, although there were no marks of violence, ‘a pene- 
tration between the labia, accompanied with force, but not sufficient to do any injury 
to the surface,’ might have occurred. In answer to this mode of putting the question, 
the witness said: ‘If the penis was brought into contact with the parts, and a dis- 
charge ensued in consequence, it would certainly be a species of violence; but in the 
present case there was nothing to show me that any friction had taken place exter- 
nally, or that any attempt had been made to do anything wrong. I am confident that 
the discharge was not, in any respect, the consequence of friction from the penis of 
any man. If there is violence, it would cause pain; but I could find not a trace of 
violence upon this child.’ One would have thought that this evidence might have 
induced the crown to give up the case; but the lawyers only took it up the more 
determinedly, and, seeing that disease from natural causes was established, changed 
their hand, and endeavored to prove, by the subsequent witness, that, acknowledging 
the child was in the diseased state described at the time the crime was committed, 
still penetration between the labia, without what might be styled violence, but as a 
simple application of the parts, might have taken place; as the Chief Justice described . 
it, the introduction of the parts, without force, and even to the ‘hundredth part of an 
inch. >? Notwithstanding the explicitness of ’the medical testimony in this case, the 
defendant got off only by proving an alibi. 

412 


BOOK III] CASES. [$ 437 


children would perish. Mr. Kinder Wood, in 1825,(h) saw twelve cases of 
this disease, of which only two recovered. It is peculiar to children. We 
think that too much importance may be attached to it as rendering really 
difficult the question of rape. In all the cases of rape on children we have 
met with, we do not find one which presented any appearance which could 
be for a moment mistaken for this affection. The discrimination should not 
embarrass the physician, although the parents or relatives of the child may 
be so far misled as to attribute the disease to criminal violence. 

Cases have arisen, however, in which both physicians and jurists found the 
distinction difficult, yet more from the circumstances of the patient suggesting 
the suspicion of violence than from the characters of the disease itself. The 
earliest case is one often quoted from Percival.(a) ‘A girl four years of age 
was admitted into the Manchester Infirmary, on account of a mortification in 
the female organs, attended with great soreness and general depression of 
strength. She had been in bed with a boy, and there was reason to suspect 
that he had taken criminal liberties with her. The mortification increased, 
and the child died. The boy, therefore, was apprehended, and tried at the 
Lancaster Assizes, but was acquitted on sufficient evidence that several in- 
stances of a similar disease had appeared near the same period of time, in 
which there was no possibility of injury or guilt.” 

The following more recent case presents very close analogies with the one 
just cited. In December, 1857, Amos Greenwood, aged twenty-two years, was 
tried at Liverpool for the murder of Mary Johnson, ten years of age. Ona 
Thursday night the prisoner and deceased occupied the same bed in a room 
with other members of the family with which they resided, and then and there 
it was charged that the crime had been committed. The other inmates of the 
room heard no noise, and the girl made no complaint of suffering for three 
entire days, when her genitals were found to be sore and her thighs excoriated. 
On the fourth day she was seen by a surgeon, who pronounced her affection 
vaginitis. Becoming rapidly worse, her friends urged her to confess a criminal 
cause for her ailment, but she protested that she had nothing to divulge, until, 
being threatened that unless she did so she should be left to die, she declared 
that “her bed-fellow had been upon her, and hurt her very much.” Mercury 
was then administered to her by an unlicensed practitioner, when sloughing 
and mortification set in, and proceeded with great rapidity. A surgeon next 
saw the patient, and discontinued the use of the mercury. The mortification 
extended, however, to the pubes and nates, including the urethra, labia, and 
vagina to the depth of two inches, and the child died thirteen days after the 
alleged attempted intercourse, and ten days from the first discovery that she 
was diseased. Greenwood was then arrested, and found to have venereal 
warts on his penis, and syphilitic sores beneath the prepuce. He was tried, 
convicted of manslaughter, and sentenced to penal servitude for life. 

In this case the only direct testimony implicating the prisoner was that of 
the girl, from whom it was extorted by threats, after she had repeatedly denied 


(h) Medico-Chirurgical Transactions, vol. vii. p. 84. 
(a) Medical Ethics, 1803, p. 103. i 
4 


§ 438] RAPE ON’-ADULT FEMALES, _ [BOOK III. 


that he had had anything to do with her.(b) Evidently, if copulation was 
attempted, it must have been so without violence, and without the infliction of 
pain, for the occupants of the adjoining bed heard no noise, and for three days 
afterwards the girl made no complaint, nor was her appearance observed to be 
different from usual. Her subsequent condition cannot, therefore, be attributed 
to an attempted violation. Is it with more probability attributable to a syphi-. 
litic infection derived from the prisoner? The existence of syphilitic sores 
beneath his prepuce would render his attempting coition improbable. But, 
admitting that they might have been insufficient to restrain his lust, is the 
existence of a syphilitic infection proved by an examination of the child’s 
genital organs? These were first seen by a medical man upon the fourth day, 
who deposed that the girl had vaginitis, with ulcerated spots all over, from 
the size of a pea downwards. These sores had no resemblance in number or 
appearance to syphilitic ulcers, but, on the contrary, presented all the charac- 
ters of aphthe. The state of the parts certainly did not suggest to the medical 
man in attendance either that the child had syphilis, or that she was the victim 
of an attempted rape. It was not until an unlicensed practitioner had ad- 
ministered mercury that the symptoms which ended fatally were developed. 
Since, therefore, neither the nature nor the fatal issue of the child’s disease 
could be distinctly traced to the prisoner, even on the supposition that there 
had been contact between the genital organs of the latter and those of the 
child, his conviction of manslaughter would seem to have been unjust. The 
person really guilty of the child’s death was undoubtedly the unlicensed prac- 
titioner who gave her mercury, immediately after which the fatal symptoms 
began to be developed. (c) 

§ 438. 2d. Rape on Adult Females.—The question of the possibility of 
rape on an adult female is one that presents considerable difficulty. The tes- 
timony of the female herself is naturally open to suspicion, since the cases of 
false accusations of rape are by no means rare. The majority of writers on 
medical jurisprudence maintain that when there is no disproportion between 
the age and strength of the parties, and the woman is awake, well, and con- 
scious, a rape cannot be accomplished unless through threats against her life. 
It must be remembered, however, that there are few circumstances in which a 
woman can be placed where, from confusion, surprise, and terror, she is sooner 
deprived of the command of her will and the power of resistance. We believe 
that no general rule should govern our opinion on this question, but that 
it ought to be decided in each case according to the correspondence of the 
injury received with the woman’s narrative and her character for modesty and 
veracity. 

We subjoin the following case because it seems to disprove the accuracy of 


(b) “Frequently,” says Casper, “have I heard very young but quick-witted children 
reveal, with the most perfect unconstraint, or even impudence, the whole course of the 
alleged affair and all its details in disgusting minuteness, so that it required but little 
penetration to perceive that they were merely rehearsing a lesson which had been 
taught them; and it has seldom happened that the facts of the case did not confirm - 
this belief.” 

(c) For the details of this case, and the discussion to which it gave rise, the reader 
is referred to Wilde, Dublin Quart. Journ. Feb. 1859, p. 51, and Med. Times and Gaz. 
May, 1859, pp. 518, 544; Kesteven, ibid., April, 1859, pp. 361, 417, 442. 


414 


BOOK IIL] RAPE ON ADULT FEMALES. [$ 488 


the general opinion, and bears strong internal evidence of credibility. On the 
22d of March, 1849, a girl, twenty years of age, unmarried, and of virtuous 
character, returning home from an errand to a neighboring village, was met 
in the pathway through a wood by a young soldier, twenty-two years of age, 
with whom she had previously a slight acquaintance. He asked her to let 
him accompany her a little way on her road, to which she consented. » After 
having gone a short distance, the soldier proposed to her to go with him into 
the bushes. He made an effort to force her, but did not succeed. He kept 
his arm around her body, however, and, seizing a favorable opportunity, sud- 
denly raised her from the ground, and, with one hand confining her arms 
behind her back, threw her down, and with the other pulling up her clothes, 
prepared to effect his purpose. Upon her beseeching him to let her hands 
free, he did so, when she again made repeated efforts to get loose from him. 
He succeeded, however, in again securing her hands, and now lay with all his 
weight upon her, and endeavored with his knees to separate her limbs, but, 
with a last effort, she freed her hands and seized him by the privates.. She 
would not let go until he promised to desist. He did so; when, as she 
attempted to rise, he caught her by the leg, and, throwing her back, finally 
succeeded by perseverance in securing her hands and separating her limbs, 
after which he fully accomplished his purpose. All this was done without 
blows or any unnecessary violence. A witness, who passed by after it was 
over, testified that he heard them quarrelling together, that the girl was cry- 
ing, and the young man endeavoring to smooth her disordered dress. Upon 
her return home, she informed her mother, with many tears, of what had 
happened, upon which her father insisted upon her going to the parish priest, 
who lived about a mile distant, which journey she accomplished, though not 
without considerable pain and difficulty. Medical examination was had three 
days after the occurrence. The traces of a recently ruptured hymen were 
found, but other marks of violence were very trifling. There were no spots of 
blood upon her linen, but some traces bearing a resemblance to seminal spots 
were found. It further appeared that she was strong and healthy, and it 
having been suggested to her that she had probably lost her breath in ascend- 
ing the hill, and hence had been easily overpowered, she said no, she had en- 
tirely recovered her breath. 'The place was examined which she had indicated 
as the scene of the outrage, and evident marks of a struggle were found. The 
woman’s statement was entirely unaffected by the cross-examination, while the 
prisoner contradicted himself repeatedly during the trial. He was sentenced 
to five years’ imprisonment. (?) 

The following very analogous case is reported by Casper,(7z7) who pronounces 
it one of the most instructive he had ever met with, because it appears to show 
that a strong, healthy, and fully grown maiden may be violated by a single 
man. On the 16th of January the accused enticed the girl, who was twenty- 
five years of age, into the park near Berlin, and having vainly endeavored, 
owing to her struggles, to accomplish his purpose by forcing her against a 


(i) Henke’s Zeitschrift, Erg. Heft 41, pp. 21-44. 
(it) Gericht.. Med. ii. 157.. 
415 


§ 440] RAPE ON ADULT FEMALES. a [BOOK It. 


tree, he seized her by the body and threw her upon the ground, where, being 
deprived, as she alleged, of all power of resistance, he flung her clothes over 
her head, and consummated his purpose. Nine days afterwards Casper exa- 


mined her. She was modest and maidenly in her behavior, and, without any 


affectation, appeared to be very sad on account of her misfortune. The orifice 
of the vagina was found to be inflamed, and painful when touched or dilated, 
the hymen was entirely lacerated, and the swollen caruncles were very red. 
The fourchette was uninjured. Without any prompting, and only after some 
general questions in regard to her condition and feelings, she stated that for 
the last few days she had suffered less than at first in passing water and in 
going to stool. From these facts it was concluded that the woman had been 
ravished. At the trial it appeared in evidence that the policemen, who had 
been attracted by cries to the spot, found the ground frozen hard, and that the 
accused, even after his arrest, was in a state of satyriasis. He was condemned 
to four years’ imprisonment. 

Although rape is a crime usually attempted without accomplices, this is not 
always the case. Dr. Taylor(7) refers to two instances of the sort. In both 
the females were married women. In one it appears that while an accomplice 
held the head of the female, with her face downwards, between his thighs, the 
prisoner had forcible intercourse with the woman from behind, her limbs 
having been first widely separated. In the second case an accomplice held the 
woman down on a bed by the neck, while the prisoner separated her thighs, 
and thus had intercourse with her. She was examined nine hours afterwards 
by an experienced surgeon, and he found no mark or trace of violence or 
injury on or anywhere near her pudendum. ‘There were bruises on her arms, 
neck, and legs, where she had been forcibly held down. 

§ 439. Where a woman has been wrought into a state of unconsciousness 
by intoxicating liquors or by narcotic drugs, and when she is prevented by 
these means from making such resistance, there can be no doubt that her 
chastity can be violated. The cases are quite numerous which attest this. (77) 

§ 440. The question whether a deep natural sleep can render the female 
unaware of the sexual act is more difficult to decide. There are certainly some 
persons whose sleep is always exceedingly heavy, and who cannot be awakened 
by loud noise—such.as thunder—by strong light, or by being rudely shaken. 
Long watching and fatigue, and heating drinks, are often followed by very 
profound sleep. It is not difficult to suppose that, in some rare instances, 
females, whose slumber may have been rendered unusually heavy from any of 
these causes, may be unconscious of sexual connection taking place at the 
time; and it must even be admitted that it may occasionally happen to virgins. 
Two cases illustrating this point are related by Montgomery,(/) the one bor- 
rowed from Gooch and the other communicated by Mr. Cusack. In both 
cases the females were unmarried, and regarded as virtuous, and both declared 
solemnly that they had no knowledge of the cause of their pregnancy. In 
each case the father of the child born confessed that he had had connection 

(J) Medical Jurisprudence, 6th ed. p. 708. 4 


(jj) See post, § 458, for the legal relations of this point. 
(k) Signs of Pregnancy, p. 362. 


a 


416 


a 


*. 


BOOK III.] RAPE ON ADULT FEMALES. [$ 442 


with the female,-who was plunged in a deep sleep produced by excessive fatigue. 
Nor should such a statement be deemed incredible, when we remember that there 
are instances, quoted elsewhere, of children born without the mother’s con- 
sciousness, and that instances of a complete absence of sexual sensibility in the 
female are not uncommon. If, moreover, the act be perpetrated under the cover 
of darkness, upon a woman who has fallen asleep while awaiting her husband 
or lover, a certain degree of belief must be given to such an explanation. Yet, 
while allowing all due weight to these exceptional cases, their occurrence should 
not be lightly assumed, the presumption being certainly against it.(a) In the 
words of Valentin, ‘““non omnes dormiunt, qui clausos et conniventes habent 
oculos!??. A case has been subjected to judicial examination, in which a girl, 
eighteen years of age, declared herself pregnant by a professor of “animal 
magnetism.’’ The state of insensibility called magnetic sleep, or hypnotism, 
is frequently marked by a total want of perception of impressions, such as 
usually occasion pain; and such was alleged to be the case in the instance 
referred to.(b) The opinion that the imputed crime is possible was expressed 
by the experts who were consulted, and was confirmed by that of Dévérgie. 

§ 441. The proof of unconscious sexual connection is usually derived from 
the occurrence of pregnancy without a knowledge of its origin. We subjoin 
a few examples. Klein(¢c) reports a case where a stepfather violated and im- 
pregnated his daughter, of the age of eighteen, during her sleep. Zittmann(d) 
relates the case of a girl who was impregnated during her sleep, and was only 
conscious of having had an oppressive dream. Alberti(/) mentions the fact of 
a girl having been violated and rendered pregnant while in a state of stupor 
from a potion prepared from the seeds of datura stramonium (Jamestown 
weed). Osiander(m) relates that a young girl, only fifteen years of age, having 
fainted with terror at the sight of some drunken soldiers, was shamefully 
misused by them, and left bleeding and in an almost dying condition; she, 
however, recovered, but had got the venereal disease and became pregnant. 
Klose(n) met with the case of a clergyman, who, while watching by the corpse 
of a young girl, gratified his lust upon her. Her death, however, was but a 
temporary suspension of animation, for she awoke and was pregnant.(o) It 
should, of course, be remembered that the truth of the statement relative to 
the commencement of the pregnancy is open to examination. 

§ 442. Rape may be committed with comparative ease upon women ad- 
vanced in life. Casper(p) relates a case in which a woman, sixty-eight years 


(a) See post, § 458 et seq. (b) Abeille Méd. xv. 293. 

(c) Kopp’s Jahrb. der St. Arzneikunde, 10 Jahrg. 

(d). Med. Forens. Cent. v. cas. 21. 

(1) Syst. Jurisprud. Méd. tom. ii. p. 200. See ante, § 201. 

(m) Handb. der Geburtsh. § 286. (n) System der gericht. Physik, § 286. 

(0) See also Riittel, Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1844, 264; Henke’s Handbuch; Zeitschrift, 
37 Bd. p. 290; Hartman, Canstatt’s Jahresbericht fiir 1851, Bd. vii. p. 84. In this 
last case the woman could not only not be convinced of the existence of pregnancy, 
but was even unaware of the nature of her labor until she saw the child. See also 
Capuron, Méd. Lég. pp. 57, 84; Fodéré, Méd. Lég. tom. i. 497; Dict. de Méd. tom. xxi. 
pp. 358-9, also tom. x. p. 465; Dévergie, Méd. Lég. tom. i. p. 431; Gooch, Compend. 
of Midwifery, pp. 81, 82; Montgomery, Signs of Pregnancy, 2d ed. p. 360. 


(p) Loc. cit. p. 26. 
nie 417 


§ 448] INFLUENCE OF ETHER OR CHLOROFORM. [BOOK III. 


of age, decrepid and horribly pitted with the smallpox, was violated by a 
young fellow of twenty-seven. 

§ 443. 3d. Rape on Persons under the Influence of Ether or Chloro- 
form.—A. trial in this city has developed the importance of the question, 
how far the capacity of resistance upon the part of the female, and her con- 
sciousness of the act, is abolished by the intoxicating and narcotic influence of 
ether and chloroform. With the exception of a somewhat similar case which 
occurred in Paris, we believe that this is the only one which has been made 
the subject of judicial investigation. 

From the novelty and importance of the questions to which it has given 
rise, we have concluded to give here a full account of the history of the case, 
chiefly extracted from Dr. Hartshorne’s vindication, and some remarks in the 
note, of our own, on the ‘ psychical effects of ether inhalation,’ both of which 
are published inthe Phil. Med. Exam. for Dec. 1854. 

“A young lady of unimpeachable character, who has for some time been 
engaged to be married, is accompanied by her betrothed to the house of an 

eminent and highly respectable dentist, who had engaged to plug one of her 

teeth. They arrive about ten o’clock on a Friday morning. She enters the 
house, and after ‘a few minutes’ spent in awaiting the exit of two other 
ladies, she is ushered into the operating room or office. Here we will allow — 
her to continue the narration in her own words. 

“T went into the office; took off my bonnet, and Dr. B went to the 
washstand to wash his hands, and he asked me after the family ; I took a seat 
on the operating chair; in a few minutes Dr. B——- told me one of the men 
wanted to speak to him, and he gave me a book to read and left the room; 
did not say what man; I supposed there were men there; he has a room in 
which the teeth are made; I believed those to be the men; Dr. B ’s family 
were out of town at that time; he said so, and the door was opened, and 
there was no furniture in the front room; I don’t know how long Dr. B 
was absent ; when he came back I was sitting in the operating chair; he went 
to the instrument case, and began with my tooth; the tooth was on the left 
side; he commenced operating on the tooth before he gave me ether; the 
operation was very painful; he said he would either put something in to de- 
stroy the nerve or give me ether, leaving the choice to me; I told him I’d 
prefer taking ether; I didn’t learn what he proposed putting into the tooth ; 
he gave me the ether on a small napkin, folded up; I felt ‘very dizzy at first 7 
I was cold and felt very numb; it increased upon me; I did not lose my con- 
sciousness of what was doing; I continued to breathe the ether ; my eyes were 
closed; I closed them voluntarily ; I did not try to open them for some time 
after; after he gave me the ether he did not, as I remember, operate on my 
tooth; he felt my pulse several times; put his hand on my arm under my 
sleeve, up my arm; I had a loose sleeve; he did it once ; he put his hand on 
my breast under my dress; on the bosom; he put his hand on my person, 
under my dress; I have a distinct memory of that; I was not able to make 
any resistance or cutcry; he went round before me and raised my clothes; I 
am perfectly distinct in my memory of that; I did not try to cry out; do not 
know if I was able; after he had raised my clothes, my feet were crossed, and 

418 


BOOK IH.] RAPE UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF CHLOROFORM. [$ 448 


he raised them and put one on each side of the stool; he then put his arm 
around me under my clothes; he drew me down to the edge of the chair; I 
do not know what he did after that till I felt pain; he did enter my person; 
it was then I felt the pain; I was not able to cry out or resist ; I did not try; 
I don’t know what was his position; my eyes were closed; I have no doubt 
that he did enter my person, and did give me pain; all this time I was con- 
scious of everything that was going on; after this he left me and crossed the 
room to the washstand; I heard him pour out water into the basin; after he 
had been to the washstand and returned, I opened my eyes, and saw my clothes 
up; he did not see me; I have a clear recollection of seeing my clothes up; I 
closed my eyes immediately; he put down my clothes, and in a few minutes 
he was at the side of the chair, and lifted me up into the seat; I was just to 
the edge of the seat; it was a large dentist chair; in a few minutes he told 
me he’d have to take the tooth out; that was the first remark he made, 
except the first, when he asked me if I was getting sleepy; at the time he. 
entered my person I did not feel his person against me; pain I distinctly felt ; 
when he spoke about taking out the tooth, I asked him why; he said they 
were both decayed, and he could not save them both; I told him I was afraid 
it would pain me, and he said he would not let it; he then gave me more 
ether, and extracted the tooth; I was on the left.side; when he extracted the 
tooth it was painful; I screamed then; he then assisted me to rise, and led 
me to the rocking-chair; I felt a little dizzy when he led me to the rocking- 
chair; he then went out of the room, and in a few minutes came up with a 
lady ; I have not seen her since; he asked me if I would be introduced to her; 
I believe I said no; he did not introduce me then; I heard him tell the lady 
he’d always been our. dentist, and that we never had been to any other; he 
said my teeth were very good; he said I had taken ether, when the tooth was 
extracted; I think she said something about hearing me scream; he said yes, 
ether had not much effect on me, I was either nervous or for some cause; in 
a little while I got up, and he introduced me to the lady; I think it was Mrs. 
P ; I made several remarks, but I don’t know what they were; I then 
put on my bonnet, and Dr. B followed me down stairs; the lady was left 
up stairs ; he came to the door, and I wanted to stop an omnibus; he asked 
me how far I was going, and I told him to Third Street and Lombard; he 
told me I had better walk ; he said he thought I had some of the ether in me, 
and the walking would do me good; I walked down Walnut to Sixth, and 
did not get in an omnibus; I did not reproach Dr. B at the house; I 
was afraid; I stopped in C ice cream saloon, at Sixth below Prune; I 
got ice cream; I went then along Sixth Street to Spruce, and down to Third 
and Lombard Street; I was going to see a young woman that sent for me; 
I did see her; don’t recollect how long I was there; when I left I came up 
to Mr. T ’s, at Chestnut Street, near Fifth ; I was very intimate with Mr. 
and Mrs. 'T——; I met Mr. M on the way up, near Sixth and Chestnut 
Street ; he joined me and spoke to me; did not accompany me to Mr. T——’s; 
did not meet any but those I have named ; I reached Mrs. 'TT——’s at 1 o’clock ; 
they had not been to dinner; I first mentioned to Mrs. T what had oc- 
curred at Dr. B ’s the same day after tea; that afternoon I was taken 
419 


§ 443] CASE OF DR. B. [BOOK III. 


unwell; it was the usual time; the door of the dentistry room at Dr. B ce 
was shut; there are two doors in the room; the one leading to the entry 
door was closed; Dr. B—— said that he closed the door because the smell of 
the ether would go over the house; the door was shut before he gave me the 
ether ; the chair is one that leans backwards. 

“ Cross-examined.—Dr. B—— was the dentist of our family; don’t remem- 
ber the number of years; it was from the time of my early youth; he attended 
all the members of the family so far as they required it; I went to him with 
the approval of my parents; he generally behaved like a gentleman; I did not 
know his family ; don’t know how many years I have been his patient; when 
I called with Miss Thr it was to get my tooth plugged; on several times 
before I had taken ether; I requested it to be given; I don’t remember of his 
persuading me from it; the tooth was not plugged when I was there with 
Miss Thr ; the following Thursday was appointed for future operation ; 
I did not go on Thursday; Mr. Thr——- had the appointment made; I be- 
lieve it was on Wednesday morning; I received a letter. from him to that 
effect; I requested him to go in with me; he was there when the woman 
came to the door; I was shown into the front parlor; it was the usual place; 
it was but a few minutes before the ladies came down; Mr. B came down 
before ; he said he had several young ladies up stairs and would be down in a 
few minutes; I went into the usual operating room up stairs; the door open- 
ing into the front room was opened at the time; it was the back room of the 
main building I was in; the workshop is in the second story back building ; 
don’t know how far from the room in which I was; it is not upon the same 
level; it is lower; I don’t know if I could see into the windows of the work- 
shop from the window of the room in which I sat; when Mr. B—— went to 
see the workmen he gave me one of the monthly magazines; while I was in 
the room nobody came to the door that I saw or heard; don’t know of the 
doctor leaving that room; did not see any women there except Mrs. P—— 
and the Miss H ; the windows were elosed in the room, 2. e., the sashes 
were down ; no change was made in their condition while I was there; don’t 
remember any one calling as a sitter while I was there, and Dr. B ’s speak- 
ing of it; I did not know of Mrs. P ’s being in that house before she was 
brought up stairs; I don’t remember speaking to Dr. B of the fan and 
requesting him to give me ether; from the time I closed my eyes after the 
ether had been taken, I did not open them until after the liberties had been 
taken ; I did not open my eyes until he returned from the washstand ; what I 
have described is from what I have heard and did not see; I did not see any 
part of his person exposed, nor the application of any part of his person to 
me; don’t know, except from the pain, what part of his person was applied 
to me; he passed his. hand up my arm immediately after he had felt my pulse; 
after the ether was administered a second time no liberties were taken; I judge 
that he did not see me when I opened my eyes, because he was not in front of 
me; when he told me he would have to pull the tooth, I asked him why; the 
reason why I agreed to take the ether a second time was, because I was afraid; 
IT was not afraid to have my tooth taken out, or to be operated upon further ; 
I don’t know if either of my teeth were prepared for plugging ; I suppose he 

420 


BOOK III. ] CASE OF DR. B. [§ 448 


touched the tooth he took out; that gave me pain; I told him I’d had the tooth- 
ache; another appointment was made for Monday at 2 o’clock; I asked him 
when I was to come again to have them finished, and he said at that time; 
I asked him that when I was going and had my things on; he booked it at 
my instance; I don’t know if it was before Mrs. P came in or not; Dr. 
B did not say there was a sitter waiting for the chair; I did not see any 
one call to inform him of a sitter; I never notice such small things as that ; 
don’t know how long after he had finished the tooth that he went down for 
Mrs. P ; I did not remain more than five minutes; Mrs. P said she 
came from the country and came to have her teeth attended to; Dr. B—— 
followed me down stairs; that is his custom, not only with me but with other 
ladies ; when at the door I did not manifest any displeasure with him ; I told 
the doctor I wanted an omnibus; I believe I bid him good bye; soon after I 
got out of the door of the aeind story, I told him to say good bye to Mrs. 
P for me, as I had forgotten it; the chair Isat in was the one I had 
always used; there was but one operating chair in the room; Dr. B asked 
me if I ever rode on horseback ; I said yes, sometimes; he said ride over and 
see us; I replied, perhaps I will; that was up stairs; on the way down to 
C ’s I did not meet any one I knew; I did not meet any one on my way 
to Third and Lombard Street; I told Dr. B I was going on an errand to 
Third and Lombard Streets ; it was an errand for my sister in respect to some 
articles of dress; I did not ee to her of the treatment I received ; did not 
sit down very ate ; when I left Dr. B ’s I think it was a ee minutes 
before or after 12 o’clock; I don’t remember which; I don’t know how long 
I was at C ’3; not long; reached Mrs. T ’s a little after 1 o’clock ; 
Mr. WK , whom I met, asked after the family; I did not tell him where 
I had been; he only walked with me a short distance ; I did not complain of 
any pain to Dr. B , except the pain of my teeth; I don’t remember how 
long the first application of the ether lasted; after I took it I felt no pain in 
my teeth; cannot describe the effect of the ether, except that it made me dizzy; 
I did not see the doctor at all during the operation of the first ether; I felt 
his breath as well as felt pain; the pain did not continue long; I had no other 
indication of the approach of my monthly discharge but that day; it occurred 
in the evening; I did not examine my person in the interval; nobody examined 
it between those times; I did not examine my garments; my mother did on 
Sunday afternoon; nobody before; those garments don’t remain now as they 
did then ; they are washed; I don’t know when; I made the communication 
to Mrs. T after tea on Friday evening; I told Mrs. T before I be- 
came unwell; I gave evidence before the Mayor; don’t know if the garment 
was washed before that; it was not washed till I went out home; during the 
time I was at Mrs. T ’s till I was taken unwell, no physician was sent for; 
I was never examined by a physician; on the afternoon of Friday I was out 
riding with Mr. and Mrs. T ; we set out about six; I do not know where 
we went; somewhere on the plank road; it was some time ‘after I returned 
that I felt unwell; spoke to Mrs. T on the subject after tea; we had tea 
as soon as we came home from riding; Mrs. T told Mr. T , and Mr. 
Thr asked me a single question about it; I answered it; and that was 
42] 


§ 443] PSYCHICAL EFFECTS OF ETHER [BOOK III. 


all I said; it was before I felt unwell that I told Mr. Thr about it; he 
remained as long as I did, and went to my grandmother’s with me; on the 
next day I went out to the depot, but did not go to my father’s; Mr. Thr 
accompanied me to the depot; I met Mr. and Mrs. T out there; I did 
not see my father or mother; I saw my father on Monday morning in Fifth 
Street; at the time he left to go down stairs, I did not see if he opened the 
door or not; I was sitting with my back to the door; I don’t know why I 
refused to be introduced to the lady when he first asked me the question ; my 
father and Mr. Thr accompanied me to the Mayor; Mr. and Mrs. T—— 
and my two uncles were there; my father was there before I was. 

“ Re-examined.—I said that Dr. B generally used me like a gentleman; 
he said a year ago that he should like me for his second wife; he had a good 
many children, but they should not trouble me, as he would get nurses for 
them; I spoke of it at home to my mother and sisters; after the doctor took 
me out of the chair after the operation, all that I said was in answer to ques- 
tions by him, or to remarks; the reason why I did make another appointment 
with him (Dr. B ) was that I did not want him to know that I knew any- 
thing of his conduct; I had not concluded what course to pursue.” 

We leave the comments upon the legal proof of penetration or of rape in 
this case to our colleague; the question as to the capability of evidence on 
the part of a female, relative to what has occurred during the period of etheri- 
zation, and the possibility of resistance under such circumstances, may, we hope, 
receive an answer in the subjoined remarks. (q) 


(q) There is a striking analogy between the effects of ether and those of alcohol ; 
the chief difference between them being in the more rapid and complete insensibility 
produced by the former, and in the more evanescent character of the intoxication. 
There is a period of excitement, of stupor, and of recovery, and the phenomena observed 
in different individuals vary according to their temperament and habits. In gene- 
ral, the state of excitement in etherized patients is short, and verges rapidly into that 
of unconsciousness and insensibility to pain. The vapors of ether seem literally to 
ascend and diffuse themselves through the brain, and to permeate every portion of the 
body ; the patient has a sense of fulness and warmth; the whole body feels lighter 
and seems to spurn the earth ; the sense of hearing becomes confused, the sight dim, 
and the touch benumbed. External objects lose themselves in a confused mist, which 
appears to swell their proportions and contort their shape ; the muscles become relaxed, 
and the patient sinks lethargic and unconscious into a profound sleep. 

During the transition into a stage of entire insensibility, he responds to external 
impressions only in an automatic manner: the most painful incisions, if felt at all, 
seem to him like the marking out of lines upon the skin, and the extraction of deep- 
seated tumors like the crackling of hair between the fingers. All his movements are 
instinctive ; an expression of suffering is often depicted upon the face; the hands are 
raised against the operator as he attempts to draw a tooth, and when spoken to, he 
answers in a vague and dreamy manner. The recovery from this condition, or from a 
more advanced stage, is apparently sudden, but, as in the waking from profound na- 
tural sleep, the perceptions are for a few moments confused, even while the person 
thinks himself fully awake and appears to be so. 

Dr. Forbes has well described the psychical state under the influence of ether. 
““Generally speaking,” he says, ‘‘the sense of external impressions becomes at first 
confused, then dull, then false, with optical spectra or auditory illusions, general mental 
confusion, and then a state of dreaming or utter oblivion. In the majority of cases, 
the mind is busy in dreaming, the dreams being generally of an active kind, often 
agreeable, sometimes the reverse, occasionally most singular, and frequently a great 
deal is transacted in the few short moments of this singular trance. Many of the 
patients who have undergone the most dreadful operations, such as amputation of one 
or both thighs or arms, extraction of the stone, excision of bones, extirpation of the 
mamma, have readily detailed to us, and most with wondering thankfulness, the 


422 


BOOK III.] AND CHLOROFORM. [§ 444 


§ 444. Finally, although a woman may be of age and strength sufficient 
for effectual resistance, she may be naturally so simple-minded, or so ignorant 


dreams with which, and with which alone, they were occupied during the operations. 
The character of the dreams seemed to be influenced, as in ordinary cases, by various 
causes, immediate or remote, present or past, relating to events or flowing from tem- 
perament.” * * * * * “A good many seemed to fancy themselves on the railway, 
amid its whirl and noise and smoke; some young men were hunting, others riding on 
coaches ; the boys were happy at their sports, in the open fields or the filthy lane; the 
worn Londoner was in his old haunts carousing with his fellows ; and our merry friend, 
Paddy, of the London Hospital, was again at his fair, wielding his shilela in defence 
of his friends. Others of milder mood, and especially some of the women patients 
from the country, felt themselves suddenly transported from the great city and crowded 
hospital-ward, to their old quiet home in the distant village, happy once more with 
their mothers and brothers and sisters. As with the dying gladiator of the poet, the 
thoughts of these poor people— 


‘Were with their heart, and that was far away.’ 


- Some seemed transported to a less definite, but still happy region, which they vaguely 
indicated by saying they were in heaven; while others had still odder and warmer 
visions which need not be particularized.” (Brit. and For. Med. Chir. Review, April, 
1843.) It is with this psychical condition that we have now chiefly to do. 

What then is the influence of the inhalation of ether upon the perceptions? It un- 
doubtedly cuts off, more or less quickly, the life of relation, and severs us from the 
external world. The lapse into unconsciousness is gradual but rapid, and does not 
admit of division into distinct intervals. The sensation of pain is often lost before 
outward consciousness has become totally obscured. Indeed, instances are related in 
which the patient has himself looked on as a calm spectator of the painless mutilation 
of his body. A patient of Prof. Pitha, being put under the influence of chloroform, at 
once fancied himself in his beloved Italy, and gave full vent to his expressions of 
delight ; he raised himself up during the operation for the liberation of a hernia, and 
watched it with great interest—answering to the question whether he felt any pain, 
“ Si, to sento incisione, ma non sento dolort.” (Prager Vierteljahrschrift, 1848, 3 Bd.) 
Such cases are rare, and it is important that we should not be misled by this apparent 
outward consciousness. In the instance just cited, the perception was by no means 
unperverted ; since, although the patient replied correctly when questioned, he ima- 
gined himself in a distant country. During an extremely painful operation performed 
by Velpeau upon a young girl, she raised herself into a sitting position, as if to observe 
it. She said afterwards that she supposed herself seated at a dinner table. (Rev. 
Méd. 1847.) In the greater number of cases, however, the perceptions are greatly 
perverted—illusions being sometimes suggested by the scene actually passing, and at 
others arising without being prompted by the external perceptions. Some cases, illus- 
trating this fact, we quote from the interesting work of Dr. Flagg. (Ether and Chloro- 
form, &c., by J. F. B. Flagg, M. D., Surgeon Dentist, &. Philadelphia: Lindsay & 
Blakiston, 1851.) 

After an operation performed on the forehead of Mr. T , a dentist of this city, he 
said that, although his eyes were shut, he saw every cut of the knife. “He saw the 
shape of the wound upon the forehead; and, what was better than all, this cutting 
appeared to him to be done upon somebody else.” A lady dreamed that she was at 
Cape May, and was going into the surf, and that while in the water she was attacked 
by a shark, which held her fast, but without pain, until the company present ex- 
tracted his teeth and liberated her. A little girl, the extraction of whose tooth made 
a report like the drawing of a cork, sprang out of the chair, “crouched upon the floor, 
and looked up anxiously at me and inquired if anybody was killed.” She supposed 
she was travelling upon a locomotive engine, which had been blown up and thrown 
her into the air. A boy fancied himself in a cotton-mill; an Irish woman dreamed 
that she had been home, and seen her friends engaged in spinning; and others dreamed 
that they were in railway cars or shipwrecked: the dream in some cases being sug- 
gested intentionally by the dentist, or being due to accidental noises. A countless 
number of cases might be adduced to show that patients under the influence of ether 
have been completely ignorant of all that passed around them while in this condi- 
tion, and have been surprised to find, upon their recovery, that they have undergone 
the most severe surgical operations. But this fact is too familiar to need illustration. 
It is only important to observe that during this state of utter oblivion the mind is 
often busily engaged upon its own inward perceptions, which may or may not be 
pertinent to the actual position of the patient. These perceptions shape themselves 
into dreams entirely similar to those of natural sleep, being grotesque and improbable, 


423 


§ 444] IGNORANCE OF THE NATURE OF THE ACT. [BOOK III. 


of the nature and consequences of the sexual act, as to offer the greatest facili- 
ties to any one who may have the knavery to take advantage of her. A case 


cheerful or painful, according to the temperament, occupation, and habitual mode of 
thought of the individual. 

' One of the most extraordinary effects of the inhalation of ether is its effects upon 
the emotions. Thus some persons are seized with the most irrepressible mirth, while 
others seem to sink under the weight of despondency. Women are especially liable 
to these effects. Hysterical paroxysms are by no means a rare accompaniment of 
ether inhalation. In others the erotic propensities are strangely excited. Siebold 
relates the case of a woman whom he rendered insensible by ether. Upon regaining 
her consciousness she appeared to be in a highly excited state, and was loud in her 
praises of the delightful condition in which she had been; her eyes sparkled, and a 
certain erotic excitation was very observable. (Ueber die Anwendung der Schwefel- 
JKther-Dimpfe in der Geburtshiilfe, Géttingen, 1847.) Pitha observed excitement 
of the sexual feelings in two cases, one of a woman and the other of a man, upon 
whom he operated. (Prager Vierteljahrschrift, 1847, Bd. 3.) ‘In one of these cases, 
observed by M. Dubois, the woman drew an attendant towards her to kiss, as she was 
lapsing into insensibility, and this woman afterwards confessed to dreaming of coitus 
with her husband while she lay etherized. In ungravid women, rendered insensible 
for the performance of surgical operations, erotic gesticulations have occasionally been 
observed ; and in one case, in which enlarged nymphe were removed, the woman went 
unconsciously through the movements attendant on the sexual orgasm, in the presence 
of numerous bystanders.”? (A Lecture on the Utility and Safety of the Inhalation of 
Ether in Obstetric Practice, by W. Tyler Smith, M. B., Lancet, March 27, 1841; also 
in Bulletin de l’Académie, vol. xii. p. 406.) We doubt not that other cases might be 
brought forward to illustrate this fact, but the paucity of published reports of such a 
nature will be readily attributed to the natural unwillingness of patients to disclose 
painful illusions of this kind, and of physicians to make them known. In further 
illustration of the disordered condition of the mind under the influence of ether, the 
following case may be cited. A female rendered insensible by ether, after some unin- 
telligible phrases, related some most circumstantial details of her private life. This 
involuntary confidence, which might have been followed by serious consequences had 
it taken place anywhere but in a hospital, was discovered afterwards to have been . 
perfectly true. (Ann. Medico-Psycholog. vol. xii. p. 376.) 

In the above observations it may very plainly be seen that the wi// no longer exer- 
cises its control over the mental operations. The thoughts run headlong upon their 
accustomed track, or in any direction in which they may have been impelled by for- 
tuitous impressions made upon the nerves of general or special sensation. There is 
no power to restrain them, and, while the dream is a pleasant one, no desire to do so. 
Often, however, the illusions are painful or disagreeable, and in such cases the indi- 
vidual may make an effort to escape from or to repel them. Movements under these 
circumstances, therefore, imply an exercise of the will. This resistance is almost 
always to illusions proceeding from external impressions. We have already referred 
to the frequent occurrence of instinctive struggles against the hand of the operator, 
while the impression, as afterwards related, has been upon the mind of the patient 
that he was playing a part in some very different scene. Thus the little girl whose 
case is before referred to, and who fancied, when her tooth was drawn, that she was 
blown from a locomotive, sprang from her chair upon the floor while still unconscious. 

Another young lady, mentioned by Dr. Flagg, when the forceps was placed upon the 
tooth, cried out, “Stop pulling! stop pulling!” The tooth was nevertheless extracted. 
‘She rose from the chair in much excitement, and would have fallen to the floor, but 
I caught and sustained her for a moment, when the ether instantly passed off.”” This 
young lady dreamed that she was in danger of shipwreck, and, seeing the rocks and 
breakers ahead, cried out to the man at the wheel, with all her strength, to “stop 
pulling.” In another instance, a lady, while under the influence of ether, resisted the 
attempt to extract her tooth. She got up from the chair, seeming much offended, and 
took her seat in another part of the room. When the effect of the ether passed off, 
which was in about a minute, she was much astonished at finding herself so remote 
from the position she occupied when she fell asleep. (Flagg, p. 102.) 

The following singular instance may be appropriate in this place. A young man 
having been sufliciently etherized, the dentist prepared to extract a tooth. In a mo- 
ment he dashed the instrument from his mouth, left the chair, and, striding about the 
room, demanded what they meant to do with him. In a few moments the effect of the 
ether passed off. Being again put under its influence, the same scene was enacted, 
with even greater violence, and he endeavored to jump out of the window. When he 
regained his memory, he related that he imagined himself surrounded by a great 

424 


BOOK III.] IGNORANCE OF THE NATURE OF THE ACT. [§ 444 


in point may be found in the second edition of Wharton’s Criminal Law, p. 
439. Here a girl allowed a medical man to have connection with her, under 


number of enemies, one of whom endeavored to drive a nail into his mouth, and being 
unable to struggle with them, he had sought safety in flight. (Union Méd., Sept. 1857.) 

Mr. Gerdy, in trying the effect of ether upon himself, with the object of observing 
closely its successive phenomena, found that, with the exception of the vibratory and 
benumbed sensation which rendered the sense of touch and of pain obtuse, and the noise 
in the ears which dulled the sense of hearing, his intelligence was clear, his attention 
active, and his will so firm that he willed to walk, and he did walk, in order to observe 
the effect upon his locomotion. He found that his step was only less sure than usual, 
and was similar to the gait of an intoxicated person. (Bulletin de l’Académie, vol. xii. 
p. 304.) 

We have cited these examples, out of many of a similar nature, for the purpose of 
showing that the power of the will over muscular movement is not entirely abolished 
in etherization. It is true that the muscles are speedily relaxed, but they are not 
paralyzed. The patient may exercise his will, or he may not; if he does, it is to escape 
from danger, real or imaginary, but which has always to him the form of reality. If 
he does not make any movement, the fact is due either to the pleasurable or trivial 
character of his mental perceptions, or to the temporary but complete unconsciousness 
and insensibility in which he is plunged. That advanced stage of etherization in which 
perfect narcotism is produced is, in reference to the present question, of considerable 
importance; for if the power of resistance is then lost, so also is the consciousness of 
a real motive for it. To be more explicit, if an outrage be perpetrated upon a woman 
lying wholly helpless and unconscious, she cannot be aware of the liberties which are 
being taken with her person, and will not, therefore, make any opposition to them. 
She cannot, moreover, afterwards describe, with elaborate detail, the manner and par- 
ticulars of the assault, and yet have been incapable of withdrawing from or repelling it. 
If her muscles and voice have been paralyzed, so also has her outward consciousness. 

The recollection of what has passed during this stage of etherization is wholly con- 
fined to the inward mental perceptions—to the dreams, which have all the vividness 
of real occurrences. In the language of Dr. Forbes, ‘the old story of the magician 
in the Arabian tales seems more than realized; the ether being like the tub of water, 
one moment’s dip of the head into which produced a life-long vision in the dreamer’s 
mind.” It is possible that these dreams may be so vividly impressed upon the mind 
that they may have afterwards to the patient all the force of real occurrences, and 
that he may refuse to believe that they have been merely the disordered perceptions 
of his own brain. In general, these dreams being of a trivial or of a pleasing cha- 
racter, itis not surprising that the patient should acquiesce in the belief of their un- 
real nature, but the case is very readily conceivable in which the hallucination may 
have been so distinct and, at the same time, of so repulsive a character as to leave an 
indelible impression upon the mind and a conviction of its reality. Authentic pub- 
lished evidence of this fact is indeed wanting, and we purposely forbear, for reasons 
which cannot fail to be apparent to our readers, to refer to that which was said to 
have been offered in the recent trial, as well as to that which we possess from private 
sources. 

The following cautious remarks of M. Bayard are not without significance: “If,” 
he says, ‘in some cases, individuals have rendered an exact report of what has 
passed around them, or of the liberties which have been taken with them while under 
the influence of ether and chloroform, it must not be forgotten that very frequently 
they have dreams, hallucinations, and illusions which they relate with a conviction 
of their actual reality. Experts should therefore receive with extreme circumspection 
declarations made before them under these circumstances, and, both in their written 
reports and verbal depositions, should endeavor to enlighten magistrate and jury upon 
the relative value and credibility of such revelations.” (Appréciation Médico-légale 
de V’Action de V’Ether et du Chloroforme. Ann. d’Hygiéne, vol. xlii. p. 201.) It 
appears to us, from what has now been stated, that the following positions may be 
assumed as correct :— 

Ist. That the consciousness or perception of external objects and impressions is 
impaired in the early and lost in the final stage of etherization. 

2d. That during the time the mind remains susceptible to external impressions at 
all, these reach it in a feeble or perverted manner. 

3d. That the emotions, and especially those of an erotic character, are excited by 
the inhalation of ether. 

4th. That voluntary muscular movement is not paralyzed until the state of perfect 
narcotism is produced, at which time, however, all outward consciousness is extinct. 


425 


§ 445] PHYSICAL SIGNS OF RAPE, [BOOK III. 


the belief that this was medical treatment. Dr. Fleischmann(7) relates a case 
which occurred in his own practice. He was consulted by the parents con- 
cerning their daughter, a girl seventeen years of age. She had been brought 
up in a very secluded manner, and was both weak-minded and wholly inexpe- 
rienced. Her monthly periods were suppressed, and a certain train of symp- 
toms set in which awakened in his mind suspicions of pregnancy. The mother 
indignantly repelled this idea. He still, however, continued his attendance, and 
prescribed various remedies, without any avail. At last the violence of her 
pains compelled the girl to take to her bed. Here she lay for a short time ia 
a half-unconscious condition, but suddenly she gave a loud cry, threw aside 
the cover, and displayed, to the astonishment of all, a living child, just born, 
lying between her thighs. In answer to her mother’s anxious inquiries, she 
declared, with the greatest candor and simplicity, that she had never slept with 
a man, and knew nothing more except that, a long while before, her cousin 
N-——, on a Sunday, when her parents were not at home, had played with 
her, and caressed her a great deal, and then, said she, “er hat mir auf dem 
sofa recht schén gethan.’’(s) 

§ 445. Very little need be said of the physical signs of rape upon the adult 
female. Where the violence employed has been great, it will be found gene- 
rally that it has been expended in overcoming the resistance of the woman 
before an actual penetration has been attempted. Hence, although bruises 
may be found upon the thighs and knees, and on other parts of the body, | 
they are certainly inconclusive of rape, without some marks of injury can be 
found upon the private parts also. We of course refer only to the medical — 
evidence, as it is plain that the fact of rape having been attempted may be 
established by other testimony. We have already alluded to the fact that a 
medical examination in cases of rape is seldom had early enough to secure 


5th. That the memory of what has passed during the state of etherization is either 
of events wholly unreal, or of real occurrences perverted from their actual nature. 

6th. That there is reason to believe that the impressions left by the dreams occa- 
sioned by ether, may remain permanently fixed in the memory with all the vividness 
of real events. 

[Since these remarks were written, there has been much evidence published, given 
at meetings of the dentists in New York and Baltimore, which fully confirms what 
has been now stated, and places the whole of the positions assumed by us beyond the 
possibility of a doubt as to their accuracy. We have only to add that the dentist, 
Dr. B., was found guilty by the jury, and sentenced by the judge to four years and 
six months imprisonment. We sincerely believe that a great wrong may here have 
been inflicted upon an innocent man, which can only be compensated by the pro- 
bability that the fallible nature of the evidence upon which he was convicted, will 
hereafter render it difficult to sustain an accusation upon similar proof.] To complete 
this history, it may be added that Dr. B. subsequently received a pardon from the 
Executive of the State, in consequence of the large mass of testimony presented by 
physicians and dentists, going to prove the entire possibility that the whole accusation 
grew out of a hallucination such as ether is competent to produce. A case closely 
resembling that of Dr. B., in the text, occurred at Montreal in 1858. A dentist was 
indicted for attempting to commit a rape upon one of his patients under the influence 
of chloroform. At the trial, a witness testified that his wife was under the strongest 
impression that she had been violated by the prisoner while under the influence of 
chloroform ; yet her husband was present during the whole time she was unconscious. 
The verdict of the jury was “guilty of an attempt to commit a rape, with a recom- 
mendation to mercy”! (Boston Med. and Surg. Journ., Nov. 1858, p. 287. For a 
similar case in Ohio, in 1860, see post, § 459.) 

(r) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1839, p. 294. 

(s) We know of no equivalent English phrase by which to translate this remark. 


426 


BOOK III.] CONDITION OF THE HYMEN, [$ 448 


any useful data; this is especially vexatious in the case of adults, in whom, | 
of course, the traces of sexual connection will soon disappear. 

§ 446. 4th. Physical Evidences of Rape.—The only valuable indications 
are deduced from the condition of the hymen and the traces of blood and 
semen. 

(1.) Condition of the hymen.—This comes under consideration only, of course 
where the female is represented as having been a virgin. Indeed, the hymen 
is looked upon as the infallible sign of virginity. A brief mention of the 
various circumstances which affect its value as a test of virginity, will show 
under what limitations evidence from it may be received. 

§ 447. (a.) It is not always destroyed by the first connection.—This is 
abundantly proved by the numerous instances in which it has been preserved 
entire until the occurrence of parturition ; a fact which proves also that it is 
not an insuperable obstacle to impregnation.(f) The accoucheur has some- 
times been obliged to incise it, in order to allow the delivery of the child; in 
some rare cases, on the other hand, it has become gradually dilated and 
extended in such a manner as to permit the child to pass without its being 
ruptured. Maschka refers to the case of a girl, eighteen years of age, whose 
vagina was notably enlarged by coition, although the hymen was uninjured. 
This membrane was crescentic, thick, and fleshy, but as elastic as India rub- 
ber. (¢t) | 

In Henke’s Zettsch. vol. xl. p. 178, is related with detail, a case in which, 
after four years’ marriage, the hymen was found to be still uninjured, being 
thick and parchment-like, although yielding and presenting an opening about 
the size of a pea. The pair fulfilled their marital duties, imperfectly, of 
course, yet nevertheless the lady became pregnant, and was confined prema- 
turely in the sixth month. Dr. Montgomery says: ‘The existence of the 
hymen at the time of labor has been observed by Ambrose Paré, Willis, 
Ruysch, Negelé, Baudelocque, Mauriceau, and many others; the cases related 
by the last two are particularly remarkable. Dr. Blundell met with four cases 
of impregnation in which the hymen remained unbroken; the diameter of 
the vaginal orifice not exceeding that of the little finger; and he knew of 
three other cases in which the male organ was not suffered to enter the vagina 
at all; yet impregnation took place from the mere deposition of semen on the 
vulva.’’(w) 

§ 448. (b.) Lt may be lost from other causes than cottion.—Without 
insisting upon the fact of its occasional congenital absence, which, although 
mentioned by Capuron, is probably, as a solitary defect, extremely rare, the 
hymen may be destroyed by accident or disease. Siebold(v) mentions a 


(t) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht fiir 1851. Credé, Bd. iv. ; Kluge, Med. Preuss. Verein- 
zeitschrift, 1835, No. 22; Siebold,—Siebold’s Journal, Bd. xii. 5. 210; Scanton, 
Lancet, Mar. 8, 1851; Schmittmiiller, Henke’s Zeitsch. Bd. xli. 8. 172; Moller, Ibid. 
Erg. Heft. No. 32,1843; Schildbach, Ibid. Bd. xl. p. 210; Ribke, Casper’s Wochen- 
schrift, 1835, No. 2,5. 16; Streeker, Henke’s Zeitschrift, Bd. xxxix. 8. 218 ; Himmer, 
Neue Zeitsch. fiir Geburtskunde, Bd. iv. H. 15.3; Montgomery, Signs of Pregnancy, 
&c., 2d ed., p. 366 et seq. where numerous other references will be found. See also 
a recent case in Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, 1855, p. 93. 

(tt) Prager Vierteljahrs., Ixvi. 69. 

(u) Op. cit. p. 366. (v) Handbuch, p. 102. 


427 


§ 450] SEMINAL SPOTS. [BOOK III. 


case in which this membrane was destroyed by an ignorant midwife, in exa- 
mining a young lady for a supposed prolapsus of the womb. He also refers 
to a case related by Steinberger, where a young girl who had climbed a tree 
to gather fruit, fell down in such a manner that a stake, planted underneath, 
penetrated the vagina an inch and a half deep, producing serious injury, and 
of course destroying the hymen. A case, in which the hymen was lost in a 
somewhat similar manner, is related by Jérg. It is sometimes destroyed by 
riding on horseback, by ulceration, by the first eruption of the menses, and by 
self-abuse. From a consideration of these circumstances it follows, that while 
the hymen is far from being good proof of chastity, it may be lost, and the | 
female still be pure. Perhaps the only exception to this remark will be found 
in cases where the traces of its destruction are recent. Here, of course, the 
presumption will be, that its laceration is due to sexual connection, unless 
other means are apparent. Where the female supposed to be violated does 
not deny having previously had carnal intercourse, the signs from the presence 
or absence of the hymen do not come under consideration. 

§ 449. The other traces of sexual intercourse, such as turgescence and 
bruising of the parts, with heat and moisture may, where opportunity for an 
early examination is given, be of some weight when taken in connection with 
other evidence. An interesting case of post-mortem examination, in which 
these signs were of value, may be found in Henke’s Zeitschrift, vol. xlvi. 
p- 41. The external genitals were found swollen and red, the clitoris in 
a state of partial erection, and the vagina, turgescent and very moist. The 
mucous membrane of the uterus was highly injected, and the mouth of the 
womb open. In its cavity there was found a yellowish white liquid of gela- 
tinous consistence, and which from its smell and other peculiarities by chemical 
reagents was evidently semen. The dead body of the woman had been found 
lying near a public road, with the clothes thrown up over the face, exposing 
the lower part of the body, and the thighs stretched widely apart. Other 
marks of violence were found upon the body, but the cause of death was 
forcible suffocation. This opinion, given by the official surgeon, was confirmed 
by the subsequent confession of the criminal, that while violating the person 
of the deceased, he had endeavored to stifle her cries by forcing the clothes 
over her face. 

§ 450. (2.) Semznal stains upon the clothing of the female, form, however, 
the most reliable medical evidence in rape either upon children or adults. It 
is of course evident that they will not always be present, since none of the 
semen may have been shed outwardly. On the other hand, the mere presence 
of seminal stains upon the female’s clothing is, of itself, no proof at all that 
violence was attempted, and still less that penetration was effected. More- 
over, all that constitutes the crime of rape, including penetration, may have 
been completed without the occurrence of seminal emission. ‘The detection of 
semen upon the female’s clothing must, therefore, be regarded only as corro- 
borative of the signs derived from the condition of the genital organs and 
other parts of the complainant’s body, as well as from other circumstantial 
evidence. Practically there is considerable difficulty in ascertaining the pre- 
_ sence of seminal spots; in illustration of this remark, we cannot do better than 
428 | 


BOOK III. ] SEMINAL SPOTS. [$ 452 


quote the words of the acute Dr. Casper, than whom there is, perhaps, no 
better authority.(w) He says: ‘In all the numerous cases which have come 
under my observation, I have never omitted, even when several months have 
elapsed since the alleged rape, to direct my attention to the chemise. But 
this is not the white, fine, and frequently changed garment of the upper classes 
of society, but almost without exception, of coarse material, ragged, and not 
washed for weeks or months; the lower half presenting two large, disgusting 
stains, made up of a compound of menstrual blood, dirt, excrement, urine, 
gonorrheal matter, &c. &c. Nothing is said of this ‘in the books;’ and 
hence the possibility of recognizing traces of semen in such a mixture is out 
of the question. But we have in the microscope, which, as well as I am 
aware, Rudolph Wagner first used for this purpose, an excellent means of 
diagnosis.” 

§ 451. The microscopical characters of semen can be recognized equally in 
the dried spot and in the recent secretion. In the former, however, the sper- 
matic animalcules will most probably be dead, and in a fragmentary condition. 
M. Bayard(«) has been able to recognize them in spots as much as six years 
old. The following directions for preparing the spots for microscopical exa- 
mination are given by M. Bayard: ‘ The tissues covered by the stain should 
be allowed to macerate in lukewarm water for several hours. The liquid 
should then be filtered, and if the spots have not entirely disappeared, the tis- 
sue should be placed in a porcelain cup with a little distilled water, and heated 
over an alcoholic lamp to 176° F. If any glutinous matter still remain upon 
the filter, it should be again macerated in water, to which a sixth part of ether 
or ammonia has been added. All the resulting liquids should then be poured 
upon the same filter. The point of this, being carefully cut and reversed upon 
a glass slide, should be moistened with ammonia to dissolve the fatty matters, 
and the paper then removed, leaving the matter to be examined upon the 
glass.” This method is objectionable because the degree of heat and the va- 
rious successive manipulations must tend to disintegrate the animalcules. 
Schmidt, in his valuable paper,(y) recommends the following simple plan, 
which has, moreover, the advantage that the spot need not be cut out. The 
inner surface of the spot, which is known by a slight shining prominence in 
the centre, and easy to find by the light of a candle, should be turned outward, 
and the tissue so folded that the middle of the spot shall form the apex of a 
funnel-shaped bag, which should dip in a watch-glass half filled with water. 
After three or four hours, warm the water in the watch-glass over an alcohol 
lamp, after the addition of a drop of ammonia. <A drop of the water may 
then be examined for spermatozoa, and being dried upon a glass plate, kept for 
future reference. Koblanck recommends the still simpler method of cutting 
out the suspected portion of linen, macerating it for five or ten minutes in a 
few drops of distilled water, and pressing it with a glass rod.(yy) 

§ 452. Spermatic animalcules exist in all animals capable of procreation, 


(w) Vierteljahrschrift fiir ger. ti off. Medecin. Bd. 1. H. 1. 
(x) Ann. d’Hyg. t. xxii. 

(y) Die Diagnostik verdachtiger Flecke in Criminalfallen. 
(yy) Canstatt’s Jabresbericht, 1853, vii. 15. 


429 


§ 453] SEMINAL SPOTS. [BOOK III. 


and are found in the semen of man from the age of puberty to quite an ad- 
vanced period of life. ‘They are extremely small, scarcely surpassing the 
one-fiftieth, and at the very most the one-fortieth, of a line in length. The 
little, oval, somewhat flattened, almond-shaped, and perfectly transparent body, 
seldom exceeds from the one six-hundredth to the one eight-hundredth of a 
_line in length; the filiform tail at the top is thickish, and so strong, that the 
double contours are plainly visible, but towards the end it becomes so fine, 
that it cannot be followed even with the highest powers, to the point; so that 
it is possible the delicate extremity proceeds further than it can be traced, and 
that the animalcule is actually longer than it can be determined to be by micro- 
metric admeasurement.’’?(z) It is hardly possible for one accustomed to 
microscopic examinations to confound spermatozoa with other objects, unless 
they should be all in a fragmentary condition. In such case, an opinion 
should be given and received cautiously. When any are found entire, we do 
not think that there is any other microscopic animaleule which a practised 
observer can mistake for them. It is important to bear in mind that the ab- 
sence of spermatozoa from the suspected stains, is not conclusive of their not 
being seminal. For it is certain that after debilitating sickness or excessive 
venery, and also in old men the seminal liquor often contains but few, if any 


animaleules. In a case reported by Dr. Beale(zz) fibrillee were found in the 


urine bearing a certain resemblance to spermatozoa, but which were concluded 
to be forms of fungi. 

§ 458. With respect to the chemical relations of semen, we think little need 
be said. The spots are usually of a slightly yellow color, somewhat stiff, as if _ 
the tissue were starched, and give out the peculiar odor of semen when moist- 
ened. They become of a deeper color by being held near the fire, and small 
whitish specks become visible in them—an effect which is said not to occur 
with stains from other discharges. Devergie first showed that spermatic stains 
on linen, when held near the fire, assume a deep nankin-yellow tint, while albu- 
minous spots remain unaltered. This method has proved successful even when 
the matter of a suspected stain upon some dark-colored stuff has been soaked 
out of it and transferred to white linen. M. Lassaigne informs us that a 
similar color is developed in albuminous stains when they are heated after 
having been moistened with a solution of plumbate of potassa, but this effect 
is not produced in spermatic stains, nor in those produced by gelatin, starch, 
gum, or dextrine.(a) Semen is alkaline, glutinous, and but slowly soluble in 
water. When seminal stains are not mixed with any other matter, they may be 
recognized by the following properties, in addition to those just mentioned. The 
solution obtained by macerating the stain in distilled water is not limpid, is 
not coagulable by heat, gives a characteristic odor on evaporation, and when 
the latter is complete, there is left a shining transparent substance, sparingly 
soluble in water, but yielding a glutinous solution with potash. Pure nitric 
acid causes no precipitate.(aa) . 


(z) Wagner’s Physiology, translated by Dr. Willis. London, 1841, p. 9. 
(zz) Archives of Medicine, No. iii. p. 251. 

(a) Annales d’Hygiéne, 2éme sér. x. 405. 

(aa) For evidences derivable from traces of Blood, vid. Buoop-Srarns. 


430 


BOOK III.] FEIGNED RAPE.—P £DERASTY. [$ 456 


§ 454. 5th. Feigned Rape.—The following singular case occurred in 
France. Maurie V , aged twenty-three years, was seen to fall down, appa- 
rently in a faint, near the house of her uncle, the district schoolmaster, at the 
entrance of a field adjoining the public road. Her hands were found fastened 
by a cord, her handkerchief was tied over her mouth, her hood (capote) 
was drawn over the upper part of her face and fastened by pins in front of the 
eyes, leaving, however, a sufficient interval for the use of sight; her clothes 
were soiled with mud at the lower part only, and her camisole was laced. She 
did not apparently regain consciousness for several hours: she then related, 
with circumstantial detail, that she had been assaulted by four.young men who 
had endeavored, though unsuccessfully, to violate her person. A medical exa- 
mination being ordered, a vast number of superficial linear incisions were found, 
made apparently with the point of a knife or scissors; there were no contn- 
sions, or marks of recent violence on the genital organs, or their. vicinity. 
Her clothes were not torn or crushed, and in her pockets a penknife and scis- 
sors were found, on the points of which there were slight traces of blood. The 
girl at last, after much hesitation, confessed that she had not been the victim 
of any assault, but that, in a paroxysm of hysteria, without any reason to 
account for the strange idea which took possession of her mind, she had her- 
self inflicted these wounds with scissors on the parts of her body which she 
had been able to reach. The legal proceedings were consequently stopped.(b) 

§ 455. 6th. Rape by Females.—An instance of this kind is related by 
Casper, in which a child, only six years of age, received a gonorrhea from his 
governess, with whom he slept. In another and far more horrible case, a 
mother satiated her unnatural lust with her own son nine years of age, upon 
whose body, however, no traces of the crime were perceptible.(bb) Two cases 
have occurred in France, in one of which, a female of eighteen years, obliged 
a boy, under fifteen years, to comply with her wishes; and in another, a girl 
of eighteen was charged with rape upon two children, the one of thirteen, and 
the other only eleven, years of age. She was affected with syphilis, which she 
communicated to the children. It is stated also, that, from a narrowness of 
the vagina, she was unable to gratify her propensities with adults. The only 
means by which the rape can be established through medical evidence, is where 
gonorrhea or syphilis has been thus communicated. 

§ 456. Tth. Pederasty.—This unnatural crime demands but little notice 
from us. It has been customary for authors, in describing the physical re- 
sults of this vice, to enumerate various local injuries, such as laceration and 
a patulous condition of the sphincter ani, prolapsus of the rectum, and ulcera- 
tions, together with constitutional effects, as consumption, dropsy, &ec., as the 
inevitable results by which the commission of it could be ascertained. Tar- 
dieu,(c) speaking of the recent signs of unnatural violence, says that they are 
found to differ with the amount of force employed, the size of the organs, 
the youth of the victim, and his freedom from previous pollution of the same 
kind. In different cases they vary from redness, excoriation, and painful heat 


(6) Lond. and Ed. Month. Journ. Dec. 1853, p. 550; from Gaz. des Hép. Oct. 30. 
(bb) Gericht. Med. ii. 129. 
(c) Attentats aux meurs, p. 133. 


431 


§ 456] PEDERASTY. [BOOK III. 


in the anus, and difficulty in walking, to fissures, lacerations, extravasation of 
blood, and inflammation of the mucous membrane, and its subjacent cellular 
tissue. The observations of Parent-Duchatelet,(cc) and of Casper,(d) show, 
however, that such consequences are far from being even the common effect of 
this disgusting vice. The former of these authors speaks from a long experi- 
ence; he says that he has never observed the results above enumerated. Dr. 
Casper, in a valuable monograph on this subject, in which he communicates a 
number of cases which fell under his notice, says, that none of the signs 
enumerated by authors are to be depended upon. In one case, however, men- 
tioned by him, in which a medical examination was obtained immediately after 
the commission of the crime, the sphincter ani was lacerated to the depth of 
two lines, and the parts irritated and painful. The most frequent result which 
he witnessed may be described in the words of Zacchias, strangely heretofore 
overlooked: ‘‘Multo magis frequentem tam nefandi coitus usum significare 
poterit ipsius podicis constitutio, qui cum ex natura rugosus existat, ex hujus- 
modi congressu levis ac planus efficitur, obliterantur enim rugee ille in ani 
curriculo existentes ob assiduam membri attritionem.”’ He also describes a 
funnel-shaped depression of the nates, as a frequent result. It should be re- 
membered, however, that these observations were made upon persons whose 
lives had been spent in the practice of this degrading vice, or who had been 
for a considerable time in the practice of it. Syphilitic ulcerations or growths, 
in these parts, although of suspicious origin, may be really due to other causes 
than a direct transmission by unnatural connection. Marks of violence may 
be naturally expected in young persons. 

The frequency of this crime is probably much greater than the statements 
above quoted from Parent-Duchatelet and Casper would seem to indicate. 
Tardieu states that on two occasions the sudden descent of the Parisian police 
upon certain dens of vice resulted in the capture of eighty-seven in the one, 
and of fifty-two in the other, persons found flagrante delicto. From these in 
part he obtained the perfect confirmation of the description of Zacchias in 
regard to the signs of this vice when habitually indulged in. In two hundred 
and five cases of avowed criminality, these indications were wanting only four- 
teen times. In addition to the details already given, he describes relaxation 
of the sphincter ani, dilatation of the anus, incontinence of feces, ulcers, piles, 
fissures, fistulee, &c., as consequences of this detestable crime. 

It is unfortunate that there is no medical evidence by which the crime can 
be brought home to the actzve transgressor; Tardieu, however, describes as 
effects of habitual indulgence in it, a tapering form of the whole penis, when 
this organ is slender, and when it is of large dimensions, a similar shape of 
the glans alone. : 


(cc) De la Prostitution dans la ville de Paris, vol. i. p. 225. 

(d) Vierteljahrschrift fiir ger. u. off. Med. Bd. i. H. 1. Also Ibid. Bd. vii. H 2. For 
an historical account of this vice, see ‘“‘Geschichte der Lustseuche im Alterthume 
nebst ausfiihrlichen Untersuchungen iiber den Venus und Phalluscultus, Bordelle, 
Novoos Snaeee der Skythen, Péderastie und andere geschlechtlichen Ausschweifungen 
der Alten, &c.” By Dr. Julius Rosenbaum. Halle, 1845. 8vo. 


432 


BOOK III.] — LEGAL RELATIONS OF RAPE. [§ 458 


LEGAL RELATIONS OF RAPE. 


§ 457. 8th. The points to which medical testimony is most likely to be 
invited, in prosecutions for rape, are the following :— 
Ist. Submission of prosecutrix. 
(1) From artificial stupefaction. 
(2) From ignorance of the nature of the act. 
(3) From mistake of person. ‘ 
(4) From fear. 


2d. Prior want of character of prosecutrix. 

3d. Subsequent suppression of the fact by prosecutrix. 
4th. Extent to which coition was carried. 

5th. Want of age of defendant. 

6th. Want of sexual capacity of defendant. 


The law on each of these points will be now briefly considered. 


(1.) Submission of Prosecutria. 


This may happen from either of the following causes :-— 


(a) From Artificial Stupefaction.(d) 


~ § 458. It makes no matter whether the drug was given for the purpose of 
producing stupefaction, in order that the rape might be effected on the female 
thus made unconscious, or whether it was administered for the purpose of 
causing sexual excitement, and thereby leading to a voluntary submission. It 
is rape in either case; the law being, that the overcoming of chastity, and 
the destroying of resistance by artificial means, is rape, when the offence is 
consummated. If the result of the dose be stupefaction, and if on the woman 
thus become insensible, carnal intercourse be effected, it is rape, though the 
intention was merely to excite. Thus, where the prosecutrix was made drunk 
by the prisoner, who then violated her person, it was held in England, where, 
from the offence being capital, it is kept within its strict common law limits, 
that the crime was rape, though the jury expressly found that the liquor was 
given with the intent of stupefying, not exciting.(e) And in this case it was 
held, that where the insensibility is the defendant’s act, and where the de- 
fendant knows that “the act was against the prosecutrix’s consent at the last 
moment she was capable of exercising her will,’’ it is rape. On this point 


_ agreed all the ten judges of England, constituting the final Court of Revision 


in criminal causes ; and it was not required by the exigencies of the case that 
they should go further. Several, however, thought—and this view is in ac- 


| cordance with the analogous cases to be hereafter noticed—that the crime was 


consummated by the mere act of knowingly violating an insensible woman, 
whether the insensibility was produced by the defendant himself or not. 


(d) See the medical relations of this point, ante, § 435. 
(e) R. v. Camplin, 1 Car. & K. 746; Wh. Cr. Law, § 1140. 


28 433 


§ 459] RAPE ON AN UNCONSCIOUS FEMALE. [BOOK III. 


§ 459. In the late prosecution of Dr. Beale, in Philadelphia, which has 
been noticed above,(/) the point was not made, and it was assumed by both 
sides, that carnal intercourse with a woman who was stupefied by chloroform | 
was rape, though the chloroform was administered, at her request, for the 
purpose of facilitating the extracting a tooth. And if the law—and the cases" 
to be subsequently noticed unite with the reason of the case in indicating that 
it is—it goes to establish the broad position, that rape is sexual intercourse 
with a woman, not against—as has been formerly said—her will, but with- 
out it. 

In January term, 1860, Dr. Davis Green was tried before the Common 
Pleas of Mercer County, Ohio, for a rape on Jane Gray. According to the 
statement before us, which was prepared by the defendant’s counsel for the 
Western Law Monthly,(g) the prosecutrix was a “truthful, virtuous girl, 
robust and healthy, of limited education and intelligence, though of good 
natural sense, aged seventeen years on the 21st of August, 1857.’ 'The evi- 
dence, according to the same statement, was that ‘‘on the night of the 23d of 
June, 1857, she lodged in bed with a daughter of defendant of about the same 
age, in the northeast corner room of a village hotel, in Mercer County; that in 
the adjoining room, south, there lodged a man and his wife, and in the adjoining 
room, west, with an unfastened door between them, there lodged the defendant, 
and other persons in other beds; that the prosecutrix and her bed companion 
retired about 10 P. M., and after talking a short time fell asleep; that during 
the night, the first thing remembered by the prosecutrix was that the defendant 
had her by the arms, pulling her out of bed; that he said he was Dr. Green,” 
and he had come to have sexual intercourse with her; that he placed her in a 
position with her feet touching the floor, and her weight partially resting on 
them and on the pillows; that in that position he had complete sexual inter- 
course with her; that she experienced the pain of rupture of the hymen, but 
experienced upon her clitoris a pleasurable sensation from the coition; that 
the act lasted but a few minutes; that upon leaving her the defendant said to 
her she must never tell it, that it would not hurt her; that he held his hand 
upon her mouth, and she felt a rag between his hand and her mouth; that 
she heard what was said, was conscious of all that occurred; that she tried to. 
speak, but felt so weak and scared that she could not, or would not speak 
aloud, and did not say but a word or two—said, ‘Go away; oh, dear!’ that 
she tried to force him away, but could not; that she experienced a ringing 
sensation in the head, felt weak, drowsy or sleepy, but did not sleep any more 
that night; that she remained in bed until morning, made no outcry, and told 
no one of the occurrence until about last of December, 1857; that next morn- 
ing she felt unwell, and presented a sad and gloomy countenance, and for a 
week or two was nervous and easily alarmed; that the ringing in the head 
lasted a day or two; for three or four days she could not sit up for any con- 
siderable time; the symptoms of the weakness lasted two weeks; that this 
time, 23d June, was the usual period for the return of the menstrual discharge, 
and symptoms of it were felt, but no actual discharge had yet occurred; that 


(f) See ante, § 445. (g) April, 1860, p.183. 
434 


e 
BOOK III. ] RAPE ON AN UNCONSCIOUS FEMALE, [§ 459 


on the morning of the 24th she observed a spot, as of blood, on her chemise, 
the only night dress she wore, which she supposed was a slight menstrual 
discharge, but that no discharge followed at any time thereafter; that she 
conceived and gave birth to a child on the 26th March, 1858; that after 
retiring to her room on the 23d June, before going to bed, her nose bled; that 
she never saw chloroform before, but smelled it on trial, and believes the smell 
to be like that she experienced on night of 23d June; that she first thought 
defendant had intercourse with her twice that night, and told others so, but, 
on reflection, was sure it was only once; that she saw him with shirt and 
drawers on, but had no other clothing; that she made an effort twice with 
both hands to resist him, but could do nothing; she weighed 130 pounds; 
was in good health, and had always enjoyed good health; did not smell 
medicine when first awoke, but did after defendant left her room, in about six 
minutes; the effect was unpleasant, cannot say painful; that her mind was 
clear from the time she awoke, and she knew everything; her feet were about 
six inches; more than half her weight on her feet, the rest thrown back on 
the upper part of the bed; the rail of the bed came in contact with the middle 
of her thighs; she made no effort to awaken the daughter of defendant, though 
her hand was near or touching hers; did not halloo nor call any body; her 
hands were not restrained at any time; defendant only touched her with one 
of his hands; is sure she remembers everything that occurred accurately.” 

- The defendant was a physician. A large amount of evidence was offered to 
prove or disprove the offence. The defendant’s daughter, a highly intelligent 
young lady, testified that she was not disturbed, perceived no odor of medicine 
in the room, and noticed nothing unusual in the appearance of prosecutrix the 
next morning. The defendant was just recovering from a long and severe 
attack of phlegmonous erysipelas. The left hand very sore; poulticed; the 
neck very stiff and sore, and the right hand also sore and in ulcers. No one 
about the house heard any noise or disturbance during the night, after parties 
had retired. The partitions between the rooms were of boards; -had stood 
twenty years; had shrunk so that there were cracks between them nearly an 
inch in width. The boards were an inch in thickness. The bed of ordinary 
size. . 

It was also testified, as we learn from the judge’s notes, that the defendant, 
before retiring to bed, took a vial from his pill-bags, which he said contained 
a weak solution of chloroform; that he bathed the court-plaster on his hand 
with it, saying that it relieved pain; that he took this vial up to bed with him, 
saying that he might need it in the night, if his hand became painful; that 
when he retired he asked which room the girls were in, and selected a bed near 
the door of their room, saying that he could be near the girls and could wake 
them early; that he rose before them next morning, and they were called to 
breakfast by other persons. 

He offered no evidence as to his character. He is a married man, age over, 
forty years. 

A witness swore (without objection) that he once, under the influence of 
chloroform, had a tooth which the surgeon endeavored to pull, but it broke 
off, when an effort was made to extract the root with a screw; that he saw, 

435 


§ 459] RAPE ON AN UNCONSCIOUS FEMALE. [BOOK IIL. 


heard, and knew all, but his volition was overcome—had no inclination to 
resist. 

- The court (Lawrence, J.), in charging the jury, adopted substantially the 
views in the text. The defendant was convicted, and a motion for a new trial 
refused. (e) 


(e) From the judge’s charge we extract the following :— 

“When the will acquiesces in cottion, there cannot, as a general rule, be any rape. 
But the acquiescence which defeats a prosecution for rape, is that of a will so far under 
the enlightened guidance and control of the other faculties, that the mind can fairly 
comprehend the nature, and judge of the consequences of the act, unless, as before 
stated, the defect of capacity is unknown tothe accused. (The judge, in a previous’ 
part of the charge, had said that if the prosecutrix, having the capacity to understand 
the nature, and judge of the consequences of sexual intercourse, and the power to 
resist it by act or word, and neither such capacity or power was overcome by force, 
fear, or chloroform, her acquiescence in the act would defeat a prosecution for rape.) 
If the faculties have been, to some extent, suspended by chloroform, but enough remain 
to reasonably comprehend the nature, and judge of the consequences of the act, their 
acquiescence in coition will defeat a prosecution for rape. 

“ But if, through the influence of chloroform, either directly upon the will, or the 
‘consciousness, or Other faculties of the mind or the serual feelings and emotions, the 
mental capacity is so benumbed, suspended, or perverted as to be unable reasonably 

‘to comprehend the nature and judge of the consequences of coition, and by reason of 
such condition, known to the defendant, the act is acquiesced in or consented to, such 
acquiescence or consent will not alone defeat a prosecution for rape. Rape may exist 
with such acquiescence, thus knowingly obtained. 

“It is of the utmost importance that you should ascertain whether chloroform was 
administered ; and if so, whether it deprived the prosecutrix of mental and physical 

owers. 
at If it be assumed (and whether it be, is for the jury to say) that there is evidence 
tending to show that chloroform was administered to the prosecutrix while asleep ; 
that sexual intercourse was had with her; that she partially or wholly awoke before 
it commenced ; that she was conscious of it, and all the movements attending it; that 
she could and did hear and understand words spoken in a low tone; that the inter- 
course produced upon her clitoris a pleasurable sensation; that this was preceded by 
the pain of a ruptured hymen; that she did not speak; that she felt a desire to resist 
physically, endeavored to do so, but could not; that the act was followed by pregnancy, 

and the birth of a child in 276 days; that she was a vigorous girl, in her seventeenth 
year, virtuous, truthful, of limited education and intelligence; that the act was at the 
proper time for the return of the menstrual period, but before any actual discharge ; 
it will be important to ascertain whether there is any stage in the effect of chloroform 
upon the human system where these facts can exist consistently with the idea that 
such intercourse could be had without her consent. 

“The inquiry may be assisted by ascertaining whether the various powers of the 
mind and body fade away under the influence of chloroform, gradually and coequally, 
and return in like manner, as the influence passes off; or whether some—and if so, 
what ones—precede others in thus fading away and being restored, and the order 
thereof, in all the various stages of the influence; and whether some—and if so, 
what—faculties are retained, and the extent and capacity of them. 

‘“‘In the case which I have assumed, where the sense of hearing remained, and the 
sensations of pain and pleasure were felt in a greater or less degree, these facts would 
tend to show that the stage or condition of anesthesia had either not been reached, or 
was past; and if so, it might be much more probable that memory would retain its 
power than if the facts were otherwise. And if the capacity to remember existed, 
statements made by its aid might be reliable. But as failure to resist by word and 
act, having the capacity to do so, would be strong if not sufficient evidence of acqui- 
escence in the covtion, it would at once become necessary to determine if the faculties 
of hearing and feeling could coexist in a sound body, without either the capacity to 
speak or make forcible resistance. If that be not possible, then due weight should 
be given to such consideration, in determining whether she acquiesced in the coition. 
But if the capacity to hear, feel, and remember be consistent with incapacity to speak 
or forcibly resist, then the evidence of guilt may thereby be enhanced. What may 
be the truth, you will determine from the evidence in the case. 

“But if the prosecutrix had the capacity to hear, feel, and remember, and a capacity 
to speak and forcibly resist, but the inclination to do so was lost, the will overcome by 
the action of chloroform, either operating upon the will faculty, or the judgment and 


436 


BOOK IIrI.] RAPE ON IDIOTS. [§ 463 


§ 460. (6.) From ignorance of the nature of an act.—A striking instance 
of this is to be found in the case of the imbecile girl already mentioned, who 
had no notion of what the sexual act consisted, and who was totally unable to 
account for her pregnancy, except by the statement that her cousin had played 
with her on the sofa.(/) 

§ 461. In England the point received a judicial decision on the trial] of a 
physician, who had sexual connection with a young girl, who made no resist- 
ance, solely from a belief that the defendant was, as he represented, treating 
her medically. All the judges held the case was rape.( ff) And it was said 
in another case, where the patient was directed to lean forward, for the pur- 
pose of receiving an injection, and where sexual intercourse was then attempted, 
that if the attempt had succeeded, rape would have been complete. (g) 

§ 462. It is no defence, also, that the party ravished gave consent, or even 
aided in the commission of the offence, when from her very tender years she is 
to be presumed incapable of knowing the nature of the act.(h) 

§ 463. From the same reasoning it results that it is a rape to have carnal 
intercourse with an idiotic or insane woman, even though her consent is given, 
she being incapable of intelligent submission. (7) 


reflective faculties (or sexual emotions), so that the mind was thereby incapable of 
fairly comprehending the nature and consequences of sexual intercourse, and the de- 
fendant, knowing these facts, had unlawful carnal knowledge of her, forcibly, that 
would be a rape. And it would in such case be wholly immaterial whether the entire 
mind was disordered and overthrown, or only such faculties thereof as are rendered 
incapable of having just conceptions, and drawing therefrom correct conclusions, in 
relation to the alleged rape. 

‘‘ Whether the physical or mental capacities I have named could operate normally 
while other faculties of the mind—as the judgment, the understanding, the reflective 
and reasoning faculties—were so deranged or overthrown as to destroy the capacity to 
comprehend the nature and consequences of coition, is a question of fact for the jury 
to determine, upon all the evidence in the case. 

“But if the prosecutrix had the capacity to hear, feel, remember, speak, and to resist, 
or in any event, it should not be presumed her will was overcome, without proof of 
that fact beyond a reasonable doubt. 

“Tf chloroform may produce delusion in the mind of its subject in any one of its 
stages, you will inquire if it existed in this case; whether its existence is consistent® 
with the other mental and physical phenomena which you may find to have existed ; 
and you will give due effect to your conclusions on this subject. 

“ With these principles as to what are necessary to constitute rape, the jury will 
proceed to inquire into the prominent points of controversy, and ascertain if it is 
proved that the defendant forcibly had unlawful knowledge of Jane Gray; and if so, 
was it against her will?” 

(The judge then read to the jury section 212 of 3 Greenl. Ev., and section 468 of 
Wharton and Stillé’s Med. Jur., and called the attention of the jury to the prominent 
points of evidence relied upon to prove and disprove the fact of sexual intercourse, 
and upon the subject of acquiescence. ) 

Verdict of the jury, Guilty. 

Motion for new trial overruled. 

Motion in arrest of judgment continued to next term, by agreement of counsel. 

(f) See ante, § 445. 

(7) R. v. Case, 1 Eng. R. 544; Wh. Cr. Law, § 1143. 

(g) R. v. Stanton, 1 Car. & Kir. 415. 

(h) Hays v. People, 1 Hill, N. Y. R. 351. 

(7) This point was lately affirmed by a highly respectable Ohio court, in the follow- 
ing case: The defendant was indicted—1. For having committed a rape on the person 
of Louisa Dowler; 2. For an assault with the intent to commit arape on said Louisa ; 
and, 3. For having carnal knowledge, she, the said Louisa, being an insane woman, 
and he, said defendant, knowing her to be such. The defendant pleaded not guilty, 
and the cause was tried by a jury at the March Term of the Court of Common Pleas. 
The evidence on the trial proved that the said Louisa Dowler was of unsound mind, 


437 


§ 464] LEGAL RELATIONS OF RAPE. [BOOK III. 


§ 464. (c.) From mistake of person.—Very early in the judicial history 
of this country, a conviction of rape was sustained in New York by a very 


\ 


and had been so from her nativity: though she was not so absolutely destitute of 
mind that she did not perform the necessary functions and calls of humanity; but 
that she had not mind enough to testify as a witness or to be held legally responsible 
for her acts, whether civil or criminal. The words of the statute are: That if any 
male person, 17 years old and upwards, shall have carnal knowledge of any other 
woman than his wife, such woman being insane, he knowing her to be such, every 
person so offending shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction 
thereof, shall be imprisoned in the penitentiary and kept at hard labor not more than 
ten nor less than three years. Mr. Knowles for the State, Messrs. Nye and Jewett for 
defendant, claimed that the said Louisa being an idiot, had no will, and therefore that 
a rape could not be committed on her person against her will: it was further claimed 
that the word insane, in the 6th section of the Act, did not embrace an idiot, and 
hence the defendant could not be convicted of either of the charges embraced in the 
indictment. Mr. Justice Nash.—It is claimed, jirst, that a female idiot is not the sub- 
ject of a rape; that she has no will, and hence an act cannot be done to her person 
against her will. No authorities are cited for this startling position. On looking into 
the books I can find no such distinction intimated; and if such was the law, it is 
singular that so important a qualification of the crime of rape should not have been 
noticed hitherto in any treatise on this subject. Rape is defined to be, the having 
carnal knowledge of a female forcibly and against her will. There is here no limit to 
the use of the word female; nothing said as to the soundness or unsoundness of her 
mind as to idiocy or insanity. In this respect our statute follows the common law, 
and must therefore be construed as the same words were construed in the definition 
of the crime at common law. There is another consideration not to be overlooked. 
The section providing for punishing assaults with a criminal intent, declares that an 
assault committed on another with the intent to commit a rape, shall be criminal. 
Now, if a rape cannot be committed on the person of an idiot, then it is no crime to 
assault her person with such an intent. The same question applies also to assaults 
committed on an insane person ; since this argument places them without the protec- 
tion of the law, punishing the crime of rape. Nor are insane persons protected under 
the 6th section, since the crime there described is committed only when the perpetrator 
knows the woman to be insane. Indeed, that section is clearly limited to the case of 
a male person’s knowingly having sexual knowledge of an insane female without 
resistance on her part, and with her acquiescence. Hence this section cannot. be 
made to embrace the case of one having such sexual intercourse forcibly and against 
the will or resistance of such insane female.. It is further claimed that an idiot is not 
an insane person under the meaning of that term in the 6thsection. The result, then, 
follows, that a female idiot is left wholly unprotected against this class of crimes. A 
person cannot be punished for having carnal knowledge of her person forcibly and 
against her will, as she has no will to overcome; she is not an insane person, and so 
not under the protection of the 6th section, and neither an idiot nor an insane female 
is protected against assaults with intent to commit a rape, since a rape cannot be com- 
mitted on the person of either. It must require some very cogent reasoning, or some 
very convincing authorities before the court could be induced to give a construction 
to a statute which must lead to such results. But here is no such authority ; no such 
decision has been found. Is there any more force in this reasoning? Let us examine 
it fora moment. In the first place, where the carnal knowledge is had by /foree, it 
must be against the will of the female. Nor need there be any direct evidence of 
this action of the will; the law implies the want of consent from the force itself. It 
is the consent of the female which takes away all criminality from this connection; it 
is this want of consent which renders this connection, obtained by force, criminal. 
Hence if an idiot has no will to be overcome, she has none to consent, and then the 
law implies that the act being accomplished by force is done against her will. But is 
it true that an idiot or insane person has no will? What is the definition of these 
two words? Do they imply a loss of will or a mere unsoundness of mind? These 
words are thus defined by Webster: “Idiot—a natural fool, a fool from birth ; a human 
being, in form, but destitute of reason or the ordinary intellectual powers of man. 
Insane—unsound in mind or intellect; mad; deranged in mind;” and one of the 
words used to define insanely, is foolishly. Fool is defined to be one who is destitute 
of reason or the common powers of understanding; an idiot. Some persons are born 
fools, and are called natural fools; others may become fools by some injury done to 
the brain. In Chitty’s Medical Jurisprudence, p. 348, an idiot is defined to be “a 
person who has been defective in intellectual powers, from the instant of his birth, or 
at least before his mind had received the impression of any idea.”? Again, Chitty 


438 


BOOK III.] . RAPE ON IDIOTS. [§ 464 


eminent judge—Thompson, C. J.—upon evidence showing that the prosecu- 
trix mistook the defendant for her husband, and permitted his embraces, under 
that impression.(%) The same point was again taken in subsequent cases : 
one in New York,(/) and another in Connecticut.(m) In England it was at 
first thought that such evidence would not sustain a conviction ;(n) though 
afterwards, convictions of the assault with intent, were ordered.(o) The in- 


says “that idiocy consists in a defect or sterility of the intellectual powers ; but it 
may be induced in after life; while lunacy or madness consists in a perversion of 
intellect.”” All these definitions imply either a weakness or perversion of the mind, or its 
powers, not their destruction. The powers are still all present but in an impaired and 
weakened state. Hence an idiot cannot be said to have no will, but a will weakened 
and impaired—a will acting, but not acting in conformity to those rules, and motives, 
and views which control the action of the will in persons of sound mind. Indeed, in 
an insane person the will is too often fearfully active, and wholly uncontrollable by 
reason or persuasion. There is here no lack of will, but simply a perversion of it. Nor 
is this the most conclusive answer tothis argument. If there is no will, how are volun- 
tary actions continued? Not only actions which, like respiration, are instinctive, and 
independent of the will; but eating and numerous other acts which necessarily imply 
the exercise of the will are performed by idiots and insane persons ; and their exercise 
demonstrates the existence of a will—of a will which can assent to, or dissent from, 
what are clearly voluntary acts. I have therefore no hesitation in holding, that both 
idiots and insane persons are possessed of a will, so that it may be legally and meta- 
physically said, that a carnal knowledge may be had of their persons forcibly and 
against their will. The next inquiry is, what is the proper construction to be given to 
the word insane? In the 6th section of the act for the punishment of crimes, Curren’s 
Revised Statutes, p. 184, that section provides: “ That if any male person seventeen 
years old and upward, shall have carnal knowledge of any woman, other than his 
wife, such woman being insane, he knowing her to be such, shall be deemed guilty,” 
&e. It is claimed that this word insane does not embrace a female who is an idiot. 
We have already seen that idiocy may be induced after infancy, as well as be con- 
genital, Chitty’s Med. Jurisp. p. 347, and that both terms are defined by the same 
words, unsoundness of mind. In the one case this unsoundness of mind develops its 
existence in want of capacity to reason at all; or, at least, in a much less degree than 
the generality of mankind; while in the other there is, perhaps, greater acuteness, 
though upon false and fancied hypothesis. (Chitty’s Med. Jurisprudence, p. 348.) 
Still, in both cases, unsoundness of mind is the cause. The very origin of the word 
insane demonstrates this ; in its Latin origin, it is a word simply meaning unsoundness 
and nothing more; and in the popular language it is used in this sense to this day, 
whatever may be the specific meaning attached to it by writers on mental diseases. 
If, then, the object and policy of this statute embraces idiots as well as lunatics, there 
is nothing in the use of the word insane which absolutely precludes us from giving 
that elementary meaning to the word in this statute. The reason of this provision 
clearly applies to idiots as well as to lunatics; if there is any reason in the case of 
female lunatics, why sexual intercourse with them should be prohibited, equally 
strong is the reason why it should not be permitted with female idiots. If the off- 
spring in one case might be affected with insanity, so in the other it might with 
idiocy. Whateyer reason, therefore, can be found to so declare the law in relation to 
female lunatics will apply equally forcibly to idiots. If the one class ought to be 
protected, equally so ought the other. Such, then, being the manifest scope of the 
law, I can have no hesitation in concluding that such was the intention of the legis- 
lature; that this word insane was used in its elementary and popular meaning, as 
descriptive of that unsoundness of mind, which renders individuals civilly and crimi- 
nally irresponsible for their acts, whether the unsoundness uncloses itself in idiocy or 
lunacy. In accordance with these views J hold that a female idiot, or an insane 
female, is the subject of rape; and, hence of an assault with the intent to commit 
that crime; and that a male person, of proper age, who shall have carnal knowledge 
of a female idiot, knowing her to be such, is guilty, under the 6th section, of having 
carnal knowledge of an insane woman, knowing her to be such. The jury were so 
charged and they returned a verdict of guilty of an assault with an intent to commit 
a rape, and not guilty on the other two counts. And sentence was passed on the pri- 
soner.—State v. Crow, Common Pleas of Athens County, Ohio.— Western Law Journal, 
vol. x. pp. 501-5. 

(k) 1 Wheel. C. C. 381. (1) People v. Metcalf, 1 Wheel. C. C. 378. 

(m) State v. Shepard, 7 Conn. 54. (n) R. v. Jackson, R. & R. 487. 

(o) R. v. Saunders, 3 C. & P. 265; R. v. Williams, id. 286. 

439 


§ 468] CONNECTION UNDER MISTAKE OF PERSON. [BOOK III. 


timation, at the same time, was thrown out, that if the question arose again, 
it would be reconsidered; and, indeed, it is difficult to reconcile an acquittal 
under such circumstances, with a conviction upon evidence that consent was 
given under the impression that the act was, as it was represented to be by the 
aggressor, an application in a course of medical treatment. (p) 

In Virginia, Tennessee, and Alabama, it would seem that such intercourse 
does not constitute rape. (pp) 

§ 465. (d.) From fear.—If consent is forced by fear of death, or by duress, 
it is no defence that such consent was given.(q) 

§ 466. (2.) Prior want of character of prosecutrix.—While it is no de- 
fence that the woman was a common strumpet, or even that she was the de- 
fendant’s mistress, the question of prior chastity is always a material one to 
be considered by the medical examiner, since unchastity can be shown by the 
defendant, not as an excuse or justification, but as a fact throwing much light 
on the value of her testimony. ‘Thus it has been expressly decided, that it is 
competent for the defendant to show that the prosecutrix’s previous character 
for chastity was bad, and that she had before been connected with himself; 
though the general opinion in England has been, that he cannot show particu- 
lar acts of unchastity, except those committed with himself.(7) But, even in 
England, a wider range seems now to be encouraged, it having been held 
admissible to ask the prosecutrix ‘“ whether she was not, on the Friday last, 
walking on the High-street to look out for men,” and, upon her denying this, 
to call witnesses to contradict her.(s) And in New York it is-now ruled, 
that the prosecutrix may be asked whether she had not had previous connec- 
tion with other men; and that, in such case, she is not privileged from answer- 
ing. (¢) 

§ 467. The object of such testimony is twofold: 1st, in making the fact of 
coercion less likely ; and, 2d, in diminishing the witness’s weight as respects 
credibility generally. It is less likely that a strumpet, or one holding herself 
out as submitting to illicit intercourse, though on special inducements or occa- 
sions alone, would resist to the extremity which a prosecution for rape requires, 
than would a chaste woman. And although, under ordinary circumstances, 
it is inadmissible to impeach veracity by attacking chastity, yet, in such an 
issue as the present, this seems but proper. Such being the case, it will be 
seen that medical testimony as to the prosecutrix’s prior condition is of pe- 
culiar value. Evidence of any prior venereal complaints, or of any other 
facts tending to prove previous illicit intercourse, it is always proper, under 
such circumstances, to receive. 

§ 468. (3.) Subsequent suppression of the fact by prosecutrix.—lIt is here 
that the presence or absence of a medical examination tells most forcibly. The 
omission of the friends of the injured party to obtain an instantaneous medical 


(p) See Wharton’s Cr. Law, § 1144. (pp) Ibid. © 

(g) 1 Hawk. P. C. Ca. 41; Whar. C. L. § 1142. 

(r) R. v. Hodgson R. & R. 2; R. v. Clarke, 211 Stark. 243; R. v. Barker, 3 C. & 
P. 589; R. v. Martin, 6 C. & P. 562. See People v. Abbott, 19 Wend. 192; Campo ». 
State, 3 Kelley, 417. Whar. C. L. §§ 1149-51. 

(s) R. v. Barket, 3 C. & P. 589. 

(t) People v. Abbott, 19 Wend. 192. 


440 


BOOK IlI.]| EXTENT TO WHICH ACT MUST BE CONSUMMATED. [§ 469 


inspection may be their misfortune, arising from ignorance or false shame; 
but it is better that they should suffer from it, in the acquittal of the offender, 
than that the stimulus to supposititious prosecutions be given, which will always 
result from dispensing with this most salutary check. It is not, of course, 
pretended that the want of immediate medical inspection is a legal bar. This 
it is not; for no matter how suspicious the omission may be, it is for the court 
to leave the whole question of the reality of the alleged rape to the jury alone. 
But it is maintained that it is a salutary rule of policy, which juries should 
themselves enforce, in no case to sustain a prosecution for rape unless the pro- 
secutrix’s evidence is corroborated by the testimony of experienced persons, 
medical or otherwise, who were called in to inspect her person as soon after 
the occurrence as the circumstances of the case would allow. And such seems 
to be the case in England, where the courts agree in telling the jury that unless 
there be positive medical evidence of some sort of violence to the person, there 
is not sufficient penetration to constitute the offence. (w) 

The nature and character of the testimony so to be obtained has been 
already discussed. Under this head it is enough to say that in all cases the 
results of, as well as the fact of, an examination are admissible evidence. It 
is admissible, also, for the prosecutrix to prove that she made a complaint, 
though she cannot put in evidence what were the particulars of her state- 
ment. (v) 

§ 469. (4.) Hatent to which coition was carried.—The English law, as to 
the extent to which the act must have been consummated, has undergone much 
fluctuation. Thus it was at first held that emission must be proved. Great 
difficulty was thus produced, which was obviated by the statute of 9 Geo. IV. 
¢c. 31, which dispensed with proof of emission. Then the question arose as 
to the degree to which penetration must be shown to have taken place. In 
Ireland it was said, somewhat loosely, by Lord Carlton, C. J., in 1800,(w) 
that it was enough if the prosecutrix swore to “carnal knowledge of her 
person.” But in England it has always been held that the entrance of the 
private parts of the man within the private parts of the woman must be spe- 
cifically proved. The first case tried on this point laid down a rule which, 
though once or twice subsequently departed from, may now be considered as 
the settled law, viz., that though it is not necessary to prove the hymen to 
have been ruptured, yet the evidence of penetration must be positive.(7) The 
only point in which this rule has fluctuated has been in respect to the necessity 
of a rupture of the hymen. Thus, in 1832, in a case before Mr. Baron Gur- 
NEY, that learned judge said that “if the hymen is not ruptured, there is not 
a sufficient penetration to constitute the offence.”’(y) In 1839, however, Chief 
Justice TrnDAL declared the only question for the jury to be, whether the 
private parts of the man did or did not enter into the person of the woman ; 
and that, therefore, though it appear from the evidence, beyond all possibility 
of doubt, that the party was disturbed immediately after penetration, and 
before the completion of his purpose, yet he must be found guilty of having 


(u) R. v. Gammon, 5 C. & P. 321, post, §§ 469,470. (v) Wharton’s C. L. § 1150. 
(w) R. v. Lidwell, 1 M’Nally’s Evid. 606. 
(x) R. v. Russen, 1 East, P. C. 438, 439. (y) R. v. Gammon, 5 C. & P. 321. 


: 44] 


§ 470] RAPE. ; [Book II. 


committed the complete offence of rape.(z) In the same year a boy named 
John Jordan was indicted for carnally knowing a girl under ten years; and 
there being no evidence of a rupture of the hymen, it was insisted by the pri- 
soner’s counsel, on the authority of Gammon’s case, just cited, that the offence 
had not been completed. The defendant was acquitted on other grounds; but 
Mr. Justice WititAMs told the jury, “I am of opinion, as matter of law, that 
it is not essential that the hymen should be ruptured. In the case of Rex v. 
Gammon it was proved that the hymen was ruptured, and the point was, 
therefore, not necessary to the decision of that case. I also think that it is 
impossible to lay down any express rule as to what constitutes penetration. 
All I can say is, that the parts of the male must be inserted in those of the 
female, but I cannot suggest any rule as to the extent.’’(a) 

§ 470. Shortly previous to this, though not reported until afterwards, was 
a trial before. Mr. Justice BoSANQUET, in which Mr. Justice CoLERIDGE and 
Mr. Justice CortMAN concurred with that learned judge in saying that it ‘‘is 
not necessary, in order to complete the offence, that the hymen should be rup- 
tured; but that, where that which is so very near the entrance has not been 
ruptured, it is very difficult to come to the conclusion that there has been 
penetration so as to sustain a charge of rape.’’? In consequence of this charge, 
the defendant was acquitted of the rape, and convicted of the assault, although 
there was evidence from the surgeon who attended the injured party that her 
private parts internally were very much inflamed, but that, in consequence, he 
could not tell whether the hymen was ruptured or not.(b) In 1841, however, 
the question was put to rest by a case which came before the twelve judges, in 
which the early decision of R. v. Russen was finally reviewed and sustained. 
The prisoner was charged with having feloniously ravished Mary Ann Wesley ; 
and it was very clearly proved by her—she being a girl between eleven and 
twelve years of age—as well as by a woman who detected the prisoner in the 
act, that carnal intercourse had been attempted. With respect to penetration, 
a surgeon was called, who deposed to the appearances in and about the child’s 
private parts, and stated his belief that penetration had taken place, but that 
the hymen, which in the prosecutrix was placed at the usual distance from the 
opening, had not been ruptured. The jury returned a verdict'of guilty, finding 
“that there had been penetration, but that the penetration had not proceeded 
to the rupture of the hymen.’ On this finding the prisoner was sentenced, 
and the judgment sustained by all the judges.(c) In accordance with this 
result, in a case tried in 1844, where the surgeon deposed that ‘the hymen of 
the child was not ruptured, but that upon the hymen was a venereal sore, 
which must have arisen from actual contact with the virile member of a man,’’ 
Mr. Baron Parke left it to the jury to say “whether, at any time, any part 
of the virile member of the man was within the labia of the pudendum of the 
prosecutrix; for if ever it was (no matter how little), that will be sufficient to 
constitute a penetration, and the jury ought to convict the prisoner of the 
complete offence.” The verdict was, not guilty.(d) 


(z) R. v. Allen, 9 C. & P. 31. (a) R. v. Jordan, 9 C. & P. 118: 
(b) R. v. M’Rue, 8 C. & P. 641, (c) R. v. Hughes, 8 C. & P. 752. 
(d) R. v. Lines, 1 C. & K. 393. 


442 : 


ine 2 Aol le ws as ieee, he ee 


Oe Le a LT 


ae 


BOOK III.] LEGAL RELATIONS OF RAPE. [§ 472 


§ 471. In this country, the rule thus laid down—that there must be some 
entrance proved of the male within the female organ, but that neither rupture 
of the hymen nor emission need be proved—has been universally followed. (e) 
Perhaps the furthest limit to which it has reached, is in a recent case in Phila- 
delphia, where, though there was no medical examination, it was held that 
proof by the prosecutrix of pain in the sexual organ, and of the juxtaposition 
at the time of the defendant’s face to her own—she at the time being in a den- 
tist’s chair, under the influence of ether—was enough to justify a jury in pre- 
suming that there was penetration, and that the penetration was sexual. The 
general result of both medical and legal opinion, however, is, that while the 
learned and able judge who tried the case properly left it to the jury as a ques- 
tion of fact, as he was obliged to do, to determine whether penetration had 
taken place, the verdict was not sustained by the evidence, and forms an unsafe 
precedent for the future.(/) 

§ 472. (5.) Want of age of defendant.—There is an absolute rule, in this 
respect, at common law, viz., that an infant under fourteen is to be presumed 
positively incapable of committing a rape, though he may be convicted of an 
assault with an intent to ravish.(g) Over fourteen, this question resolves it- 
self into the ordinary one of capacity. 

(6.) Want of sexual capacity of defendant.—This is purely a medical 
question, which has been examined under another head.(h) 


(e) State v. Leblanc, 3 Brevard, 339; Penns. v. Sullivan, Add. 143; Stroud v. Com. 
118. & R. 177; Com. v. Thomas, 1 Virg. Cases, 307. See Wh. C. L. § 1137. 

(7) Com. v. Beale, Phil. 1854, cited Whar. C. L. (3d ed.) 518-9; see ante, § 443 
et seq. 


(g) Wharton’s Cr. Law, § 1134. (h) See ante, § 419-425. 
443 


BeOiO Key LP Ne 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO IDENTITY. 


PAGIN Avey Le CA te a Lie 


CHAPTER I. 
IDENTIFICATION OF THE LIVING OR DEAD. 


Ist. CASES OF DOUBTFUL IDENTITY, § 473. 
2d. MEANS OF IDENTIFICATION, § 474. 
(1.) Establishing age from the skeleton, § 474-5. 
(2.) By means of the teeth, § 477. 
(3.) Determination of sex from inspection of the skeleton, § 478. 
(4.) Fractures, deformities, and peculiarities in the dead body, § 479. 
(5.) Cicatrices, § 481. 
(6.) Hair, § 483. 
(7.) The length of time that has elapsed since death, § 484. 
(a.) Heat as influencing decomposition, § 485. 
(b.) Air as influencing decomposition, § 487. 
(c.) Water as influencing decomposition, § 488. 
(d.) Dryness and moisture of the soil as influencing decomposition, 
§ 489. 
(8.) Putrefaction in the foetus, § 491. 
(9.) Influence of lime on the putrefactive process, § 492. 


§ 473. Ist. Cases of doubtful identity.—Many curious cases of doubtful or 
disputed identity might be cited to illustrate the singular fortuitous resemblance 
between individuals, not only in their general personal appearance, but also in 
accidental marks. Other cases also might be related, in which long absence 
and various circumstances have so changed a person, that his nearest relatives 
have not been able to recognize him. Usually, in cases of disputed identity, 
whether of the dead or living, a scar, a deformity, or some congenital or in- 
delible mark, as a nevus maternus, or mother’s mark, a mole, tattooing, &c., 
has proved the only means of recognition. 

Salomé Muller sued for her liberty before the courts of Louisiana, alleging 
that she was a white woman, and had come over from Germany with her 
parents, at the age of three years. Since that time she had been held in 
slavery. She was recognized by her resemblance to her family, and further 
identified by the existence of two small nevi materni upon the inside of each 

444 ; 


= ———~ 


BOOK IV.] IDENTIFICATION OF THE DEAD. [$ 478 


thigh, which were correctly described by the midwife who assisted at her birth, 
and the woman who took care of her upon the Atlantic passage, after the 
death of her mother. (a) 

Usually, medical testimony can hardly be required respecting the identity 
of the living. In disputed cases, it may become necessary for the physician 
to give his opinion respecting the permanence of scars, tattoo marks, and con- 
genital or acquired deformities. But more frequently he is called upon to 
assist in the identification of the dead, or to state after how long a period of 
time and under what circumstances such identification is possible. Kriigelstein 
says that he assisted at the inquest upon the body of a man found dead in a 
morass. The body was recognized by a number of persons present, as well as 
by the wife of the deceased, who, however, remarked that her husband when 
he had left her, wore a different jacket from the one on the body. Some time 
afterwards, however, the man who was supposed to have been dead, came 
home again, and upon investigation it was finally discovered that the deceased 
was a person belonging to a neighboring village, who had left his home at an 
early age, and upon his return was recognized by no one. ‘The likeness be- 
tween the two men, it is stated, was most extraordinary.(b) Dr. Kinlock, 
of Drumoak, Aberdeenshire, relates a case of mistaken identity under extra- 
ordinary circumstances. The body of a man between sixty and seventy years 
of age, was found slightly imbedded in the sand, on the bank of a river; both 
eyes had been picked out by hooded crows, but decomposition had made no 
progress, The left ear and the first finger of the left hand were wanting, 
having the appearance of having been lost in early life. The body was con- 
veyed to a suitable place, and persons were requested by advertisements to 
come and identify it. After some time, two young women claimed it as the 
body of their father, who, they stated, was a lawyer; that he was in the habit 
of leaving home for two or three weeks at a time, without informing them 
where he went, and that he had lost the left ear, and first finger of his left 
hand. They apparently recognized the clothes and the body, and gave vent 
to expressions of grief on the event. Subsequent doubts in the mind of the 
one sister were overruled by the confident affirmations of the other. The 
funeral took place accordingly, and was attended by the daughters and friends 
of the supposed deceased lawyer. Returning from the funeral, the boatman 
of the ferry which they had to cross, asked them for whom they were in 
mourning, and upon receiving their answer, laughingly informed them that he 
had, only half an hour before, ferried their father over alive and well, and 
directed them where they would find him. This, to their great joy, proved 
true. Whose was the body they had buried in the churchyard at Drumoak 
remained undiscovered.(c) Cases might be indefinitely multiplied by citations 


(a) Beck, vol. ii. p. 664, from the Monthly Law Reporter, Boston, 1845, Wh. C. L. 
(2d ed.) 337. 

(b) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1850, 4 H. . 

(c) Ed. Month Journ. Feb. 1854. The following curious case occurred in Boston: it 
was said that upon the testimony of the captain of a vessel and six of his crew, a man 
named James Guard had been arrested by the police on the charge of attempting to 
rob a vessel, but was afterwards released on its appearing that he could not be the 
man, as on the night of the robbery he was safely slumbering in the watchhouse of 


445 


§ 474] IDENTIFICATION OF THE DEAD. [BOOK Iv. 


from the annals of criminal procedure, to show that nothing is more common 
than the failure of the nearest friends to identify the body of a deceased person, 
or than the most positive judicial testimony in regard to the identity of per- 
sons found dead, but which subsequent events have proved to be utterly erro- 
neous. 

§ 474, 2d. Means of identification.—The means of recognizing from the 
skeleton the age of the deceased, are found chiefly in an observation of the 
degree of ossification. A brief description of this process at different ages 
up to the time at which it is completed, will enable us to determine the ques- 
tion in an appropriate manner. One of the most reliable indications of age 
in the skeleton of a supposed new-born child, will be found in the osseous 
point in the cartilaginous epiphysis of the lower extremity of the femur. Its 
importance in this relation was first pointed out by Beclard, but has lately 
been further substantiated by the observations of Ollivier and Mildner.(d) At 
the commencement of the last month of intra-uterine existence, there may be 
seen upon a transverse section of this epiphysis, a spot which is more vascular 
and darker than the surrounding structure, in the midst of which a body of 
the size of a poppy seed or the head of a fly may be recognized, which, upon 
drying, will be found to be of newly formed bony matter. At the time of 
birth, this osseous point has attained the size of a pea or lentil, is hollow and 
incloses a porous and vascular substance ; the shell itself being of a firm, bony 
nature. From the observations of the above-mentioned authors, it results 
that, 1st. If this osseous point be wanting, the skeleton is that of a foetus of 
not more than eight months; 2d. When it has attained the size of a poppy 
seed or the head of a fly, the foetus is probably in the last month of gesta- 
tion; 3d. When it has acquired a diameter of one and a quarter lines, the 
full period has been reached; and, 4th. If the point of ossification be three 
lines, or more, it may be assumed that the child has lived after its birth. These 


the North End, whither he had repaired for lodging. It was also stated, that on Monday 
night a body was found in the water at the end of Commercial Wharf, which an officer 
of the north station testified before a coroner’s jury was the body of the unfortunate 
James Guard, who, but a night previous, had been so falsely charged with crime, but 
who, nevertheless, appeared to have rather suddenly come to a tragic end. 

The coroner’s jury had no doubt, from the testimony of the officer, that the body 
was really that of James Guard, and they returned a verdict in accordance thereto, 
stating that “James Guard came to his death by accidental drowning.” Thus the 
matter was deemed and considered to be settled, when—so runs the report—last night, 
as the aforesaid officer sat meditating in his office, at the station house, upon matters 
connected, no doubt, with the city’s welfare, the door slowly opened, and what ap- 
peared to be the body of James Guard entered. In these days, a police officer is not 
apt to be a believer in ghosts, but, for a moment, thoughts of that character flitted 
through his brain. A request for lodgings uttered in no ghostly tones, awakened him 
to a sense of reality, and an explanation ensued, when it appeared that James Guard, 
who had been once charged with robbery, and on the oath of a coroner’s jury with 
having been picked up drowned, was in reality alive and kicking, with sufficient love 
of the things of this world to receive with gratitude‘the gift of a soup ticket, presented 
to him by the penitent police officer. Thus the body now lying in the dead-house is 
not that of James Guard, but of some one who so closely resembled him as to have 
been mistaken for him by a dozen persons. It is probably fortunate for the living, 
that this ‘ Dromio,” who might have continued to work mischief for him, has really 
deceased. It is, certainly, a strong case of personal resemblance. Boston Law Re- 
porter, vol. viii. No. 1, page 55, &c. 

(d) Prag. Vierteljahrschrift, 4, 1850. 


446 


BOOK IV.] AGE. [§ 475 


statements have been verified by their authors, but, it is needless to say, that 
having so important a bearing upon questions of infanticide, as well as upon 
other questions not less vital in their character, much additional confirmation 
is required to entitle them to our unreserved confidence. 

§ 475. The length of the skeleton of a new-born, mature child is between 
fifteen and sixteen inches. At the end of the first year, the two sides of the 
frontal bone are united in half their length, the fontanelles diminish in size, 
the temporal bone is still composed of four pieces, and the four incisor teeth 
have appeared. Points of ossification are found in the coracoid process of the 
scapula, in the ensiform cartilage, and in the patella. At the end of the second 
year, the length is about thirty-two inches; the four portions of the temporal 
bone form but one piece; the anterior fontanelle is usually closed, and both 
halves of the os frontis are united. Two canine and four molar teeth have made 
their appearance. The pelvic bones, which are afterwards consolidated in the 
acetabulum, touch each other; the epiphyses of the metatarsal and metacarpal 
bones are ossified, and points of ossification are seen in the lower end of the 
tibia and fibula. At the expiration of the ¢hird year, the sutures of the bones 
of the head have a zigzag appearance ; all the first set of teeth are fully ex- 
truded ; the odontoid process of the second vertebra is firmly united with the 
body; the spinous processes of the vertebree ossify, as do the trochanter major, 
the patella and the cuneiform bones. At the end of the fourth year, the 
child is about three feet long, the styloid process of temporal bone is formed, 
and the process of ossification, continues in the parts mentioned. In the fifth 
and szxth year, no further trace of the division of the os frontis is found; the 
sutures unite, the arches of the vertebrae become united with the bodies and 
the lower extremity of the ulna, and the pisiform bones are ossified. In 
the seventh and eighth year, the second set of teeth replace the first. If the 
eight permanent incisors are present, the age is probably at least nine years. 
The canine and molar teeth make their appearance between the tenth and 
twelfth year, with the exception of the last molar, which is very irregular in 
the period of its extrusion. Orfila describes the ossification at this period as 
follows: At eight years, the upper extremity of the radius; at nine, the 
navicular bone of the carpus; at twelve, the trochlea of the os humeri; from 
thirteen to fourteen, the trochanter minor and the three parts of the os inno- 
minatum, which last is sometimes delayed till the fifteenth year; and at fifteen, 
the sacral vertebree are united together. From this period up to the age of 
twenty-five, the same author observes that the process of ossification is most 
noticeable in the following points: From fifteen to sixteen, the coracoid pro- 
cess of the scapula is united with the body of the bone, and the acromion 
contains an ossific point; from fifteen to eighteen, an osseous point in the 
sternal end of the clavicle; from fifteen to twenty, ossification of the last bone 
of the coccyx. At sixteen years, an osseous point is seen in the head and 
tubercles of the ribs; at seventeen, bony union of the epiphyses of the pha- 
langes; and at eighteen, of the head and trochanter of the femur. From 
eighteen to twenty-five, union of the sphenoid and occipital bone of the three 
parts of the tibia; and from twenty to twenty-five, of the first piece of the 
sternum to the rest of the bone. Between twenty-five and thirty years, occurs 

447 


§ 477] STATURE, [BOOK IY. 


the complete union of the first to the second bone of the sacrum; from forty 
to Jifty, of the ensiform cartilage to the lower extremity of the sternum; and 
between this and the statieth year, the union of the sacrum and coccyx. In 
advanced life, the bones lose their density; the earthy matter predominates, 
and they hence become more brittle. According to Sémmering, they lose 
nearly a fourth part of their weight. They are yellower than in the previous 
years of life; the diploé in the flat bones disappears, so that the two plates of 
bone touch each other, are thin and sometimes lose their substance in this 
part, forming an opening. The sutures in the bones of the skull become in- 
distinct, and generally first on the inside of the cranium. The intervertebral 
substance loses its thickness, and the borders of the cervical vertebre are smaller 
before than behind. If the teeth have been lost, the alveolar processes become 
absorbed, but if they remain, they bear unmistakable signs of age in their 
yellow color and worn appearance. The ensiform cartilage is completely 
-ossified, as well as those of the ribs. There are, however, no such alterations 
in the condition of the skeleton as would give more than an approximate 
appreciation of the exact.age at this period of life.(e) 

§ 476. Statwre.—When the whole skeleton has been preserved, and the 
articulating ends of the long bones have not been wasted by decay, the height 
of the individual can be obtained by adding from one and a half to two inches 
to the length of the skeleton. Should, however, the bony remains be in a 
fragmentary condition, an accurate estimate of the height of the living person 
cannot be made. Orfila and Sue have, indeed, by assuming the superior 
border of the pubes to form the exact centre of the body (as it should do in a 
well-formed adult), considered it possible to calculate the height. The tables 
prepared by M. Orfila comprise, moreover, measurements of the several cylin- 
drical bones, from which he proposes to calculate the stature of the skeleton 
and of the living body.(/) Dr. Guy has found, however, upon a careful exa- 
mination of these tables, that they cannot be relied upon as accurate, since in 
one instance the upper half of the body exceeded in length the lower by five 
and.a half inches, and in another the excess was six inches in a contrary 
direction. By taking the average of all the measurements, this author states 
that we may be in error to the extent of two and a quarter inches; and in the 
table of the measurements of the cylindrical bones we may be led into error in 
calculating from them the height of the skeleton, to the extent of more than 
four inches, and in no case of less than one and three-quarter inches.(g) Hence, 
owing to the false inferences (which occasionally may be of serious importance) 
to which these calculations may lead, the physician should use great reserve in 
giving an opinion as to the stature of the body, from the inspection of merely 
a portion of the skeleton. . 

§ 477. (2.) Teeth.—The most striking part of the evidence by which the 
identification of the remains of the murdered Dr. Parkman was secured was 


(e) The foregoing statements have been taken chiefly from the works of Mendé, 
Nicholai, and Friedreich, who have devoted particular attention to the subject; also 
from Dr. J. Miller, Das Knochengeriiste des Menschen, &c., in Henke’s Zeitschrift for 
1852, 3 H. p. 62. 

(f) Traité de Méd. Lég. 4th ed. (g) Forensic Medicine, p. 24. 


448 


Da! 


BOOK IV.] TEETH. [$ 477 


that given by the dentist, Dr. Keep. He testified that about three years pre- 
viously he had made and fitted a set of teeth for.Dr. Parkman, a set for each 
jaw, consisting of manufactured artificial teeth, formed in combinations of three 
blocks to each jaw, and set upon gold plates fitted and adjusted thereto. He 
stated that several natural teeth and stumps remained, to which, as well as to 
the natural shape and peculiarities of the jaws, it was necessary that the plates 
should be adjusted. An attempt having been made to consume the head by 
fire, in an assay furnace, the gold had melted away, but the mineral teeth, 
being composed of an infusible material, remained, preserving more or less of 
their original shape. Dr. Keep recognized the blocks of mineral teeth as of his 
own manufacture, and as having been made for Dr. P., and showed that they 
could have belonged to no one else, from their correspondence with the trial- 
plate and the mould of the jaw of the deceased, which had been carefully 
preserved and marked with hisname. In addition, the lower jaw had a certain 
peculiarity of natural formation which served to distinguish it from others, 
and render the correspondence of the block of mineral teeth with it more sig- 
nificant than it might otherwise have been. 

Dr. Guy states that a doubtful case of identity, in Edinburgh, was decided 
by a dentist, who produced a cast of the gums which he had taken before 
death. So also the remains of the Marchioness of Salisbury, discovered 
among the ruins of Hatfield House, were identified by the jaw-bone having 
gold appendages for artificial teeth.(h) 

In Mr. Sargent’s history of Braddock’s expedition(?) is narrated a very 
interesting instance of identification by means of an artificial tooth. Sir 
Peter Halket, in 1758, after the reduction of Fort Du Quesne, proceeded to 
the spot of Braddock’s defeat for the purpose of discovering, if possible, the 
remains of his father, who was there killed. ‘In reply to his anxious ques- 
tions,” we are told, “‘one of his tawny guides had already told Halket that 
he recollected, during the combat, to have seen an officer fall beneath such a 
remarkable tree as he should have no difficulty in recognizing ; and, at the 
same moment, another, rushing to his side, was instantly shot down, and fell 
across his comrade’s body. As they drew near the spot, the detachment was 
halted, and the Indians peered about through the trees to recall their memories 
of the scene. With speaking gesture, they briefly discoursed in their own 
tongue. Suddenly, and with a shrill cry, the Indian of whom we have spoken 
sprang to the well-remembered tree. While the troops rested on their arms 
in a circle around, he and his companions searched among the thick fallen 
leaves. Ina moment, two gaunt skeletons were exposed lying together, the 
one upon the other, as they had died. ‘The hand that tore away their scalps 
had not disturbed their position ; but no sign remained to distinguish the relics 
from the hundred others that strewed the ground. At the moment, Sir Peter 
remembered him of a peculiar artificial tooth which his father bore. The 
bones were then separated, and an examination of those which lay undermost 
at once solved all doubts—‘ It is my father !’ exclaimed the unhappy youth, as 
he sunk into the arms of his scarce less affected friends.” 


(h) Guy’s Forensic Medicine, p. 23. (4) Philada. 1850, p. 277. 
29 449 


§ 478] SEX. [BOOK Iv. 


A most singular case of disputed identity, in which there was between two 
persons such a similarity of name, time, place, age, occupation, and circum- 
stances, as for a long time utterly to perplex the investigation, occurred in 
London. The body of a woman supposed to have been murdered, was miss- 
ing, and another woman was arrested upon suspicion of having secretly made 
way with her and sold her remains for dissection. Both direct and circum- 
stantial evidence brought the crime home to her. The day after the alleged 
murder, an old woman, of the description of the supposed deceased, was found, 
with a fractured thigh, lying exhausted in the streets. She gave her name as 
Caroline Walsh, and said that she was from Ireland. She died, and was 
buried at the London Hospital. The name of the missing woman was also 
Caroline Walsh, and she was also Irish. The prisoner, Elizabeth Ross, when 
arrested, insisted that this was the female whom she was accused of having 
murdered. Various points of difference were established by the evidence of a 
large number of witnesses, but the chief distinction was, that while it was 
stated that the missing woman had very perfect incisor teeth (a remarkable 
circumstance for her age, which was eighty-four), the other one, who died at 
the Hospital, had no front teeth, and the alveolar cavities corresponding to 
them had been obliterated for a considerable time. Moreover, the non-identity 
was further confirmed by the granddaughters of the missing woman, who 
swore that the exhumed body of Caroline Walsh was not that of their grand- 
mother. 

§ 478. (3.) Sex.—The determination of sex from an inspection of the 
skeleton, is seldom attended with much difficulty, and even when but a few of 
the bones remain it is sometimes possible to give a positive opinion relative to 
the sex of the deceased person. The general osseous development is greater 
in man than in woman; in two persons of equal weight, of the two sexes, 
the proportion is, according to Autenrieth, as 8:10. The skull of the female 
is a little smaller than that of the male, while the facial portion is obviously 
shorter and smaller; hence the apparent disproportion between the cranium 
and the face in the female. Its bones are also thinner, the forehead is lower 
and narrower, the frontal sinuses and all the foramina smaller, the orbits com- 
paratively larger, and the buccal and nasal cavities less capacious than in man. 
The thorax is shorter and narrower than in the male, and the difference is par- 
ticularly marked in the upper part ;. the clavicles are less bent, and the shoulders 
are lower and narrower, the arms and hands shorter, and the fingers more de- 
licate and pointed. The bodies of the lumbar vertebree are higher, and the 
intervertebral substance thicker than in the male skeleton. ‘The ribs are 
shorter, thinner, and flatter, and have sharper edges than in the male, and 
have also other peculiarities, which it is not necessary to dwell upon. The 
most striking difference, however, is in the pelvis; the hip-bones being more 
widely apart, and all the diameters of the true pelvis, both of its entrance, 
cavity, and outlet, being greater than in man ; the sacrum is more concave, the 
upper border of the symphysis pubis is inclined more forward, and the arch of 
the pubis is wider. On account of the greater width of the pelvis the hip- 
joints are further apart than in the male, although the trochanters are smaller; 
the neck of the femur forms an angle of 120°-125° with the body of the 

450 


a 


ee ee * 


BOOK IV. | FRACTURES, DEFORMITIES. [$ 480 


bone, while in the male it is from 127°-135° ; the femur is shorter, more bent, 
and directed obliquely inwards, and the tibia is also shorter, and the bones of 
the feet smaller and more delicate.(j) 

Some of these differences are not so striking in the skeletons of females ad- 
vanced in life, but the essential characters of the pelvic bones remain and are 
sufficient to indicate the sex.(/) 

§ 479. (4.) Fractures, deformities, and peculiarities in the dead body.— 
Dr. Taylor relates an instance in which the utility of evidence of this kind 
was shown. A gentleman was tried in India for the murder of a native. It 
was stated that the prisoner had struck the deceased, a few hours before his 
death, several blows upon the chest and had thereby broken his ribs. A ske- 
leton was produced as being that of the deademan, and upon examination it 
was found that one of the ribs had been broken, but that it was united by a 
firm osseous callus. Hence the opinion was very properly given that the 
fracture could not have been caused a few hours before death, but must have 
taken place from another cause some time previously. The period at which 
eallus is fully formed after a fracture depends somewhat upon the age and con- 
stitution of the individual; it is usually, however, several weeks before it is 
sufficiently firm to bear the weight of the body, when one of the long bones 
of the lower extremity has been broken. Gunshot and other penetrating 
wounds of the skull are generally identified by the form of the opening and 
the sharp and broken character of the edges. Sometimes a portion of the 
weapon or the ball is found in the head. The absorption of bone made by 
the pressure of a tumor is recognized by the loss of substance around the 
opening and its smooth and polished character, and the previous existence of 
necrosis can also be readily known by its diffusion around the orifice, and in 
other parts of the skull. 

In 1814, portions of a human body having been found floating in the Seine, 
were taken up and submitted to a medico-legal examination. The body was 
identified from the fact that disease of both hip-joints was found, which must 
necessarily have caused considerable deformity and lameness, since it was evi- 
dently of old standing, new cavities having been formed above the acetabula, 
in which the heads of the thigh-bones rested. The assassin was afterwards 
discovered. (7) 

§ 480. In those cases in which certain portions only of the human body are 
found, or in which all appear to be present, though in a dissevered condition, 
the preliminary step to the identification depends necessarily upon the ability 
of the examiner to so adjust the parts together as to be certain that they 
naturally formed parts of one body. This has been successfully done in many 


(j) Dr. Jno. Neill found, upon an examination of thirty-two skeletons, that the 
thyroid foramen in the male is oval, and in the female triangular. He also observed 
that the male foramen is longer and narrower, and that the long axis is nearly par- 
allel to the rami of the pubes and ischium; whereas in the female, the foramen is 
not only smaller and triangular, but the apex of the triangle is downward, its internal 
side nearly parallel to the rami, and the base of the triangle is proportional to the 
chord of the arch of the pubes.— Trans. Coll. Phys. of Phil. vol. iii. No. 2. 

(k) Krause, Handbuch der Mensch]. Anat. 2 Aufl. Bd. 1, p. 225. 

(1) Briand, Méd. Lég. p. 586. 


451 


§ 481] CICATRICES. [BOOK IV. 


remarkable cases, as in the one just quoted; in the case of Ramus, where the 
head was found in the Seine, the trunk in a sewer, and the legs near the Pont- 
Neuf; and in that of Dr. Parkman, where the remains of the bones of the 
head were found in a furnace, and the thorax and limbs concealed in different 
localities. In the last case, the head having been almost entirely consumed, 
nothing remaining but a few fragments of bone, there could be no clue to iden- 
tity from the features; but it having been found that the other portions of the 
body could be adjusted to each other in such a manner as to prove that they 
had once constituted a whole, a presumption of identity was established from 
the computed stature, certain peculiarities of form, the presence of gray hair 
upon various portions of the body, and, finally, from the block of mineral teeth, 
which, as before stated, fitted the mould of the jaw of the deceased, as pre- 
viously taken by a dentist. 

—§ 481. (5.) Cicatrices.—The indelible marks upon the skin which are left 
by wounds, cutaneous diseases, and surgical operations, afford frequently valu- 
able means of identification. The tissue of which the scar is formed is of a 
dense and fibrous nature, and it is distinguished from the surrounding skin by 
its whiter color, and the absence of hair and sebaceous follicles. When not 
distinct, it can often be brought out by friction, which reddens the adjoining 
skin, but does not affect the scar. Some have, however, a red or purplish 
color, especially those which are the result of eruptions depending upon a con- 
stitutional cause, as syphilis or scurvy. The shape presented by cicatrices is 
very various. <A linear cicatrix is the result of a simple incised or punctured 
wound, which has healed by adhesion. But all incised wounds do not leave 
scars of this shape. They are sometimes curved or elliptical, owing to the 
retraction of the skin, or to the wound having been inflicted upon a convex 
surface. Whenever the injury has been attended with loss of substance, 
the healing process must necessarily take place by granulation, and the scar 
will be irregular in shape. Gunshot wounds, when a bullet has been the pro- 
jectile, leave a round and sunken scar, which is usually much smaller than the 
ball, if no efforts to dilate the wound have been made, and it is also adherent 
to the subjacent parts. If the shot has been fired close to the individual, the 
grains of powder will also sometimes penetrate the skin, and give it a tattooed 
appearance. A round scar is sometimes also left by a penetrating wound from 
a weapon with a rounded or triangular blade, but it has not the sunken ap- 
pearance left by a gunshot wound. The cicatrix which results from the healing 
of a scrofulous or syphilitic sore has considerable similarity to that made by a 
ball. If the scar has resulted from a scrofulous abscess in the gland, the ap- 
pearance of it is peculiar. Its shape is more angular than round; itis traversed 
by adherent bridles of skin, and is therefore uneven and fenestrated, although 
its surface is shining, smooth, and white. When it is seated on other parts of 
the cutaneous surface it is not so deep, except it has become adherent to a 
subjacent bone, and resembles in its smooth and enamelled surface very much 
that which is left by a burn. “Lhose which are caused by syphilitic ulcerations 
are irregular in shape, are puckered, hard, often elevated, and more or less of a 


(m) Guy’s Forensic Medicine. (n) Lond. Med. Gaz. vol. xxxviii. p. 481. 
452 


BOOK IV. | DISAPPEARANCE OF CICATRICES. [$ 483 


copper color. The position of these cicatrices will often, moreover, give a key 
to their origin, being usually seated over the lymphatic glands. The cicatrices 
resulting from burns are too familiar to need description. 

§ 482. The question may arise as to the possibility of the disappearance 
of a scar. We believe that, as a general rule, all scars resulting from wounds 
and from cutaneous diseases, which involve any loss of substance, are indelible ; 
the only exception that can be made being in regard to trifling punctured 
wounds, where but little violence has been done to the skin. Tattoo marks 
are also usually considered indelible. This is not the opinion of Dr. Casper, 
who, in a trial at Berlin, where the question came up, stated, as the result 
of his inquiries made among the old soldiers at the invalid hospital in 
that city, that the marks of tattooing can disappear.(o) The evidence, how- 
ever, was not, we think, of sufficiently precise a character to warrant this 
statement. ‘Out of 36 examples, the marks had become faint with time in 
3, were partially effaced in 2, and completely obliterated in 4.”’ Hence, for 
the actual previous existence of these last he had to depend upon the word of 
the person whom he examined. Moreover, the age and the substance with 
which the operation was effected are not reported. No doubt the pigment 
used is often partly absorbed, since the lymphatic vessels leading from the spot 
have been found filled with it, but better evidence of its complete disappearance 
is yet required before the well-established belief of the contrary can be shaken. 

§ 483. (6.) Hair.—A curious case, illustrating the possibility of a fraudu- 
lent decolorization of the hair interfering with the identification of a person, 
is reported by Orfila. 

A man named Benoit was arrested on suspicion of murder. Some witnesses 
testified that they had seen him in Paris at two in the afternoon with black 
hair, while others declared that they saw him at Versailles, with fair hair, at 
five or six in the evening of the same day. The question being proposed 
whether it was possible to change the color of the hair from dark to light, 
Orfila deposed that it was. He made numerous experiments to show this, 
from which it resulted, that by washing the hair with solutions of chlorine, 
black hair could be changed to various lighter shades, according to the strength 
of the solution, and the length of time it remained applied. This mode of de- 
colorization can, however, readily be detected by the peculiar smell of the chlo- 
rine, and by there being something unnatural in the color resulting from its 
application. He found also that the most effectual way to darken hair natu- 
rally light, was by the employment of a compound of litharge, chalk, and 
fresh lime in*nearly equal parts. After the hair which has been wetted with 
a solution of these materials, has become dry, the chalk and oxide of lead 
remaining attached to the hair are removed by weak acetic acid, and cleaned 
with the yolk of an egg. The hair is thus effectually dyed black, without any 
injury to its texture. The fraud can, however, easily be detected by steeping 
some of the hair in dilute nitric acid, which dissolves the ingredients with effer- 
vescence, and on testing the solution with hydrosulphuric acid, the black sul- 


(o) Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, 1852, 1 Bd. 2 Heft (Der Process Schall eine cause 
célébre). 


453 


§ 485] HAIR—INFLUENCE OF TEMPERATURE. [BOOK IV. 


phide of lead will be obtained. Such cases can, however, very seldom come 
before courts of justice, this being, as far as we know, the only instance in 
which, since the ancient union of the functions of the barber and the surgeon, 
they have been again combined. 

The color and peculiarities of the hair may undoubtedly, in many cases, 
assist in the identification of the dead, but it is not unimportant to remember 
that in those cases where the body has been exposed to the vicissitudes of the 
weather for some time after death, the hair becomes bleached by the exposure, 
and thus hair which was really dark during the lifetime of the deceased, may 
present a tawny appearance. 

§ 484. (7.) The length of time which has elapsed since death, as ascer- 
tained from an inspection of the remains of the human body, can seldom be 
known with great precision, and in many cases, especially at a late period in 
the process of decomposition, many errors may be committed. The rapidity 
of this process depends upon a great variety of circumstances, and the influ- 
euce of these, it is therefore of some importance to consider. 

The age and constitution of the person, his last sickness and mode of death, 
the existence of wounds, the length of time the body has remained exposed to 
the air before interment, and the temperature and hygrometric condition of the 
air at this time, the nature and depth of the ground, if the burial has taken 
place, and if not, the nature of the medium in which the body has remained, 
and many other causes which it is here needless to particularize, must all be 
carefully considered in any estimate of the time that has elapsed since death. 

§ 485. (a.) Heat, especially when accompanied with humidity, is a power- 
ful accelerating cause of putrefaction. Dry heat, if the temperature is elevated, 
does not promote it. Thus, the bodies of those that have perished in the cara- 
vans that traverse the African deserts, are often found in a dry and mummy- 
like condition. Even in temperate climates corpses interred in very dry vaults, 
as in the Catacombs at Rome, the leaden vaults of Bremen, the convent of the 
Capuchins at Toulouse, a church at Bordeaux, &c., remain in a tolerably per- 
fect condition, very much resembling the Hgyptian mummies. 

The following case illustrates the present topic, and affords a striking illus- 
tration of the important aid which justice may receive from science. In March, 
1850,a workman engaged in repairing a Rumford fireplace, found in the hot- 
air chamber the body of an infant which had been introduced through an 
opening made by the removal of two bricks. The body was mummified. 
During the preceding years four tenants had successively occupied the apart- 
ment. On examining the remains, M. Bergeret, to whom this duty had been 
judicially assigned, found within them a large number of bodies as large as a 
grain of wheat, dry, friable, open at either end, and of a mahogany color. These 
were the shells of the nymphs which produced the insects, the larve of which 
had devoured nearly all the abdominal organs. These nymphs were found in 
great numbers about the mouth and neck of the body. The interior of the 
limbs was filled with larva, or maggots. Now the succession of these transfor- 
mations is as follows: The female fly lays her eggs, from which in due time 
the larva, or maggot, issues, and is after a time transformed into a nymph, or 
chrysalis, which is inclosed in a sort of case or shell, and from which the perfect 

454 


ee oa -”:—S—GV“nKM' 


BOOK IY. | INFLUENCE OF MOISTURE. [§ 486 


insect ultimately escapes. A year is necessary for these metamorphoses. The 
eges are laid in the summer and their changes result in the reproduction of the 
insects at the commencement of the following summer. Now the eggs which 
produced the larvee found in the body in March, 1850, must have been de- 
posited in the summer of 1849. But the body also contained a number of 
empty nymph cases which must in their turn have been preceded by larvae pro- 
duced by eggs laid in 1848. Hence it was concluded that the death of the 
child had taken place in the summer of 1848, and consequently that no sus- 
picion could attach to the persons who had occupied the room since that date. 
The inquiry having thus received a definite direction, a female who lived there 
apart from her husband, at the time indicated, was arrested, and a variety of 
circumstantial evidence rendered it certain that she had been pregnant and de- 
livered of a child about that time. She was, however, acquitted of the charge 
of infanticide, on the presumed ground that there was no proof that her child 
had not died a natural death. (00) 

§ 486. In very cold climates, bodies may be preserved for a long time. 
This is the case in some parts of Norway, where persons dying in the winter 
are not interred until the spring, the ground being frozen too hard to permit 
burial, and the corpse is preserved uninjured for several months. The body 
of Prince Menschikoff, banished to Siberia by Peter the Great, was found 
ninety-two years afterwards entirely unchanged. In the beginning of this 
century, the thawing of large masses of ice on the banks of the Lena, left 
exposed the body of a mammoth, which was in such a state of preservation, 
that the flesh was eagerly devoured by dogs, bears, wolves, &c. The corpses 
which are preserved at the hospice on the top of Mount St. Bernard, where 
the thermometer stands nearly the whole year round below the freezing point, 
are perfectly recognizable after the lapse of several years.(p) 


(00) Annales d’Hygiéne, 2éme sér. iv. 442. 

(p) There is upon the summit of the Great St. Bernard, a sort of morgue (dead- 
house), in which have been deposited, from time immemorial, the bodies of those unfor- 
tunate persons who have perished upon this mountain by cold, or the fall of avalanches. 
The study of the circumstances of locality and of temperature in which this establish- 
ment is placed, may, to a certain degree, indicate the most favorable conditions for the 
long preservation of bodies. Thus are shown to travellers, bodies, which they assert 
have been sufficiently well preserved to be recognizable after the lapse of two or three 
years. <A physician, whose position as former prosector of the faculty of Medicine of 
Paris, rendered him curious to visit this part of the hospital in all its details, verified, 
with his own eyes, all that travellers have written, and has transmitted to us the fol- 
lowing observations :— 

“The hospital of St. Bernard is, as is well known, the most elevated habitation of 
Europe, being 7,200 feet above the level of the sea. The temperature of this part of the 
globe is always very low, rarely above zero, even during summer. This extensive es- 
tablishment is built upon the borders of a lake, at the bottom of a gorge in the moun- 
tain; the principal mass of the building represents a long parallelogram, placed in the 
direction of the gorge, so that its two principal faces, pierced with numerous windows, 
are sheltered from the wind by the rocks ; whilst the two extremities, on the contrary, 
are exposed to all the violence of those which blow from one side of the gorge to the 
other. About fifty steps beyond the principal building, and a little out of a right line 
with it, is situated the morgue, a sort of square chamber, the walls of which are three 
or four feet thick, constructed of good stone, and the arched roof of which is very solid. 
Two windows, about four feet square, are pierced in the direction of the breadth of 
the valley, directly facing each other, so that a perpetual current of cool air traverses 
the interior of the chamber. There is, further, but a single table in this morgue, upon 
which they place the bodies when first introduced; after a while they are arranged 
around the walls in an upright attitude. At the time of my passage of the Great Saint 


455 


§ 489] INFLUENCE OF MOISTURE. [BOOK Iv. 


§ 487. (b.) The air, at its ordinary temperature, favors the progress of 
putrefaction. In bodies which are exposed for a long time to all the changes 
of the weather, it is estimated that all the soft parts are completely destroyed 
in less than six years, and most of the bones in twelve, as they become light, 
brittle, and honeycombed in their appearance. 

§ 488. (c.) Water being a natural constituent of the human body, is also 
one of the elements necessary for the progress of decomposition. If, however, 
the body be sunk in water, putrefaction does not advance so rapidly as in the 
air, and often the changes which take place are different from those of ordinary 
decomposition. The soft parts of the body become converted into substance, 
ealled, by Chevreul, adipocere. It is solid, white, and fusible. The ammonia 
which results from the decomposition of the muscles, as well as a certain 
quantity of potash and lime, form a combination with the oleic and margaric 
acids of the fatty portions of the body. ‘The bodies of children, and of stout, 
fat persons, undergo this change most readily. But the presence of consider- 
able moisture is necessary for it, and it therefore occurs only in the water, or 
in moist soils, especially where many bodies are buried together. It is uncer- 
tain at what time this saponification takes place in the water: according to 
Devergie’s observations, it is pretty complete in five months. In the ground, 
the process is much slower, requiring at least three years for a total trans- 
formation. A remarkable example of this change observed in New York is 
reported by Dr. Dalton. (pp) | 

§ 489. (d.) Soil.—The dryness or moisture of the ground, the depth at 
which the body is buried, and its more or less complete isolation from contact 
with the earth, are circumstances which modify the progress of putrefaction, 
and render any general opinion as to period of death inapplicable. ‘The body 
of Numa Pompilius was preserved in a stone sarcophagus for several centuries; 
and the bones of Dagobert, who died nearly twelve hundred years ago, were 
found entire, having been placed in a wooden coffin inclosed in a stone tomb. 
The bones of Abelard and Heloise were so well preserved, after a lapse of five 
hundred years, that the female skeleton could be readily distinguished from 
the male.(q) On the other hand, the body of a child buried in the earth has 
been found reduced to the mere bones in nine months; and that of a young 


Bernard (31st August, 1837), there were several of these mummified bodies along the 
walls of the chamber, but a greater number were entirely divested of flesh, and lie 
scattered about the earthy floor of the room. They informed me that decomposition 
only took place when the bodies fell by accident to the ground, which was owing to 
the humidity occasioned by the snows, which occasionally entered with the currents 
of air through the windows of the morgue.” 

Dr. Harlan says, “ Early in September, 1833, I had an opportunity of inspecting the 
contents of the morgue of Saint Bernard. Among the group of bodies of every age and 
sex, we were particularly struck with two figures, one, that of a man, whose counte- 
nance was horridly contorted by the act of desiccation; each limb and every muscle 
of the body had assumed the expression of a wretch in purgatory. The other was 
that of a mother holding her infant to her bosom, the latter with an imploring expres- 
sion, looking up to the face of the mother, whom it appeared to have survived some 
time, as is generally the case when mother and child are frozen together, a greater 
power of forming animal heat, existing in children.”? (History of Embalming, &c., by 
J. N. Gannal. Translated from the French by R. Harlan, M. D. Philadelphia; Judah 
Dobson, 1840.) 

(pp) New York Journ. of Med. Nov. 1859, p. 375. 

(q) Blumenbach, Geschichte u. Beschreibung der Knochen, &c., Gdttingen, 1807. 


456 


BOOK IV. | DECOMPOSITION IN VAULTS. [§ 490 


man, who died of smallpox, in less than six.(7) In general, observation has 
shown, that of the body of an adult, buried in an ordinary coffin, nothing at 
the end of twenty years will remain but the skull and the thigh bones, some- 
times also the arm-bones; and Schiirmayer states, that in general, in church- 
yards, the time will not exceed fifteen years. In order to show, however, how 
little dependence can be placed upon the uniformity of these changes, the 
following case will serve as an example. A skeleton was found, in digging 
the cellar under an old house. A question arose whether the individual to 
whom it belonged had died more than twenty years before. Soon afterwards, 
other skeletons were found near by; and finally, an investigation having been 
set on foot, the fact was clearly made out that the site of the old house had 
formerly been a burial place, and that the skeleton was at least 200 years 
old.(s) 

The following general results have been obtained by Orfila, whose celebrated 
treatise, Sur les EHxhumations juridiques, contains nearly all that is accu- 
rately known on this subject :— 

1. Putrefaction is, under equal conditions, more rapid in manure, than in 
water, privy soil, or the ground. 

2. In privy soil it is not so rapid as in water, but more so than in the 
earth. 

3. Water especially, when frequently renewed, accelerates decomposition 
next in rapidity to manure. 

§ 490. Dr. Waller Lewis, who was engaged for many months in the years 
1849 and 1850, in inspecting the vaults of the churches of London for the 
General Board of Health, states, among many other interesting facts, which 
are not here in place, the following, relative to the time for decomposition in 
vaults: ‘‘'The complete decomposition of a corpse, and its resolution into its 
ultimate elements, is by no means accomplished in a period of ten years; nor 
is that description accurate which represents, that at the end of that period 
nothing ‘but a few brittle bones are left in the else vacant shroud.’ On the 
contrary, so extremely slow is the process, under the circumstances, that I 
have but rarely seen the remains in a leaden coffin, of any age, in the condi- 
tion described. In a wooden coffin, the remains are found exactly in this 
state in a period of from two to five years. This period depends upon the 
quality of the wood, and the free access of the air to the coffin. But in 
leaden coffins, fifty, sixty, eighty, and even a hundred years, are required to 
accomplish this. I have opened a coffin in which the corpse had been placed 
for nearly a century, and the ammoniacal gas formed dense white fumes when 
brought into contact with hydrochloric acid gas, and was so powerful, that 
the head could not remain near it for more than a few seconds ata time. The 
putrefaction is, therefore, very much retarded by the corpse being placed in a 
leaden coffin.”’(¢) 

In estimating the period that may have elapsed since the death of a person, 
it is very important to be acquainted with the fact that the process of putre- 


(vr) Joh. Miller. Knochengeriiste des Menschen, &. Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1852, 3 H. 
(s) Miller, ante. (t) Lancet, Aug. 9, 1851. 


457 


§ 490] PROGRESS OF DECOMPOSITION. [BOOK Iv. 


faction is not equally rapid in all of the organs, but that it invades them 
successively, and, for the most part, in a determinate order. There are tissues, 
says Casper,(tt) which require from twenty to thirty times as long as others 
to become putrid, and the relative condition of certain internal organs in this 
respect affords a securer basis than that of the superficial parts for making a 
probable conjecture as to the period of death. This author presents the 
results of his observations, of which the following is a concise summary :— 

Of internal organs the trachea, with the larynx, is the first to undergo 
decomposition. Its lining membrane may be completely softened when 
greenish spots are only beginning to appear upon the surface of the abdomen. 
The brain of children within the year follows next in order. The stomach 
soon becomes putrid. The earliest traces of this change are visible in from 
four to six days, in the fundus of the organ, and consist of dirty reddish spots 
varying in size from mere specks, to that of the palm of the hand, without 
regular shape or limits, and traversed by bluish venous streaks. The import- 
ance of this fact in cases of suspected poisoning is very evident. As time 
elapses the dirty red color diffuses itself and gradually changes to a grayish- 
black tint, and in the same proportion the softening of the submucous tissues 
proceeds. In no case, says Casper, have I met with a separation of the 
mucous from the muscular coat, such as follows the action of a caustic poison, 
and which could not be distinguished from the merely emphysematous disinte- 
gration of the mucous membrane produced by putrefaction alone. Putrefaction 
of the intestines follows that of the stomach and passes through the same 
stages. In the majority of cases the spleen is next in undergoing decompo- 
sition; but this depends upon its greater or less degree of soundness. It 
grows softer and softer, so that at last it may be readily broken down with 
the handle of the scalpel. Its color turns to a pale bluish-green. 

The omentum and mesentery resist change somewhat longer, especially if 
they contain but little fat. They then become dry and grayish-green in color. 
Usually the diver continues firm for some weeks after death. It changes more 
rapidly in new-born infants than in adults. The alteration begins upon the 
convex surface with shining green spots, which gradually invade the whole 
organ and change its color to coal-black. The gall-bladder resists longer. 
Next in order of change is the brain of adults. It gradually contracts after 
death. Putrefaction begins at its base, giving the parts a pale greenish 
color, proceeding upwards, and from the cineritious to the medullary sub- 
stance. In moderate weather the brain becomes soft in two or three weeks, 
but a month elapses before it is converted into the reddish paste into which 
the brain of infants so speedily turns. If air has access to it, these changes 
occur more rapidly. 

The preceding organs may be associated as quickly putrefying. The fol- 
lowing are more slowly changed. Even after the stomach, intestines, liver, 
&c., are far gone in putrefaction, the heart appears fresh, and all its parts are 
recognizable. Gradually it softens, first in its internal muscles and then in its 
walls, becoming soft, greenish, and finally black. About the same time as 


(tt) Handbuch der Ger. Med. i. 51. 
458 


BOOK IV.] PUTREFACTION IN THE F@TUS. [$ 491 


the heart, but sometimes earlier, the Jungs undergo decomposition. In bodies 
which externally are far advanced in putrefaction, the structure of these organs 
is commonly very evident. This remarkable slowness of putrefaction in the 
lungs proves how little practical foundation there is for the notion that in the 
bodies of new-born children, otherwise fresh, the floating of the lungs in water 
can be ascribed to decomposition of their substance. The first evidences of 
this change consist in small collections of air beneath the pleura from the size 
of a millet seed to that of a bean. They may form on any part, but, as the 
process advances, they become. more numerous, especially upon the posterior 
surface of the lungs. Notwithstanding the development of these vesicles the 
color of the organs is very slowly altered. As putrefaction advances they 
become darker, of a bottle-green and finally of a black color, and in the same 
degree the parenchyma grows soft and collapses. The kidneys putrefy still 
later, first assuming a chocolate color and then softening. But their granular 
structure is very long retained. ‘The bladder does not begin to decay until 
complete putrefaction of all the above mentioned organs has taken place. 

The esophagus in this respect does not at all resemble the rest of the 
digestive canal, and it is found months after death moderately firm, and in 
color a dirty grayish-green, when no trace of stomach and intestines remains. 
As regards the pancreas, for a long time it remains of a dirty reddish color, 
and when it becomes decomposed the rest of the body must have utterly gone 
into putrefaction. The diaphragm is one of the parts which yields the latest 
to this process. It is true that within a few weeks after death it is spotted 
with green; but after the lapse of from four to six months its muscular can 
be distinguished from its tendinous portion. The larger bloodvessels, and the 
arteries especially, change very slowly. Devergie mentions a case in which 
_ the aorta of a body exhumed fourteen months after burial was perfectly dis- 
tinct. The uterus is, however, of all the organs the one which retains its 
form and texture the longest. When not another organ is in a condition 
suitable for examination, the uterus remains tolerably fresh and firm, of a 
dusky red color, and so well preserved that it may be cut and its interior 
examined. These statements are not less applicable to the female foetus and 
new-born infant than to the adult. A case is related by Casper of a woman 
whose body was found in a privy well nine months after she had suddenly 
disappeared, reports having meanwhile become current that she had concealed 
herself or been murdered by a certain person, otherwise of good repute, to 
avoid the discovery of her pregnancy. Her remains were in the last stage of 
putrefaction, all except the uterus, which was of a light red color, hard when 
handled or cut, and presented all the characters of a virgin’s womb. 

§ 491. (8.) Putrefaction in the Foetus.—The foetus dying within the 
uterus, undergoes a change which is different from the putrefactive process. 
The body is remarkably flaccid in all its parts, and if it have died previous to 
the fifth month, it will often, after having undergone a certain degree of 
maceration, wither, contract, and become hard, principally upon the surface, 
exactly as if it had been preserved in a weak saline solution. In the later 
months, however, its tissues soften and lose their cohesion, the skin has a 
spotted appearance, and when the cuticle is detached, has a brownish-red color. 

459 


§ 492] PUTREFACTION IN THE FETUS. [BOOK Iv. 


The abdomen is usually bare of the cuticle, which is, however, easily detached 
from all parts of the body. ‘The head lies flat in whatever position it may be 
placed, and all the joints are extremely relaxed. The umbilical cord is of a 
brownish-red color, and very flaccid. The cellular tissue is infiltrated with 
bloody serum, and the cavities of the body contain the same liquid. The viscera 
are disorganized, easily lacerated, and very loosely connected with each other ; 
gas is developed in the lungs and liver, and the kidneys and uterus are usually 
better preserved than any other parts. The lungs are of a dark brown color, 
and punctuated with black blood. The odor is peculiar, but not that of 
putrefaction, unless the child has been born after a lingering labor, and air 
has had access to it. The child which dies immediately before birth, will not, 
of course, present these appearances. When the foetus has been retained a 
long while in the womb, it is said that it may be converted into adipocere. 
This is not unfrequently the case with extra-uterine foetuses. There is no 
‘difference in the putrefaction of children born alive, from that of adults, 
except in the greater rapidity of its progress. In order to determine the 
length of time which may have elapsed since the birth of the child, with a 
view to its identification when it is found in a putrid condition, recourse must 
be had to the same sources for an opinion as those already indicated, viz., the 
locality, temperature, medium, &c., to which it has been exposed, or in which 
it has lain. : | 

§ 492. (9.) Influence of lime upon the putrefactive process.—The belief 
is a very general one, that lime has the property of hastening the process of 
decomposition, and it is usually with this view that it has been thrown upon 
human remains which are sought to be rapidly destroyed. A few years since, 
upon the trial of the Mannings, in London, for the murder of O’Connor, 
medical evidence to this effect was given; the advanced state of putrefaction 
in which the body was found being attributed to the action of the lime, and, 
in particular, the destruction of the brain, to the fact of this substance having 
penetrated through the wounds of the head, and thus exercised a direct action 
upon it. But more attentive observations and careful experiments have shown 
that it does not possess the property thus attributed to it. The following 
conclusions were drawn by Dr. Taylor, from some experiments made for the 
purpose of ascertaining the effects of lime on animal matter :— 

1. Lime neither retards nor hastens decomposition in dead bodies, whether 
whole or in fragments. | 

2. It has, however, the effect of hindering the diffusion of noxious effluvia 
from the dead body, from its combination with carbonic acid, sulphuretted and 
phosphoretted hydrogen. 

3. Lime is therefore one of the best, safest, and cheapest means of prevent 
ing the effluvia from dead bodies. 

4, The belief, therefore, that it hastens the putrefactive process, is entirely 
groundless.(w) The experiments of Mr. John Davy(v) confirm these conclu- 
sions. He placed various structures of the bodies of animals in wide-mouthed 


(u) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 41, EH. H. p. 294. 
(v) Edinb. Month. Journ. Jan. 1850. 


460 


BOOK IY.] INFLUENCE OF LIME ON PUTREFACTION, [§ 492 


vessels, and covered them with a paste of freshly-prepared caustic lime. At 
the end of a month they were found perfectly well preserved, although some- 
what softened. Hven seven months afterwards, they were found nearly in the 
same condition. At the end of two years, certain changes had taken place. 
The membranous portions were soft and transparent, the muscular tissue was 
converted into adipocere but had no offensive smell, and the other structures 
were no longer recognizable. In other experiments of the same kind, it was 
found that the lime was destructive only to the hair, nails, and epidermis ; and 
that, in animal tissues which were already beginning to putrefy, the immersion 
in fresh lime destroyed all foul smell, and brought the process to a standstill. 
The green color which the muscular tissue receives from contact with lime, is 
ascribable to a chemical action of this substance upon the coloring matter of 
the blood contained in them. 

A detailed account of the changes which take place in the body after death, 
will be found in. Chapter XVI. 

461 


B O,QACGWY 


QUESTIONS RELATIVE TO THE CAUSE OF DEATH. 


PrAGie rt oe, 
POISONING: 


FUNGAL i Oa As ae 


CHAPTER I. 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 


ist. DEFINITION OF PoIsoN, § 493. 
2d. Mops oF ACTION oF Poisons, § 494. 
(1.) Where a harmless substance is converted into a poison, § 495 
(2.) Influence of the habit of taking poison, § 496. 
(3.) Influence of disease, § 497. 
3d. EvipENcE oF PoisonineG, § 498. 
(1.) The symptoms, § 499. 
(a.) The mode of invasion of the symptoms, § 499. 
(o.) The duration of the symptoms, § 499. 
(2.) Post-mortem appearances, § 501. 
(3.) Chemical analysis, § 503. 
(4.) Experiments upon animals, § 504. 
4th. DIFFERENTIAL DIAGNOSIS OF POISONING, § 505. 
(1.) Diseases most liable to be mistaken for poison, § 506. 
(a.) Cholera, § 506. 
(b.) Bilious cholera, § 507. 
(c.) Perforation of the stomach, § 508. 
(d.) Gastritis, gastro-enteritis, and peritonitis, § 511. 
(e.) Strangulation of the intestines, § 511. 
(2.) Sources of error arising from natural changes in the body 
after death, § 514. 
5th. CLASSIFICATION OF Porsons, § 518. 


CHAPTER II. 
IRRITANT POISONS—AOCIDS. 


I. SULPHURIC ACID (Oil of Vitriol), § 519. 


462 


Ist. SYMPTOMS WHICH FOLLOW THE INGESTION OF THE ACID, § 520. 
2d. QUANTITY TAKEN, § 521. 
3d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 522. 
4th. Porsonine By ink, § 525. 
Sth. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 526. 
(1.) Stains on clothing, § 528. 
6th. AROMATIC SULPHURIC AciD, § 528. 
7th. SULPHATE OF INDIGO, § 529. 


BOOK v.| IRRITANT POISONS.—ANALYTICAL TABLE. 


I 


Ht, 


IV. 


III. 


lV, 


IV. 


. NITRIC ACID (Aqua-fortis), § 530. 
1st. Symptoms, § 531. 
2d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 532. 
3d. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 533. 
(1.) Diluted acid, § 533. 
(2.) When the liquid contains organic matters, § 534. 
(3.) Stains on cloth, § 535. 
HYDROCHLORIC ACID, MURIATIC ACID (Spirit of Salt). 
Ist. Symproms, § 536. 
2d. Post-MoRTEM APPEARANCES, § 537. 
3d. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 538. 


OXALIC ACID, § 540. 
Ist. Symptoms, § 540. 
2d. Rapipity oF its action, § 542. 
3d. QUANTITY CAPABLE OF DESTROYING LIFE, § 543. 
4th. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 544, 
5th. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 545. 


. TARTARIC ACID, § 548. 
. ACETIC ACID, § 549. 


CHAPTER III. 
IRRITANT POISONS—ALKALINE. 


. POTASH, SODA, &c., § 550. 
. NITRATE OF POTASSA, § 551. 


Ist. PosT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 552. 
2d... CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 553. 
AMMONIA AND SESQUI-CARBONATE OF AMMONIA, § 554. 
Ist. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 555. 
2d. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 556. 
BARYTA, § 557. 
1st. CHLORIDE OF BARIUM, § 557. 
2d. CARBONATE OF BARYTA, § 558. 
3d. PosT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 559. 
4th. Tests, § 560. 


Crea Pe Et Ra LV.. 
IRRITANT POISONS—METALLOIDAL. 


. PHOSPHORUS, § 561. 


1st. Symptoms, § 562. 

2d. QUANTITY REQUIRED TO DESTROY LIFE, § 562. 
3d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 563. 

4th. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 564. 


. BROMINE,,§ 566. 
Il. 


IODINE, § 567. 
Ist. Symproms, § 567. 
2d. PosT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 568. 
3d. CHEMICAL TESTS, § 569. 
Ath. IopipE oF PorassiuM, § 569. 


CHLORINE, § 570. 


CHAPTER V. 
IRRITANT POISONS—METALLIC. 


. METALLIC ARSENIC, § 571. 
. ARSENIOUS ACID (White Arsenic), § 572. 
Ist. Symproms, § 573. 
2d. Posr-mMoRTEM APPEARANCES, § 582, 
3d. QUANTITY CAPABLE OF DESTROYING LIFE, § 585, 


IRRITANT POISONS.—ANALYTICAL TABLE, [BOOK V. 


Ath. Irs EFFECTS UPON THE PUTREFACTIVE PROCESS, § 587. 
5th. ARSENIC FOUND IN THE BODY, § 590. 
6th. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 592. 
(1.) As a solid, § 592. 
(2.) As a liquid, § 596. 
(a.) Hydro-sulphuric acid, § 597. 
(b.) Ammonio-nitrate of silver, § 598. 
(c.) Ammonio-sulphate of copper, § 599. 
(3.) Mixed with organic matter, § 601. 
(a.) Marsh’s process, § 602. 
(b.) Fallacies to which Marsh’s process may give rise, 
§ 604. 
(c.) Reinsch’s process, § 606. 
(4.) Arsenic in organic mixtures, § 607. 
(5.) Arsenic not a natural constituent of the body, § 610. 


III. SUBOXIDE OF ARSENIC (Fly Powder), § 612. 
IV. ARSENIC ACID, § 613. 
Vv. ARSENIATE OF POTASH, § 613. 
VI. ARSENIATE OF SODA, § 614. 
VII. SULPHURETS OF ARSENIC, § 615. 
VIII. ARSENIURETTED HYDROGEN, § 616. 
IX. ARSENITE OF POTASH, § 617. 
X. ARSENITE OF COPPER (Scheele’s Green), § 618. 


XI. CORROSIVE SUBLIMATE (Bichloride of Mercury), § 260. 
Ist. Symptoms, § 621. 
2d. SMALLEST QUANTITY CAPABLE OF DESTROYING LIFE, § 621. 
3d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 622. 
4th. Tests, § 624. 
(1.) Corrosive sublimate in the solid form, § 624. 
(2.) Corrosive sublimate in solution in water, § 625. 
(a.) By sulphuretted hydrogen, § 625. 
(b.) By protochloride of tin, § 625. 
(c.) Metallic test, § 625. 
(d.) Galvanic test, § 625. 
(3.) Corrosive sublimate in organic liquids, § 626. 
5th. WHERE CORROSIVE SUBLIMATE HAS BEEN THE CAUSE OF DEATH, IT IS NOT 
ALWAYS FOUND IN THE BODY OF THE DECEASED. 
6th. LENGTH OF TIME REQUIRED FOR ITS DISAPPEARANCE FROM THE £YSTEM, § 629. 


XII. NITRATE OF MERCURY, § 630. 


XII. DELETERIOUS EFFECTS OF MERCURIAL PREPARATIONS, § 632. 
lst. CANcRUM oRIS, § 633. 
2d. GANGR@NopSIS, § 635. 


XIV. THE SALTS OF LEAD, § 640. 
Ist. Form, § 640. 
2d. Symptoms, § 641. 
3d. PostT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 646. 
4th. CHRMICAL EXAMINATION, § 647. 


XV. THE SALTS OF COPPER, § 648. 

ist. Symptoms, § 648. 
2d. Post-MoRTEM APPEARANCES, § 649. 
od. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 652. 

XVI. TARTRATE OF ANTIMONY AND POTASSA (Tartar Emetic), § 653. 
Ist. Symproms, § 653. 
2d. PosT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 654, 
3d. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 655. 
4th. CHLORIDE oF ANTIMONY, § 658. 

XVII. SALTS OF ZINC, § 659. 
Ist. OxrpE oF zinc, § 659. 
2d. SULPHATE OF zINc, § 660, 
od. CHLORIDE OF ZINC, § 662. 

XVII. TIN, § 663. 

Ist. CHLORIDE oF TIN, § 663. 

XIX. SILVER, § 664. 
Ist. NirRATE OF SILVER (lunar caustic), § 664. 


464 


BOOK V.]| 


NARCOTIC POISONS.—ANALYTICAL TABLE, 


XX. IRON, § 665. 


II. 


Il. 


Tat 


2d. 
od. 


4th. 


SULPHATE OF IRON (copperas, green vitriol), § 665. 
(1.) Symptoms, § 665. 
(2.) Chemical analysis, § 665. 

CHLORIDE (MURIATE) OF IRON, § 666. 

SUBNITRATE OF BISMUTH, § 667. 

BICHROMATE OF POTASH, § 668. 


od beds ool ad MANA SNA ip 


IRRITANT POISONS—VEGETABLE. 


Ist. 
2d. 
we 


Ist. 
2d. 
3d. 


4th. 


ste 
2d. 
3d. 


4th. 


. COLCHICUM AUTUMNALE (Colchicum, Meadow Saffron), § 669. 


SyMPtToms, § 669. 
PosT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 669. 
CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 670. 


- DRASTIC PURGATIVES, § 671. 
. CASTOR SEEDS OR BEANS, § 672. 
. FUNGI (Mushrooms), § 673. 


DESCRIPTION OF DIFFERENT KINDS, § 673. 

How THEIR POISONOUS QUALITIES MAY BE REMOVED, § 674. 
SYMPTOMS OF POISONING BY THEM, § 675. 

PosT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 676. 


CB ARE Rav tT. 
IRRITANT POISONS—ANIMAL. 


. CANTHARIDES, § 677. 


Proprertigs, § 677. 

Symptoms, § 678. 

QUANTITY REQUIRED TO DESTROY LIFE, § 679. 
Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 680. 


POISONOUS SAUSAGES, § 681. 
Ist. NATURE OF THE Porson, § 681. 
2d. Symptoms, § 682. 
3d. PosT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 684. 


. POISONOUS CHEESE, § 686. 
. POISONOUS FISH, § 687. 


Ist. Oysters, § 687. 
2d. Mussets, § 688. 


- UNSOUND MEAT, § 689. 
. MECHANICAL IRRITANTS, § 690. 


1st. EFFECTS OF PINS AND NEEDLES, § 691. 


. OPIUM 


Ist. 
2d. 

od. 

4th. 
5th. 
6th. 
7th. 
Sth. 
SoU. 


CG BA PP RR e rh et: 
NARCOTIC (EF GERSON 


AND ITS PREPARATIONS, § 692. 

Symptoms, § 692. 

AVERAGE DURATION OF CASES, § 694. 

AMOUNT WHICH WILL PROVE FATAL, § 695. 

INFLUENCE OF IDIOSYNCRASY IN MODIFYING ITS EFFECTS, § 696. 
Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 698. 

PoIsoNING BY MORPHIA, § 699. 

CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 700. 

Moreau, § 702. 

DETECTION IN ORGANIC MIXTURES, § 703. 


HYDROCYANIC OR PRUSSIC ACID, § 705. 


tet. 
2d. 


Irs quauitizs, 3 705. 
Irs symptoms, § 706. 


465 


‘ 


NARCOTICO-ACRID POISONS—ANALYTICAL TABLE, 


3d. PERIOD AT WHICH DEATH TAKES PLACE, § 707. 
4th. SMALLEST QUANTITY CAPABLE OF DESTROYING LIFE, § 709. 
5th. INSTANCES OF RECOVERY FROM VERY LARGE DOSES, § 710. 
6th. Post-MoRTEM APPEARANCES, § 711. 
7th. CuEmicay TEsTs, § 716. 
(1.) The iron test, § 717. 
(2.) The silver test, § 718. 
(3.) The sulphur or Liebig’s test, § 719. 
(4.) Detection after death, § 720. 
8th. EssENTIAL OIL OF BITTER ALMONDS, § 721. 
(1.) Instances of its fatal effects, § 722. 
(2.) Its strength, § 723. 
9th. APRICOT KERNELS, § 724. 
10th. PeacH KERNELS, § 725. 
11th. CHERRY-LAUREL WATER, § 726. 
12th. CyANIDE oF POTASSIUM, § 727. 
I. CHLOROFORM AND ETHER, § 728. 
Ist. WuHeEn rnJuRiovs, § 728. 
2d. Symproms, § 729. 
3d. PosT-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 731. 


I 


— 


4th. WHETHER THEY CAN BE USED FOR CRIMINAL PURPOSES, § 733. 


IV. ALCOHOL, § 734. 
Ist. FATAL EFFECTS OF LARGE QUANTITIES, § 734. 
2d. Symptoms, § 736. 
3d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 737. 
V. CAMPHOR, § 738. 
Ist. Symproms, § 738. 
2d. Power, § 739. 
VI. HYOSCYAMUS NIGER (Henbane), § 740. 
VII. HASCHISCH, § 742. 
VII. LACTUCA, § 743. 
IX. SOLANUM, § 744. 


CHAPTER IX. 


NARCOTICO-ACRID POISONS. 


I. DATURA STRAMONIUM, § 745. 
1st. NATURE AND EFFECTS, § 745. 
; 2d. Post-MoRTEM APPEARANCES, § 746. 
II. NICOTIANA TABACUM (Tobacco), § 747. 
Ist. Symproms, § 747. 
2d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 748. 
3d. Nicorina or nicotiA, § 749. 
IY. CONIUM MACULATUM (Common or Spotted Hemlock), § § 753. 
Ist. Irs ACTION UPON THE HUMAN SsysTEM, § 753. 
2d. Symptoms, § 754. 
3d. THE HEMLOCK WATER DROP-worRT, § 754. 
Ath. ConictnE or conta, § 755. 
IV. NUX VOMICA—STRYCHNIA, 8 756. 
Ast. Quatiriss, § 756. 
2d. Symproms, § 757. 
3d. Power, § 158. 
4th. Post-MoRTEM APPEARANCES, § 759. 
5th. Usual TESTS FoR stRycuntA, § 760. 
V. ACONITE (Monkshood, Wolfsbane), § 761. 
Ist. ITs EFFECTS UPON THE BoDY, § 761. 
2d. Symptoms, § 762. 
3d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 763. 
4th. Tests, § 764. 
VI. LOBELIA INFLATA (Indian Tobacco), § 765. 
VII. CEDAR OIL, § 766. 


466 


BOOK V.] GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. [§ 493 


VIII. SAVIN, § 767. 
Ist. Post-MoRTEM APPEARANCES, § 768. 
2d. Detection, § 769. ; 
IX. TAXUS BACCATA (Yew), § 770. 


X. OIL OF TANSY, § 771. 


XI.. COCCULUS INDICUS, § 773. 
Ist. Symptoms, § 773. 
2d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 774. 


XII. ATROPA BELLADONNA (Deadly Nightshade), § 776. 


XIII. DIGITALIS PURPUREA (Foxglove), § 778. 
Ist. Symproms, § 778. 


XIV. QUINIA, § 780. 
XV. DAPHNE MEZEREUM, § 781. 


CHAPTER X. 


POISONOUS GASES. 


I. CARBONIC ACID GAS. 
lst. EFFECTS UPON THE HUMAN BODY, § 782. 
2d. Irs quaLitigs, § 786. 
3d. Licuryine cas, § 786. 


II. SULPHURETTED HYDROGEN, § 789. 
1st. Symptoms, § 789. 
2d. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 790. 


Il. EXHALATIONS FROM THE DEAD, § 791. 


PA Re Tit, 
P, Or Lt ON IoN) G 


CHAPTER I. 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 


§ 493. Ist. Definition of poisons.—Physicians generally understand by the 
word potson a substance having an inherent deleterious property, which ren- 
ders it, when taken into the system, capable of destroying life. It is difficult, 
however, to give a definition to the term which will meet the signification 
attached to it by different classes of persons; for while, in common language, 
poisons are understood to be those articles. only which are deadly in small 
doses—as strychnine, prussic acid, arsenic, &c.—the lawyer and the physician 
will unite in affixing to it a general meaning, similar to that which we have 
given above. Some substances are habitually classed as poisons which, accord- 
ing to the popular signification, would have a doubtful claim to be so called, 
being fatal only in large doses; and every medical practitioner is aware that 
very many active remedial substances may, in an overdose, produce serious and 
fatal effects. Moreover, questions may arise as to the applicability of the term 
to .substances which destroy life by mechanical irritation, such as powdered 
glass, &c. Therefore, in order to avoid the evil of giving too wide or too 
restricted a meaning to the word “poison,” we adopt the definition above 

467 


ee  ———————————— OO ee 


§ 496] IDIOSYNCRASY.—HABIT. [BOOK V. 


given, which makes no reference to the quantity required to produce a poison- 
ous result, nor to the mode in which it is introduced into the system. 

§ 494. 2d. Mode of action.—The mode of action of poisons, although 
exceedingly interesting as a physiological question, cannot here occupy our 
attention. Whether a poisonous substance exercises its specific deleterious 
action by being absorbed into the system, by entering into the blood, or by an 
immediate or remote action upon the nerves, is a question, that must often 
remain undecided. Its mode of action may be conjectured by the comparative 
rapidity and the nature of its effects. These it is important to study, since 
they are the basis upon which any classification of poisons must be founded. 
We will therefore return to them hereafter. The poisonous effect of any 
article is, however, not universally the same. There are certain peculiarities 
of constitution which in one case will prevent the injurious effects of a sub- 
stance which is generally poisonous, and in another will render a compara- 
tively innocuous alimentary or medicinal article highly pernicious. 

§ 495. (1.) Conversion of harmless substance.—The idiosyncrasy which 
converts a harmless substance into a poisonous agent, is very frequently ob- 
served in the case of articles of food. Thus mussels, fish, pork, mushrooms, 
and mutton have frequently given rise to all the symptoms of irritant poison- 
ing. It should be remembered, however, that the symptoms in these cases 
may result as well from the mechanical irritation of the food—too large a 
meal having been taken, or from the fact of its being in a condition unfit for 
use. The cases in which a really poisonous substance has been taken with 
impunity are more rare. In the majority, the immunity is only comparative, 
the person being affected merely in a less degree than is usual. ~An instance 
is, however, related, on the authority of Dr. Christison, in which a gentleman, 
unaccustomed to the use of opium, took nearly an ounce of good laudanum 
without any effect. Dr. Hartshorne says, that a medical friend of his had 
“lately seen a man in this city swallow about five grains of corrosive subli- 
mate, and was informed by the apothecary at whose shop he witnessed the 
act, that the individual in question was in the habit of taking the same quan- 
tity every day.’”’(a) : 

§ 496. (2.) Habit.—The influence of habit in rendering the system tolerant 
of poisonous substances is daily seen in the increased doses rendered necessary 
in the continued use of certain medicinal articles. Thus the system becomes 
rapidly tolerant of opium and its preparations, and doses increased beyond the 
usual limit of safety are required in order to produce the effect originally ob- 
tained. 'Those who have become addicted to the vice of eating or smoking 
opium for the sake of creating a pleasurable excitement of the system, find it 
necessary to gradually augment the amount they consume, and are unable to 
suspend or discontinue the habit without experiencing the most distressing 
sensations. Accounts have been lately published, which would seem to show 
that the system may become tolerant even of arsenzc, and that the dose may 
be gradually increased without the production of toxical effects. General 
medical experience is certainly not in harmony with this statement. On the 


(a) Taylor’s Med. Jur. Am. ed. p. 98. 
463 


BOOK V.] ARSENIC EATERS, [$ 496 


contrary, a slight increase of the dose is very soon followed with a sensation 
of heat in the throat and stomach, inflammation of the eyes, swelling of the 
face, together with nausea, griping, and other alarming symptoms. The ac- 
counts alluded to are those coming from various sources relative to the prac- 
tice of arsenic-eating in some of the provinces of Austria. A case in which a 
person was charged with poisoning, was tried at Cilli, in Styria. The victim 
was an old soldier, who died suddenly, and in whose stomach arsenic was 
found. It is said that the court, in submitting the case to the jury, asked the 
question, ‘“‘ Was the.deceased an arsenic-eater ?’’? To which the jury replied, 
“Yes, he probably was.’? This question had reference to the fact, that ‘in 
the provinces of Lower Austria and Styria, bordering on Hungary, it is quite 
common with men to chew particles of arsenic, mixed with their bread, very 
much as the Chinese chew opium. ‘The absorption of the small quantity 
thus used, induces a fresh and clear complexion, and, to a certain extent, 
brightens the .intellectual faculties ; but with those who make a habit of thus 
eating it, there follows, before long, debility, and a premature death. Females 
do not at all indulge in it, and the few men thus distinguished are known by 
the name of eaters of poison.” (b) 

Dr. Tschudi states that the peasantry purchase it under the name of hedri 
(hedri, hedrich, hatter-rauch), from wandering herbalists or peddlers, who, on 
their. part, obtain it from workmen in Hungarian glass, from veterinary sur- 
geons, and from charlatans. ‘These poison-eaters (toxicophagt) have a 
double aim; first, they wish to give themselves, by this dangerous habit, a 
fresh and healthy appearance, and a certain degree of embonpoint. Many of 
the peasant girls, and even the men, have recourse to this expedient from 
coquetry and a desire to please; and it is remarkable what success they attain, 
for the young toxicophagi are distinguished by the freshness of their. com- 
plexion, and by the aspect of flourishing health. The following is one of 
many instances. A girl who attended cows, in good health, but pale and 
thin, was employed at a farm in the parish of H Having a lover whom 
she wished to attract yet more by her personal charms, she had recourse to the 
usual method, and took arsenic several times a week. The desired result was soon 
attained, and after some months she became fat, chubby-cheeked, and, in short, 
quite to Celadon’s taste. To carry the effect further, she increased the dose, 
and fell a victim to her coquetry—she died poisoned. 'The number of deaths 
from the abuse of arsenic is by no means inconsiderable, especially among. 
young people. Dr. Tschudi states, that so careful are the victims of this prac- 
tice to conceal it, that the secret often is revealed only on the death-bed. The 
second advantage gained by the toxicophagi, is that they become more free in 
respiration, and are able to ascend high mountains with ease. Upon every 
long excursion into the mountains, they take a little bit of arsenic which they 
let dissolve in the mouth. The effect is surprising. They ascend without diffi- 
culty heights which would have been almost insurmountable without this prac- 
tice. They commence with a piece of arsenic the size of a lentil seed, or about 


(b) Journ. des Connais. Méd.-Chir. Dec. 1851; and Am. Journ. Med. Sci. July 
1852, p. 270. 
469 


§ 497] INFLUENCE OF DISEASE. [BOOK V. 


half a grain. They keep to this dose, which they swallow several times a 
week, morning and evening, for a long period, to become accustomed to it. 
Then they increase the quantity insensibly, but with precaution, until the 
desired effect is produced. A countryman, named R——, of the commune of 
Ag—, a sexagenarian, and in excellent health, was in the habit of daily taking 
four grains. He had followed the habit forty years, and had transmitted it to 
his son. There was no trace of arsenical cachexia in this individual, no symp- 
toms of chronic poisoning. It is to be remarked, however, that when the prac- 
tice is dropped, emaciation generally ensues from some cause, either from the 
withdrawal of the stimulus, or from accidental or acquired disease. The cus- 
tom does not diminish the sexual passion, as is the case with the opium-eaters 
of the East, or with those who use the betel, in India and in Polynesia. On 
the contrary, the feeling becomes more strong. It may be as well to bring to 
mind a general use of arsenic in Vienna, among the stablemen and coachmen 
of the great houses. They mix a good pinch of the powder with corn, put a 
piece the size of a pea in a linen bag, and attach it to the bit of the horse. 
The saliva dissolves the poison. ‘This produces a bright aspect of the skin, 
roundness and elegance of form, and foam at the mouth. The coachmen of 


the hills adopt the same practice before commencing a laborious journey; and ~ 


horse-dealer's carry with them smal] balls of arsenic, to be given to those animals 
which they are leading to the market. Should a horse thus treated pass into 
the hands of a master who does not employ arsenic, he gets thin, loses his 
freshness, becomes dull, and, in spite of abundant food, does not recover his 
former sleekness.(c) The practice of arsenic-eating, and the singular effects 
which are attributed to it, are wholly discredited by Drs. Pereira, Taylor, and 
Christison, and are irreconcilable with our positive knowledge of the action of 
this substance upon the human system, as well as upon animals. The detailed 
account just given, possesses at least some literary interest, and may, perhaps, 
at some future time, receive that explanation of which, at present, it seems to 
stand so much in need. The only fact at all corroborative of this tolerance of 
arsenic, is that mentioned by Flandin. He states that he gave to animals 
doses of arsenic, commencing with th of a grain mixed with their food, 
and that in nine months, by progressive increase, they bore a dose of upwards 
of fifteen grains of arsenious acid, in powder, in twenty-four hours, baa 
their appetite or health becoming affected.’’(d) 

- § 497. (3.) Disease.—Disease also has sometimes the effect of rendering 
the system tolerant of substances which in the same doses would, in a healthy 
state of the system, be poisonous. On the other hand, certain diseases render 
the body more susceptible to the influence of poisons. Examples of the fact 
first mentioned are seen in the tolerance of large doses of opium, or other 
narcotics in tetanus, mania-a-poti, and some other diseases marked by great 
nervous tension. During the active stage of severe inflammatory and febrile 
diseases, mercury may be given in large and repeated doses without producing 


(c) Med. Times and Gaz. July, 1854, from Gaz. des Hépitaux, May 16. 

(d) Traité des Poisons, vol. i. p. 737. The statements in the text are confirmed by 
Mr. Heisch, of London, who gives, as authority, Dr. Arbele, Dr. Kottowitz, Dr. Lorenz, 
and a director of the arsenic works near Salzburg. Ranking’s Abst. (Am. ed.), xxi. 27. 


470 


BOOK V.] EVIDENCE OF POISONING. [$ 499 


salivation. Illustrations of the second are presented by the aggravation or 
the ready production of cerebral symptoms, after the use of small doses of 
narcotics, in those who have a predisposition to cerebral congestion or apo- 
plexy, and by the extreme facility with which salivation follows the adminis- 
tration of mercury in persons affected with the disorganization of the kidney, 
which usually accompanies albuminous urine. The use of iodide of potassium 
after mercurial preparations, is said to favor the development of the mercurial 
cachexia. (e) 

§ 498. 3d. Hvidence of poisoning.—The medical evidence in cases of sus- 
pected poisoning, is derived from several sources, to wit, the symptoms, the 
post-mortem appearances, chemical analysis, and experiments on animals ; 
the whole evidence being at the same time strengthened by reference to the 
known effects of the poison in other well authenticated instances. 

§ 499. (1.) Symptoms.—lIt is but rarely that some knowledge of the symp- 
toms preceding death is not obtained, even where the mode of their invasion 
has been unobserved. Occasionally, indeed, persons are found dead from 
the effects of poisoning, of the precise manner of whose death nothing can 
be learned, the suspicion of poisoning arising only in consequence of the 
finding of the phial from which the poison has been taken, or other circum- 
stantial evidence of a similar character. Such are, in general, cases of self- 
destruction; the unfortunate victim of misfortune or excess having designedly 
withdrawn himself from observation, with the view of being undisturbed in 
his purpose. But in most cases of accidental and homicidal poisoning, some 
knowledge is acquired, either directly or indirectly, of the nature and progress 
of the symptoms. With few exceptions, medical aid is sought, and the direct 
testimony of the physician can thus be obtained. ! 

With regard, therefore, to this portion of the medical evidence, it is im- 
portant that the following circumstances, bearing upon the probability of 
‘poisoning, should be considered :— 

(a.) The mode of invasion of the symptoms.—In most cases of acute poi- 
soning, by which is meant those in which a single dose capable of destroying 
life is taken, the symptoms arise more or less suddenly. In the chapters upon 
the individual poisons, the length of time elapsing before the accession of the 
symptoms, will be given; it varies with each poison, and is influenced also by 
several circumstances, such as the fulness or emptiness of the stomach, the 
state of health and the habits of the individual. Although arising suddenly, 
the symptoms do not necessarily follow immediately the ingestion of the poi- 
son. If it have been swallowed in food or drink, the symptoms announcing 
the fact of poisoning may not come on for an hour or more afterwards. This 
fact has been frequently observed in arsenical poisoning, and is usual in poi- 
soning by opium, belladonna, digitalis, and some other narcotics. But when 
the symptoms have begun to manifest themselves, there is a progressive 
development of them, and they present (like any disease) certain features, 
which, combined, form a portrait.by which they may be referred to some one 
class of the poisons, or be known to depend upon a particular poison. It 


(e) Trans. Coll. Phys. Philad. vol. ii. No. 8, 1855. 
| 471 


§ 500] EVIDENCE OF POISONING. [BOOK V- 


is not indeed meant that there may not bea remission of the symptoms in 
poisoning, due either to the influence of treatment or to the spontaneous 
struggles of nature; but this circumstance, which is more apt to take place 
when a dose insufficient for the destruction of life has been taken, can hardly 
affect the value of the fact of the sudden accession and development of charac- 
teristic symptoms. It should not be overlooked, that poisons have sometimes 
been taken or administered otherwise than by the mouth, as by the rectum or 
vagina, and in the case of volatile poisons, as carbonic acid, prussic acid, ether, 
chloroform, &c., by the lungs. 

(b.) The duration of the symptoms is another consideration, which has im- 
portant bearings. Although sudden death is not produced by the majority of 
poisons, or at least by such as are usually swallowed, yet death from acute 
poisoning is an early result. A few minutes or hours may suffice; and, on 
the other hand, the patient may survive for days. No general rule upon this 
point can be laid down; arsenic usually destroys life within twenty-four, opium 
within twelve hours, and prussic acid in a few minutes. Exceptions are seen 
to all of these general rules; and with no poison is there so wide a range in 
the duration of the symptoms as in arsenic, since it has been known to prove 
fatal in less than two hours, and after several days. The reader will find suffi- 
cient details upon this point hereafter. 

§ 500. All the importance of the evidence derived from the symptoms, de- 
pends upon the possibility of showing a distinction between them and a 
disease suddenly developed. This distinction should be sufficient, not merely 
to satisfy the mind of the physician, but to afford convincing proof to the jury 
upon the subsequent trial. This is often the most difficult and annoying duty 
of the physician; for while his own mind may be perfectly satisfied of the 
correctness of his judgment, he can rarely, with perfect conscientiousness, assert 
that the symptoms might not be explained upon the supposition of disease. 
Hence, this portion of the medical evidence cannot stand alone, but must be 
supported either by the positive correspondence with it of the post-mortem 
appearances and chemical analysis, or by the absence of any evidence from the 
autopsy confirming the notion of disease. Thus, in suspected poisoning by 
strychnia, the tetanic convulsions caused by this alkaloid might be readily 
and plausibly ascribed to other external or internal causes; upon the symp- 
toms alone, it would be impossible to base evidence sufficiently strong to pro- 
cure a conviction. Or again, should a person die with the symptoms of 
irritant poisoning, the physician would find it difficult to defend the position 
that similar phenomena might not be witnessed in an attack of cholera, or 
in gastro-enteritis, arising from some other cause. Dr. Lee says: ‘“‘ During 
the prevalence of malignant cholera in 1832, we mistook a case of poisoning 
by arsenic for an attack of this disease. A lady took more than a drachm 
of the arsenite of potash, as we afterwards ascertained, with the intention of 
destroying her life, which was followed by severe retching, vomiting, cramps, 
livid, cold, and clammy skin, and the other symptoms which usually attend a 
severe attack of cholera.’’(/) 


(f) Copland’s Dict. Am. ed., art. “ Poisons.” 
472 


q 
{ 
| 


BOOK V.] SYMPTOMS.—POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES, [$ 501 


Certain portions of the ordinary circumstantial evidence blend closely with 
that which is purely medical; hence, the medical expert should carefully dis- 
tinguish in his own mind, between the evidence required of him as a physician, 
and that of which he is no better qualified to judge than any other good ob- 
server. One of these cases is that in which a number of persons are suddenly 
seized with similar symptoms of poisoning after a meal, while one or more of 
them remains unaffected. This evidence will often not merely support the fact 
of poisoning, but also indicate its source. Not unfrequently, this circumstance 
has been the first to awaken suspicion, and direct inquiry in the right direction. 
Although this portion of the evidence cannot be considered as falling exclu- 
sively within the province of the physician, its value may here be illustrated 
by one or two examples. The following are related by Casper :( 7) A woman 
acting as the accomplice of her lover, poisoned her husband with phosphorus in 
bread and butter. The husband ate only half of the bread, for he did not like 
its taste, and soon afterwards symptoms of poisoning appeared, and after a short 
illness he died. No dissection was made of the body at the time, but, after- 
wards, suspicions of foul play arose; it was taken up, and found to be far gone 
in putrefaction. Nevertheless, traces of inflammation were clearly to be seen 
in the stomach. An imperfect chemical examination gave negative results. 
The examination of witnesses would have been equally fruitless had it not 
been for the remarkable evidence of several witnesses, simple-minded peasants, 
servants, &c., who testified that the man’s fingers which he had used in eating 
the bread and butter, were observed to emit light when he soon afterwards 
went into the dark stable, and also that on the next day the piece of bread 
which he had left uneaten smelled like lucifer matches—a circumstance which 
the witnesses were unable to account for. Another case in which a similar 
criminal motive may be presumed, is related by the same author. A man of 
high rank was accused of having poisoned the husband of his mistress with 
arsenic. It appeared that as often as the accused had been entertained at 
the table of the deceased person, the latter, who was a healthy and vigorous 
person, was attacked with symptoms resembling those of an irritant poison. 
At last he died, and his widow married the prisoner. A good while after- 
wards the dead body was disinterred, and found to be greatly mummified, 
but no arsenic was detected by a chemical investigation. On searching the 
house, however, a box was found belonging to the prisoner, containing arsenic, 
and a less quantity of it than he was proved to have purchased. 

Tn such cases as the above, the medical expert is not called upon to give an 
opinion as to the guilt or innocence of the aceused, but simply whether the 
symptoms which were observed could have been produced by the poison alleged 
to have been administered. On his affirmative decision, it becomes the pro- 
vince of the law to inquire whether the poison was actually administered, and 
not voluntarily taken, and whether or not the accused was guilty of its ad- 
ministration. 

§ 501. (2.) Post-mortem appearances.—There is no portion of the medical 
evidence of poisoning which demands closer scrutiny than this. In the majo- 


(ff) Gericht. Med. i. 408. 
473 


§ 502] POST-MORTEM INSPECTION, [BOOK V. 


rity of cages, the post-mortem appearances are not conclusive of poisoning ; 


in some, there are no alterations whatever of the natural structure, and in © 


others, what little force may lie in this portion of the evidence, may be prac- 
tically lost by ingenious explanations or suggestions. With the exception of 
the destructive changes caused by the corrosive acids, or other caustic sub- 
stances, there are perhaps none which can stand unsupported by the evidence 
from symptoms; so that, in cases of death in which these have been unob- 
served, no satisfactory conclusion can be obtained. In such cases, the reality 
of poisoning can be ascertained only by a resort to chemical analysis. From 
the prevailing want of familiarity with the usual appearances of the viscera 
after death, it is to be feared that many errors are daily committed; pheno- 
mena, the result of cadaveric change simply, or perhaps the effect of disease, 
being mistaken for the immediate and characteristic effects of some poisonous 
substance. A striking illustration of this fact, will be referred to in the 
chapter upon ‘“ Aconite.’”? Sometimes, however, the undissolved remains of 
the poison may be found in the stomach and intestines, or its presence may 
be detected by its peculiar odor or color. These are enumerated in each 
case under the ‘post-mortem appearances,” and often afford valuable hints 
as to the nature of the poison which has been swallowed. Thus the salts of 
copper, for example, may be detected by their color; hydrocyanic acid, or 
the oil of bitter almonds, by its powerful odor; and the leaves of savine, 
and some other vegetable irritants, taken in substance, by their botanical 
characters. The physician, however, should guard himself against the error 
of too readily depending upon these indications, for the senses of smell and 


sight are both often deceived in such cases, and the odor or color supposed 


to be due to the presence of some poison, may really depend upon natural 
causes. 

§ 502. Nevertheless, the value of the microscope in identifying the presence 
of some vegetable poisons by their botanical characters, has not received: that 
attention which it deserves. Dr. Frazer, in the course of some judicious 
remarks upon this point,(g) says :— 

“The point in such an investigation, which we require to determine in the 
first instance, is identically similar to the first step in deciding on the nature 
of a botanical specimen ; if the specimen consists altogether of cellular tissue, 
it is to be classed as one of the ‘cellulares,’ and possibly may prove to be some 
of the poisonous fungi; should it, however, yield us distinct evidence of vas- 


_ cular tissue, in that case we will have, as our next duty, supposing it is a_ 


fragment of leaf which we fre examining, to decide on the nature of the 
venation, which at once points out whether it constituted a portion of an 
exogenous or of an endogenous plant, the latter having the well-known 
parallel venation, and the former presenting an equally distinctive reticulated 
arrangement. Having advanced so far, we then have four other points, at 
least, for aiding our further identification of its source. | 

“Ist. The presence or absence of hairs; their relative abundance on the 
upper or under surface of the leaf; and their shape, composition, and arrange- 
ment. 


(9g) Monthly Journ. April, 1855. 
ATA 


ft 


% 
* 
q! 


pene 


; 
; 


BOOK V.]| CHEMICAL ANALYSIS. [$ 503 


“9d. The appearance of the epiderm on the upper surface of the leaf; the 
form of the cells of which it is composed ; the existence or non-existence of 
stomata; and, if they are present, their shape, size, and disposition in the 
epiderm. 

‘3d. Similar observations on the epiderm, upon the under surface of the leaf. 

“4th. The disposition of the parenchyma of the leaf; the development of 
various crystalline matters (raphides) in this tissue, and their form, when they 
exist.” 

He suggests, that as the chemist may exhibit, in a sealed tube, his sublimates 
of arsenic or mercury, so the microscopic observer may produce, to corrobo- 
rate his testimony, accurate drawings of the fragments of a poisonous plant, 
printed by solar light, as photographs, or more slowly obtained with the aid 
of a pencil and camera. 

§ 503. (8.) Chemical analysis.—The indefatigable researches of Orfila in 
the domain of toxicology, and the assiduous culture of this science by other 
eminent chemists, have placed in our hands perhaps the least fallacious of all 
the means for verifying the fact of poisoning. It is of the utmost importance 
that the chemical analysis in cases of suspected poisoning should be intrusted 
to a competent chemist, capable not only of conducting it with system and 
accuracy, but also of meeting the numerous objections that may, at the subse- 
quent trial, be brought against his evidence. In the majority of cases of 
poisoning chemical tests are applicable and yield a positive result; they may, 
except where the poison is of a volatile character, or is liable to destructive 
decomposition, be employed with the certainty of valuable results, at consider- 
able periods after death. The substance or liquid submitted to analysis may 
be either a portion remaining unconsumed, or the food in which the poison 
has been taken; it may be the matters rejected from the stomach, or the 
secretions by which the poison is eliminated from the system; it may be the 
contents of the stomach as found after death ; or, finally, the viscera them- 
selves or the blood where it has arrived by absorption. The fallacies attending 
chemical analysis, when conducted by an expert chemist, are few; they arise 
chiefly from the fact of the possible accidental impregnation of the reagents or 
of the substance to be examined, with the same mineral poison as that which 
it is the object of the analyst to detect, or its existence as a natural constituent 
of either. Other objections that may be raised are due to the faulty manner of 
conducting the investigation, or to an over-hasty inference from too limited a 
number of tests. In estimating the value of the chemical proof of poisoning, 
the quantity of the supposed poison is of essential importance. The question 
of the life or death of the accused person in trials for murder, or of his cha- 
racter under other circumstances, is too momentous a one to be determined 
upon any but the most positive proof. This, in the present instance, consists 
in the extraction from the dead body, or from the matters discharged during 
life, a substantial portion of the alleged poison, which can be recognized not 
only by its behavior with different reagents, but by its physical qualities, the 
form of its crystals, if any, its taste, smell, &e. Unless, moreover, this evidence 
points to the same cause of death as that which is indicated by the symptoms, 
it would be not only hazardous, but cruel, to conclude that a crime had been 

475 


§ 005] DIFFERENTIAL DIAGNOSIS OF POISONING. [BOOK V. 


committed. Indeed, the only value of chemical analysis in judicial questions 
such as those referred to, is, when its results are positive, to corroborate the 
evidence derived from the symptoms during life. With regard to the possi- 
bility of poison being surreptitiously introduced into the stomach after death 
with a view of casting suspicion upon others, we may safely say that its con- 
sideration is not required until some authentic instance of the fact can be 
produced. This is one of the chimeras of medical jurisprudence, which the 
ingenuity of authors has evoked, but whose existence is fabulous if not absurd. 

§ 504. (4.) Experiments upon animals.—In the succeeding pages it will 
be found that little allusion is made to these, in proof of the mode of action 
of poisons. It appears to us that well authenticated instances of poisoning 
in the human subject are far better adapted to advance our knowledge of toxi- 
cological agents than are experiments upon the lower orders of animals. . The 
frequent variation in the effect of poisons upon these creatures, the security 
enjoyed by some of them against poisons which are virulent in their action 
upon man, and the difficulty of accurately distinguishing the symptoms which 
are the result of the operation often required for the introduction of the poison 
into the animal’s stomach, from those which are due to it alone, are the 
principal grounds on which we are disposed to rest our exclusion of this kind 
of evidence. We can better afford to dispense with evidence of such doubtful 
and fallacious character, when it is remembered that practically an appeal to 
such experiments is rarely received with favor. The only case in which the 
effect of poison upon animals practically becomes a question, is in those not 
uncommon instances in which some one or more of the domestic animals have 
sickened and died in consequence of eating portions of the suspected food 
which has been thrown out, or where, for sake of experiment, it has been 
given to them. But here the mere fact of their dying suddenly after eating 
of the suspected food, is in itself important enough to direct inquiry into the 
case. ‘The peculiar symptoms manifested by them cannot be a matter of much 
interest, although it may occasionally be necessary to make a chemical analysis 
of the contents of the digestive organs for the purpose of ascertaining the 
nature of the poison contained in the food. This course has frequently been 
resorted to, and much light thereby thrown upon cases which might otherwise 
have remained doubtful. 

§ 505. 4th. Differential diagnosis of poisoning.—The physician is often 
at a loss, upon the first view of a case of poisoning, to determine whether the 
symptoms presented by the patient may not be really due to disease. The 
aspect of a case of irritant poisoning presents a certain resemblance to cholera 
or to gastro-enteric disturbance, and most of the phenomena of narcotic poi- 
soning are found in acute diseases, affecting the brain or spinal marrow. 
Should he content himself with remaining a silent spectator of the case, he 
may remain in doubt until its close; but if, on the contrary, he has witnessed 
or been made aware of the time and circumstances under which the symptoms 
came on, and their mode of invasion, he will be less embarrassed, and if an 
autopsy is obtained, can seldom be at a loss to give a decided opinion. The 
diagnosis must always remain incomplete without a post-mortem examination, 
whether its results be positive or negative; and hence, for practical ends, the 

476 


a 
t 


Se: a 


BOOK V.| MALIGNANT CHOLERA, CHOLERA MORBUS. [$ 507 


careful analysis of symptoms in those diseases, which leave but few traces 
behind them, is of primary importance. 

~§ 506. (1.) The diseases most apt to be mistaken for ¢rritant poisoning 
are :— 

(a.) Cholera.—This disease in its malignant form, as is well known, is often 
rapidly fatal; it may supervene shortly after a meal or a draught of liquid; 
its onset is sometimes sudden, although usually preceded by diarrhoea; there 
is great thirst, vomiting, and purging without effort, of a thin and slightly 
turbid liquid; the surface is cold and shrivelled, the features collapsed, the voice 
almost extinct, the pulse feeble or imperceptible, and the intellect undisturbed ; 
the lesions discovered after death are not sufficiently characteristic to be used 
in evidence, the most uniform, perhaps, being an increased development of the 
glands of Brunner in the small intestine. In most of the symptoms enume- 
rated, it may resemble very closely a case of poisoning by arsenic or other irri- 
tant, but there are, nevertheless, sufficient means of distinction. In poisoning 
by the irritants, a burning sensation in the throat and stomach, and pain 
and distress in the whole abdomen, but chiefly over the stomach, precede, or 
are simultaneous in their occurrence with the vomiting. They are the most 
prominent and constant symptoms during the continuance of the case. The 
matters passed from the stomach and bowels, after their previous contents have 
been evacuated, are mucous and bloody, and are not spouted forth as in cho- 
lera, but rejected with great distress and effort. The anus is often indeed ex- 
coriated by their irritating properties. Furthermore, it may be observed, that 
those who have once witnessed a case of malignant cholera, will most proba- 
bly have the peculiar, but indescribable features of this disease so impressed 
upon their memory, that they will not readily mistake for it any case of irri- 
tant poisoning. Finally, the epidemic prevalence of the disease, or the fact 
that about the same time other cases, resembling Asiatic cholera have oceur- 
red, will materially assist the physician in giving a positive opinion as to the 
nature of the attack. 

§ 507. (b.) Bzilious cholera, or cholera morbus, as it is usually termed, is 
a disease which has more points of resemblance to the effects of poison, than 
that which has just been mentioned. In it, both the extreme collapse and 
the peculiar rice-water discharges are not seen; but, on the other hand, the 
vomiting and purging are of a bilious character, and there is excessive pain in 
the abdomen. The progress of the case is, however, different. The pain in 
cholera morbus is remittent, coming on in paroxysms: and in proportion as the 
offending matters are discharged, the vomiting is less frequent and painful. In 
irritant poisoning, on the contrary, the pain is constant, and there is usually 
also tenderness upon pressure; the vomiting is of mucus and blood, and the 
discharges from the bowels are of a similar character. The tendency in the 
latter is to death, in the former to recovery. Cholera morbus is seldom fatal, 
and when it is, death does not in general take place for several days. The 
contrary is the rule in poisoning by the irritants. Such are the distinctions 
usually advanced by authors; and while they are, as a general rule, undoubt- 
edly correct, it should not be forgotten that distinctions valid in medicine, may 
not be so in their application to criminal cases. While in the science of medi- 

ATT 


§ 508] PERFORATION OF THE STOMACH. [BOOK V. 


cine, diagnosis is founded upon a careful investigation of the prevailing and 
general characters of diseases, the most delicate questions in medical jurispru- 
dence are, on the other hand, determined by exceptional cases. Now, as ex- 
perience shows that persons may not die from the effect of the poisonous irri- 
tants until several days have elapsed, or, indeed, that they may not die at all, 
we are at a loss to perceive how, in such cases, it will be possible, in the 
absence of circumstantial and moral evidence, to decide that the symptoms 
were due to attempted poisoning, rather than to the disease in question ; for, 
although there may be some points of distinction, as, for example, the early 
occurrence of a burning sensation in the throat, the unremitting character of 
the pain and the sanguinolent discharges, yet these may be absent in mild 
cases of poisoning, and where life is not destroyed. On the whole, we con- 
sider the assertion hazardous and untrue, that in every case the symptoms of 
irritant poisoning can be distinguished from those of bilious cholera. 

- The corrosive poisons leave traces behind them sufficiently distinct to prevent 
any likelihood of mistaking their effects for those of disease. 

There are certain diseases or sudden accidents partially resembling in their 
symptoms those of the irritant poisons which are so readily recognized on 
post-mortem examination, that it is needless to enlarge upon the modes of 
distinguishing them. These are rupture of the stomach, intestine, biliary 
ducts, and uterus, and no one will contend that such lesions can be produced 
by poisoning. . | 

§ 508. (c.) Perforation of the stomach may, however, give rise to embar- 
rassment ; not, indeed, so much from the symptoms of the disease when con- 
sidered alone, but from their offering perhaps sufficient resemblance to those 
of poisoning to support the opinion that the lesion referred to may be due to 
this cause. While it is true that in this disease, the seizure is sudden and the 
pain in the abdomen acute, it is not preceded by the sensation of burning in 
the throat and stomach, nor is the vomiting urgent unless upon the ingestion 
of the liquids. There is again no diarrhoea; the main symptoms are acute 
diffused pain all over the abdomen arising from peritonitis, and the patient is 
collapsed from the first. But in a case of this kind which has not been closely 
observed, the discovery after death of the perforation in the stomach will 
naturally awaken the suspicion of poisoning. If we now inquire under what 
circumstances this lesion is produced in cases of poisoning, we will find that 
with the exception of the corrosive acids it is seldom occasioned by any kind 
of poison. Perforation from arsenic, which poison is the one to which it will 
most probably be attributed, is so rare an event that but three cases are said 
to be on record, and the fact of the perforation being so unusual in a form of 
poisoning so exceedingly common, renders it highly probable that in these 
instances it was due to an already diseased state of the coats of the stomach. 
But the corrosive poisons, which undoubtedly produce, in many instances, a 
perforation of the stomach, leave in addition such manifest traces of their 
action upon the throat, cesophagus, and stomach, not to mention the corrosion 
of the mouth and lips, that it seems to be inexplicable how the single fact of 
the perforation should leave any doubt in the mind of the examiner or of the 


jury. Moreover, the character of the perforation alone affords a sufficient 
478 


BOOK V.] PERFORATION OF THE STOMACH AFTER DEATH. [$ 509 


ground of distinction, The stomach in such cases is blackened and extensively 
destroyed ; the aperture is large, its edges rough and irregular, and the coats 
are easily lacerated. Further, the poison escapes into the cavity of the abdo- 
men, where it may be easily discovered by chemical analysis. In perforation 
from disease, on the other hand, if the affection be of a cancerous nature there 
will be no difficulty in distinguishing the cause, and if it be simple ulceration, 
such as occurs sometimes in persons in the enjoyment of apparently good 
health, the opening is also characteristic in its nature. ‘The aperture is 
usually of an oval or rounded form, about half an inch in diameter, situated 
in or near the lesser curvature of the stomach, and the edges are smooth. 
Indeed it has not unfrequently the appearance of having been ‘ punched out.’ 
The outer margin of the aperture is often blackened, and the aperture itself is 
funnel-shaped from within outwards—z. e., the mucous coat is the most 
removed, and the outer or peritoneal coat the least. The coats of thé 
stomach, round the edge of the aperture, are usually thickened for some dis- 
tance; and when cut they have almost a cartilaginous hardness.’”’ (Taylor.) 
Death takes place from peritonitis, the contents of the stomach being effused 
into the cavity of the abdomen. 

§ 509. There is still another form of perforation, which is due to a solution 
of the coats of the stomach by its contents after death. It cannot give rise 
to a suspicion of poisoning, unless in the absence of any knowledge of the 
symptoms preceding death. It is purely a cadaveric phenomenon, and may 
occur in the stomach of persons dying from any cause, provided the peculiar 
fermentative process necessary for its production exist.(h) It is formed only 
in the larger end of the stomach, the opening is large and irregular, with 
ragged and pulpy edges and no surrounding inflammation. The edges may 
be discolored and black, as the result of a chemical action of the intestinal 
gases upon the coloring matter of the blood. There is no peritoneal inflam- 
mation, but the spleen, diaphragm or other subjacent viscus may be soft- 
ened by the acid. The absence of any disorganization of the pharynx 
and csophagus, and of peritoneal inflammation, is sufficient to distinguish 
this post-mortem perforation from that caused by corrosive poison, with 
which alone it is possible to confound it. Dr. Budd has found, naturally 
enough, that this post-mortem softening of the coats of the stomach is more 
common in hot weather. He says: “During the past summer, which was a 
very hot one, my attention was casually drawn to this subject, and from the 
middle of May to the middle of August, I carefully examined the stomach 
in all the bodies that were opened in the King’s College Hospital. In several 
instances the mucous membrane of the stomach, in the greater curvature, was 
completely destroyed, and in a very large proportion, it had been clearly acted 


(h) See Med. Times and Gaz. (No. 246, p. 268), for a case in which the stomach of 
a child (which had been asphyxiated by its intoxicated mother hugging it too closely) 
presented the following appearances: Nearly the whole of the great cul de sac had 
disappeared ; the edges of the aperture were thin, jagged and flocculent; another 
similar but smaller opening existed lower down and abutted upon a corresponding 
aperture in the transverse colon. No unnatural adhesions or other morbid appear- 
ances existed, and a quantity of milk was found in the stomach and in the cavity of 
the abdomen. 


479 


$512} * GASTRITIS—STRANGULATION, [BOOK V. 


upon more or less by the gastric juice. I renewed my observations in 
October, but the change, in a striking degree at least, was then much less fre- 
quent.’’(2) 

Should the rules thus laid down for the discrimination of the source of 
these perforations not prove sufficient, a resort to chemical analysis will render 
the demonstration complete. If any poison has been taken in so large a dose, 
or is possessed of such violent properties as to cause the lesion thus referred 
to, it will readily be found by these means. It has been said that a person 
may die with the symptoms of irritant poisoning, and after death, perforation, 
the result of cadaveric change, be found, and that hence the knowledge of the 
true cause of the perforation does not exclude the idea of poisoning. It is 
true that such a rare coincidence may happen, but the want of connection 
between the poison and the perforation merely renders it necessary to support 
the charge upon other evidence. The case of Miss Burns, for the murder of 
whom, by poison, a Mr. Angus, of Liverpool, was tried in 1808, is one in 
which this doubt arose. The charge of poisoning was not sustained by chemical 
- or pathological evidence, and the prisoner was acquitted. 

§ 510. Perforation of the intestines is also occasionally met with, but as it 
is not the result of poisoning, except in circumstances where this can be readily 
known, it is unnecessary to dwell upon it. 

§ 511. (d.) Gastritis, Gastro-enteritts, and Peritonitis.—It is the natural 
effect of poisonous irritants to produce one or more of these diseases, but 
as they may arise from other causes, a distinction is in practice necessary. 
Gastritis is rarely, if ever, primary or idiopathic, and with the other two 
affections has a more protracted course than is usual in irritant poisoning. 
Diarrhea, so universal a symptom of irritant poisoning, is not always present 
in these diseases, and there is in them an intense febrile condition which is not 
seen in poisoning. _ However satisfactory these distinctions may be to a physi- 
cian, it is apparent that they may have little weight with others; hence, 
practically, it is important to examine them closely, for the accusation in such 
cases will have to depend upon the results of the chemical investigation. 

(e.) Strangulation of the intestines has been enumerated among the diseases 
likely to awaken suspicion of poisoning, but with little justice, for if the symp- 
toms are not sufficient to distinguish it, most certainly it cannot fail to be 
detected upon the post-mortem examination. | 

§ 512. The symptoms produced by narcotic poisoning may be closely imi- 
tated by those of natural diseases, such as apoplexy, epilepsy, congestion of 
the brain, and tetanus. Indeed, occasionally the similarity is so great, that, 
upon the medical evidence alone, it may be impossible to acquire a certainty 
of the cause of death. Many distinctions have been drawn by writers upon 
toxicology, between the effects of narcotic poisons and those of diseases of 
_ the brain and spinal marrow, but they serve only to show the very close 
analogy between them. When, moreover, it is remembered that the most 
important of these poisonous agents leave no distinct traces in the dead body 
of their action, it will be perceived that the differential diagnosis must come 


(7) Lancet, 1847, p. 593. 
480 


BOOK V.] APOPLEXY—TETANUS. [$ 518 


to depend mainly upon the results of chemical investigation, and the moral or 
circumstantial evidence in the case. 

(f.) Apopleay, it is said, may be distinguished from opium poisoning by 
the following considerations, viz: that it does not usually occur under the 
age of thirty, nor come on without warning symptoms, and that the time of 
seizure is irrespective of the taking of food or drink; but these distinctions 
are futile, even when, as is rarely the case, an accurate account of the whole 
history of the sickness can be obtained. More reliable are the facts that in 
poisoning by opium the symptoms are gradual in their accession, and that the 
more confirmed effects are preceded by drowsiness, and that the patient, until 
an advanced period of the stupor, can be temporarily aroused from it. The 
pupils also, in general, are strongly contracted, and there is no contortion of 
the face or paralysis of the limbs. In the majority of fatal cases of apoplexy, 
the attack is sudden, although indistinct warning symptoms may have pre- 
ceded it; the patient cannot be roused, the pupils are dilated and insensible, 
and the face is slightly contorted, indicating a paralytic condition of one side 
of the body. Yet, let us hasten to say, there are numerous exceptions to 
these rules, a fact which is easily understood, when we reflect that opium in 
addition to its specific narcotic properties produces the very same pathological 
condition, with the exception of effusion of blood into the substance of the 
brain, from which it is our aim to distinguish it. 

(g.) Tetanus.—The same remark is applicable to the resemblance between 
the convulsions of ¢etanus and those produced by strychnia. It is needless, 
therefore, for us to draw a parallel between the diseases referred to and the 
symptoms so closely imitating them, produced by the poisonous narcotics. 
Where the success of either prosecution or defence comes to stand upon such 
vacillating ground as this, other sources of evidence failing, it would be better 
that the most approved works on pathology should be consulted and the de- 
scriptions of disease there given be compared with the symptoms enumerated 
under the narcotic poisons, than that the reader should draw an unwarranted. 
conclusion from such an imperfect abstract as it would be proper for us to give 
in this place. 

In Palmer’s case, the distinction between the symptoms of poisoning by 
strychnia, and tetanus, was thoroughly investigated. (27) 

§ 513. Finally, all cases of sudden death may awaken suspicion of poison-- 
ing. If, as may well be the case, the post-mortem alterations do not cledrly 
indicate the seat and nature of the affection, a review of the manner of dying, 
and the absence of any positive result from chemical investigation, must at 
once negative the presumption of poison having been taken. ‘Thus, certain 
diseases of the heart, over-distension of the stomach, fatal syncope, and some 
obscure diseases, may not be recognized at the autopsy, but the mode of 
death in them is entirely different from that in any form of poisoning, except, 
perhaps, by prussic acid, in which the odor or chemieal tests will disclose the 
cause of death. The importance of a careful collection and comparison of all 
the medical evidence in every case, cannot be too strongly insisted upon; for 


(ii) Lond. Lancet, May and June, 1856. 
ol 481 


§ 514] ERRORS IN POST-MORTEM INSPECTIONS. [BOOK V. 


upon this combination of proof it is that a correct knowledge of the true cause 
of death must depend. 

§ 514. (2.) Sources of error arising from natural changes in the body 
after death.—Having thus shown the chief means of distinction between the 
effects of poison and of the natural diseases to which the human frame is sub- 
ject, it only remains for us to point out some sources of error which the natu- 
ral changes taking place in the body after death may give rise to. This 
important subject is one which has received but little attention at the hands of 
medical jurists, but there can be no doubt that the natural appearances of 
those parts of the body usually inspected after death, where poisoning has 
been attempted or is alleged, are often mistaken for pathological changes in- 
duced by the administration of poison. Nothing is more common than to 
meet with the expressions that ‘‘the stomach and intestines were red and in- 
flamed,” ‘‘the mucous coat corrugated,’ ‘‘the brain was highly congested,’ 
‘the blood of a dark color, and fluid,’”? &c.—statements which are objection- 
able not only on account of their want of precision, but because they may be 
predicated of conditions perfectly natural and healthy. Dr. Yelloly’s observa- 
tions, though often quoted, are deserving of repetition here. He states, 

Ist. That vascular fulness of the lining membrane of the stomach, whether 
florid or dark-colored, is not a special mark of disease, because it is not incon- 
sistent with a previous state of perfect health. 

2d. That the effects of putrefaction and spontaneous changes, induced by 
the loss of vitality, are sometimes attributed to the action of poisons. 

3d. That the vascularity in question is entirely venous—the florid state of 
the vessels arising from the arterial character of the blood remaining for some 
time in the veins after its transmission from the arterial capillaries at the close 
of life; the appearance, however, is sometimes due to transudation only. 

4th. That the fact of inflammation having existed previously to death can- 
not be inferred merely from the aspect of vessels in a dead part—there must, 
at least, have been symptoms during life.(/) 

In the examination of the stomach it will be found that it presents variable 
appearances, according as it is inspected during or after the process of diges- 
tion, or after long fasting; whether itis empty or full, distended or contracted ; 
and whether the distension is due to liquid or to air. 

During, and immediately after digestion, the stomach is filled with gas and 
the remains of the food, and is, therefore, moderately distended, and its mucous 
membrane appears thin and does not lie in folds. Its color is of a pale rose, 
uniformly spread over the surface, or if the organ is unusually distended, it is 
gray or dirty white. On the other hand, in the fasting condition it is strongly 
contracted, and the mucous membrane is corrugated and thick. Its color is of 
an ashen gray when it is covered with mucus, but when this is not the ease, it 
is of a reddish-brown: It may be partly contracted and partly distended, in. 
which event, the differences referred to will be visible at the same time in the 
pyloric and cardiac portion. Moreover, the cadaveric hypostasis, or settling 
of blood, will be seen on the folds of the mucous membrane, or in those por- 


: (j) Med. Gaz. vol. xvii. p. 309. 
482 


BOOK V.] APPEARANCE OF THE STOMACH AFTER DEATH. [$ 516 


tions of the organ which are the least distended. After the process of diges- 
tion is entirely completed, the abdominal system of veins is loaded with blood, 
and the same engorgement occurs in certain diseases of the heart and lungs : 
should death take place at such a time, the mucous membrane of the stomach 
is found highly injected, and, in consequence of the transudation of liquids 
taking place in the dead body, ecchymoses are formed which often have the 
appearance of submucous extravasations; they frequently occupy the entire 
half of the stomach and both curvatures, and have a bluish-slate color. This 
injection may also occur in streaks, and thus give rise to an unfounded opinion 
that death was due to some irritant. This is especially the case where pow- 
dered substances, such as arsenic, are found near them, but it is a mere coin- 
cidence, since the existence of folds or rugs is a sufficient explanation of the 
adhesion of the powder to these places. (/) 

§ 515. Inflammatory redness may be known not only by its dirty hue, but 
by the simultaneous softening of the mucous coat. This is a pathological change 
which is of very frequent occurrence, especially in persons of intemperate habits 
—a fact which should not be overlooked in questions of poisoning. The soft- 
ening of the mucous coat after death has been already referred to, when speak- 
ing of perforation of the stomach; it is of course seen in lesser degrees, and, 
most probably, when not equally distributed over the whole stomach, is purely 
a cadaveric change depending upon the solvent powers of the liquids contained 
in the organ. When the mucous coat is found apparently thickened, this 
condition is often due merely to the stomach being in a contracted state; and, 
on the other hand, it may appear to be very thin when the appearance is solely 
due to its distension. Similar sources of error to those we have thus cursorily 
noticed, arise in the inspection of the brain, heart, and other organs. The 
physician should be upon his guard against them, and carefully distinguish the 
changes produced by disease from those which are brought about in the act 
of dying, or after death, by the position of the body and the transudation of 
liquids. If familiarity with the ordinary post-mortem appearances does not 
enable him to form a positive opinion as to the causes of death, it is far better 
that he should have the candor to say so, than, by giving an unwarranted 
opinion, incur the risk of causing the innocent to suffer. But in every case it 
is proper that precise and accurate language should be used in the description 
of post-mortem appearances, and that such expressions as inflammation, gan- 
grene, &c., which imply the manner in which the morbid change has resulted, 
should not be used, but rather, instead, such terms as will simply express the 
physical condition of the part, in reference to its size, color, consistence, &c. 

§ 516. From the foregoing remarks it is, we think, apparent that the most 
perfect evidence of poisoning is derived from the combined results of the in- 
vestigation of the symptoms, post-mortem appearances and chemical proof; 
should any portion of this evidence be wanting, the effect is thereby weakened, 
but not necessarily always to an equal degree ; since a chemical analysis afford- 
ing positive results, or a decided and characteristic post-mortem change, or a 
well marked set of symptoms, may each in certain cases afford high proba- 


(k) Darstellung der Leichenerscheinungen, &c., von Dr. Josef. Engel, Professor an 
der Universitat zu Prag. Wien. 1854, 8vo. 
483 


§ 518] CLASSIFICATION OF POISONS. [BOOK V. 


bility, if not conclusive demonstration of the fact of poisoning. On the other 
hand, the failure of the chemist to discover poison in the dead body does not 
always destroy the value of other evidence sustaining the fact of its having 
been taken, since the whole of it may have been removed by vomiting and purg- 
ing, or if the patient have lived long enough, been absorbed into the system, 
and then eliminated from it principally by the urine. Indeed, in the case of 
the vegetable poisons, the chemical analysis is often fruitless, they having been 
rapidly volatilized, decomposed or absorbed, but here, on the other hand, the 
symptoms are less likely to be taken for the effects of disease, or if they are, 
the fallacy of the assumption is demonstrated by the autopsy. 

§ 517. For this reason also the demonstration of the presence of a poison 
in the body is generally sufficient to establish the fact of poisoning; the 
amount detected may bear but a small proportion to that which was taken, 
but is as conclusive as if the whole were discovered. If, for example, the con- 
tents of the stomach contain sufficient arsenic, to form the metallic ring or 
spot, by Marsh’s process, the evidence is quite as good as if a more ponderable 
quantity had been found. As, in every case, the opinion of the expert may 
be strengthened by the perfect combination and correspondence of all the 
medical evidence, no portion of it should be neglected, since however strong 
it may appear to be, in a medical point of view, it is far from certain that 
subsequent inquiry may not evoke some doubts, which a more perfect exami- 
nation might have obviated. | 

§ 518. 5th. Classification of poisons.—We have followed in this treatise 
the classification usually adopted, viz: into Irrirant, Narcotic, AND NAR- 
COTICO-IRRITANT poisons. This division cannot be rigorously maintained ex- 
cept for the end of convenient reference ; since there are poisons usually classed 
under irritants, which are likewise sometimes narcotic in their action, as, for 
example, arsenic and oxalic acid; and, on the other hand, some of the pure 
narcotics, especially opium, occasionally produce the symptoms of irritant poi- 
soning. The classification is, however, sanctioned by the use of the most 
eminent toxicologists, and in the present imperfect state of our knowledge of 
the mode of action of poisons, has fewer objections against it than can be 
urged against any other. 

The symptoms produced by each class of poisons are sufficiently indicated 
by their name. Thus, the irritants produce vomiting and purging, intense ab- 
dominal pain, and fatal exhaustion. Septic irritants produce, in addition, 
symptoms which are known as typhoid ; and certain metallic irritants in small 
and long continued doses give rise to impaired digestion and nutrition, and 
death by a gradual exhaustion of the system. Their primary action is ex- 
pended upon the intestinal tube, causing inflammation or corrosion, and the 
effect upon the nervous system is secondary. The narcotics produce fulness 
of the head, vertigo, dimness of vision, delirium, coma, paralysis, and some- 
times tetanic convulsions. The narcotico-acrid poisons produce stupor or 
delirium and convulsions, and also irritate the stomach and bowels, causing 
vomiting and purging. Both these and the irritant poisons are commonly 
known by their taste, which is hot and acrid, metallic, nauseous, or bitter; 
arsenic is the chief exception to this rule, as its taste may be either unperceived 

484 


BOOK V.] IRRITANT POISONS.—ACIDS. [$ 520 


or be only distinguished as rough or sweetish. The corrosive poisons, such 
as the mineral acids and caustics, have so violent an effect upon the mouth 
and throat, that the mere fact of their having been taken, affords a good pre- 
sumption, in this country, at least (from the readiness with which any kind 
of poison can be obtained), against their having been voluntarily swallowed. 
The pure narcotics have only a slightly disagreeable taste. This class is, how- 
ever, but a small one compared with the others, and, with the exception of 
opium, rarely gives rise to judicial investigations. 


CHAPTER II. 


IRRITANT POISONS—ACIDS. 
I. Sulphuric Acid. (Oil of Vitriol.) 


§ 519. Concentrated sulphuric acid is a dense, oily, transparent and color- 
less liquid, with an energetic attraction for water. When diluted with 
water, heat is evolved by the mixture. It rapidly destroys and carbonizes 
organic matter, the extent of the destruction depending, of course, upon the 
degree of concentration of the acid, and the length of time it remains in con- 
tact with the organic structure. It is more frequently taken and given by 
mistake than by design, at least in our country, although cases are not want- 
ing, in which it has been criminally given to young children. An interesting 
case is related in Henke’s Zeitschrift, where it was used with the hope of 
inducing abortion. From the ease with which it can be procured, without 
awakening suspicion, it is sometimes made the means of self-destruction, and 
of late years, in England, numerous cases have occurred where it has been 
employed for the purpose of disfiguring the person, by being clandestinely 
thrown upon the face or neck. 

§ 520. Ist. The symptoms which follow the ingestion of this acid depend for 
their intensity upon its degree of concentration, and the quantity taken. 
When the strong acid has been taken, violent symptoms at once arise. The 
lining membrane of the mouth, throat, cesophagus and stomach, being instanta- 
neously corroded by it, extreme agony is felt in these parts, violent efforts to 
vomit are made, and dark and bloody masses of mucus and detached and altered 
membrane are discharged. Death takes place in extreme suffering, generally 
within twenty-four hours. In a case observed by Mr. Traill, death occurred 
in one hour, and in another related by Casper, where an adult took by mistake 
a mouthful of crude sulphuric acid, death took place in two hours. In most 
instances it will be found that the early administration of antidotes has miti- 
gated the symptoms and prolonged existence for a short time. 'The last named 
author mentions the case of a child, only seven weeks old, which lived eight 
days after it had been given concentrated sulphuric acid by its mother. Here 
the child was made to take carbonate of magnesia shortly after the poison had 
been administered. 

When the diluted acid has been taken, the symptoms are less violent and 


the case is more protracted. The presence of food in the stomach has an im- 
485 


§ 522] POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK V. 


portant influence upon the fatality of the dose, since much of the corrosive or 
carbonizing action of the acid may be expended upon this, and the mucous mem- 
brane of the stomach be thereby shielded. Cases are reported in which persons 
have survived for a long time. Thus, a young woman is referred to by Mayo, 
who lived eleven months after swallowing a tablespoonful of sulphuric acid, 
and then died from marasmus, in consequence of imperfect nutrition. 

§ 521. 2d. The smallest quantity which has been taken, with rapidly fatal 
results, appears to be that which was given in a case quoted by Dr. Taylor. In 
it, the quantity is said not to have exceeded forty drops. But the patient was 
a child only a year old, and antidotes were administered about half an hour 
after it had taken the acid. The symptoms, however, came on immediately 
and the child died in twenty-four hours. Dr. Christison says, that one drachm 
proved fatal to a young man in seven days. It is always difficult, however, 
to ascertain the exact quantity which has been swallowed, since the immediate 
impression made upon the mouth by the contact of so corrosive a liquid, 
naturally excites an instantaneous effort to get rid of it. The amount actually 
swallowed forms usually, therefore, but a small portion of what is taken into the 
mouth. It may indeed not reach the stomach at all, its action being expended 
upon the throat and cesophagus, and proving fatal by the inflammation and dis- 
organization there produced.(7) Occasionally, also, it enters the air-passages. 
A case of recovery after an injection of sulphuric acid, given in mistake for 
castor oil, is reported.(/) 

§ 522. 3d. Post-mortem appearances.—The following case will illustrate 
the effects of this poison when concentrated and swallowed. A man, thirty 
years of age, went to his closet in the dark, and drank a ‘‘ good mouthful” 
of commercial sulphuric acid. He was bled shortly after, and the blood is 
described as being of a syrupy consistence. Milk and soapsuds were given 
to him, and brought on vomiting, but he died in two hours. The whole 
tongue was white and sphacelated, and the mucous membrane here and there 
detached. The fauces and cesophagus were of a grayish-black color; the sto- 
mach was perfectly black on both surfaces, and of a soft and pulpy consist- 
ence. The omentum majus was likewise partly carbonized, in consequence of 
the escape of the acid into the abdominal cavity. The upper portion of the 
small intestine was of a blackish color, and the mucous membrane swollen and 
indurated. The contents of the stomach yielded, on chemical examination, 
one drachm and seventeen and a quarter grains of free sulphuric acid.(?) In 
Mr. Traill’s case, a washerwoman took a wineglassful of crude commercial acid 
of the specific gravity of 1.833, in mistake for ale. Although the proper 
antidotes were very soon administered, she died in one hour. A hole with 
ragged edges was found at the fundus of the stomach, and the adjacent tissue 
tore with the slightest touch. The rest of the mucous membrane was mottled 
with dark-brown patches. There was also great inflammation of the perito- 
neum, from the escape of the acid.(m) When much acid has been swallowed, 


(j) This happened in a case reported by Dr. W. Hull, in the Lond. Med. Gaz. 
June, 1850. 

(k) Ed. Month. Journ. April, 1850. 

(7) Casper Gericht. Leichenoff. 1 H. p. 117. (m) Month. Journ. Aug. 1854. 


486 


ns 


BOOK V.| POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES, [$ 528 


the stomach presents an appearance which is altogether peculiar and charac- 
teristic. It is as black as coal, and its tissue is softened to a jelly. The acid, 
softening the walls of the bloodvessels, allows their contents to escape, and 
then acting upon the blood, gives it a dark color. That such is the source 
of the black color referred to, is proved by the fact that it is not produced 
when sulphuric acid is introduced into a dead stomach. 

In general, the eroded and inflamed appearance of the mouth and throat is 
found to coexist with the blackened and disorganized condition of the sto- 
mach. But sometimes the poison does not reach the stomach, and when this 
is the case in young children, death may take place from the local action on 
the fauces alone. In Dr. Hill’s case, already referred to, it reached the lungs. 
The epiglottis was partially destroyed, the vocal chords and the mucous mem- 
brane of the trachea were softened, the left pleura was perforated, and a crust 
of sulphate of lime formed upon the ribs. There was no trace of the acid, 
either in the cesophagus or stomach. The person was an adult female. It is 
probable, in such cases, that death takes place by suffocation, the glottis being 
closed by the tumefaction of the mucous membrane. Husemann reports two 
fatal cases in children of five years of age. The symptoms were chiefly those 
of inflammation of the throat and larynx, without any evidence of disorder of 
the stomach.(mm) No dissection was made. In most cases of poisoning 
with sulphuric acid, there are also traces of its action left upon the skin, near 
the mouth, either from a portion escaping when swallowed, or from the corro- 
sion of the vomited liquids. The marks thus left upon the skin are of a dark 
brown color, and of a leathery consistence. Where, however, the acid has 
been given in a spoon, the anterior portion of the mouth may escape entirely. 
In a case referred to by Dr. Taylor, the fauces, cesophagus, and stomach of an 
infant ten days old, were much corroded by sulphuric acid, but there was no 
appearance of injury to the mouth. This was probably owing to a spoon 
having been used, and the poison having been poured down the throat slowly, 
as the mucous membrane was extensively corroded at the back part. A case 
is reported, in which, although the acid was taken from a teacup to the amount 
of fifteen and a half drachms, there was not the slightest vestige of a stain on 
the outside of the lips, angles of the mouth, cheeks, neck, or hands, nor upon 
the clothing.(n) 

§ 523. On the other hand, a case occurred in France, in which, although no 
corrosion, nor any indication of the use of an acid, was seen in the mouth, 
fauces, cesophagus, or stomach, and the appearances in the last organ were 
not very striking, yet several eminent men, among whom were Devergie and 
Lesueur, gave their opinion that death was caused by sulphuric acid. No 
trace of this acid was discovered in the viscera, and the only ground for the 
opinion seems to have been the presence of stains of sulphuric acid upon the 
clothing of the child, and a slight pathological alteration in the stomach. In 
children, especially, such an opinion can hardly be justifiable on so slender 
grounds. | 

We find a case of gelatiniform softening of the stomach, with perforation 


(mm) Journ. f. Pharmakodyn. ii. 166. 
(n) Dr. Walker, Ed. Month. Journ. June, 1850. 
487 


§ 526] POISONING BY INK. [BOOK V. 


of the fundus, and effusion of a brownish liquid into the peritoneal cavity, 
reported by Dr. Casper. In this case there had existed suspicion of poisoning, 
which his opinion of the result of the examination set at rest; and it is by 
“no means impossible that the preceding case may have been a similar one. 
Were it admitted, in the absence of direct proof by chemical analysis of the 
contents of the stomach, that an inflammatory condition, a softening, or ulcer- 
ation of the stomach could be regarded, apart from any corrosion of the mouth 
or fauces, as presumptive evidence of poisoning, we should be led undoubtedly 
into many grave mistakes.(0) Spontaneous softening of the stomach in 
infants, and ulceration and perforation of this organ in adults, are not rare 
events, but their characters are far different from the charring and disorganiza- 
tion produced by sulphuric acid. We think that in no case is an opinion 
warranted that sulphuric acid has been swallowed, unless it can be clearly 
traced by its effects from the mouth or fauces to the stomach. 

- Ithas already been mentioned that in a case of poisoning by this acid the blood 
had a syrupy consistence. This condition is stated by Casper to be the ordi- 
nary one. He adds that the blood is generally of a cherry-red color, and that 
it has an acid reaction. ‘This acidity has also been noticed in a pericardial 
effusion, and in the amniotic liquid of a pregnant female poisoned by sulphuric 
acid. It would appear that after death by this poison bodies remain fresh and 
without smell for an unusually long time; a fact which Casper explains by 
stating that the acid continues, until exhausted, to neutralize the ammonia 
which is given off in decomposition. 

§ 524. This acid has been given by mistake in enema, and in one case death 
was produced thereby. It has also been thrown into the vagina, with the view 
of procuring abortion. In cases such as these the black and disorganized 
appearance of the parts, and the evidence of the presence of the acid on che- 
mical analysis, will form the grounds of an opinion as to the cause of death. 

§ 525. 4th. Poisoning by ink.—A drunken soldier had given to him a 
large glass of ink, under the pretence that it was porter. He drank it, and 
after sleeping for an hour, awoke in the most violent pain. He suffered 
extreme weakness, headache, and painful cramps in the thighs. After four or 
five hours he commenced vomiting a pasty mass mixed with ink, which gave 
strong indications of sulphuric acid. Mucilaginous and saccharine beverages 
were given him, and after a short time he improved. He was convalescent on 
the third day, but still complained of weakness, trembling, and an oppressive 
pain in the back of the head.(p) Ink, we may observe, does not usually con- 
tain this acid, and the liquid employed may not have been ink, but blacking, 
of which sulphuric acid is an ingredient. 

§ 526. Sth. Chemical examination.—Concentrated sulphuric acid is known 
by its oleaginous appearance, great specific gravity, its property of setting free 
the carbon of organic substances (thus charring them), and by the evolution 
of heat on its being mixed with water. When diluted, the best evidence of its 
presence is obtained by the addition of any of the soluble salts of baryta, the 


(0) See ante, §§ 508, 509. 
(p) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. April, 1854, from Pharmaceutical Journal, Oct. 1853. 


488 


BOOK V.| SULPHURIC ACID.—CHEMICAL EXAMINATION. [$ 528 


sulphate of baryta being immediately precipitated in the form of a heavy white 
powder. The precipitate is insoluble in nitric and hydrochloric acids. Further 
proof of its presence may be obtained by igniting the precipitate with carbonate 
of soda or with vegetable charcoal, by which the sulphate is reduced to a sul- 
phuret, which may be shown by its blackening a bright silver surface on being 
moistened with water. In testing a solution for sulphuric acid by means of a 
salt of baryta, care should be taken that the liquid does not contain too much 
nitric or hydrochloric acid, as salts of baryta, which readily dissolve in water, 
are almost insoluble in these acids. The liquid containing the precipitate may 
be diluted with distilled water, which will redissolve all the other salts but the 
sulphate. In order to ascertain whether the sulphuric acid exists in a free 
state, a portion of the liquid may be evaporated to dryness, when, if uncom- 
bined sulphuric acid be present, it will be entirely driven off in dense white 
fumes. 

§ 527. When the liquid to be examined is mixed with organic matters, it 
must be filtered; or, if turbid and thick, it should be first boiled with distilled 
water, and then filtered, before the tests, as above, are applied. In most cases 
of poisoning by this agent, antidotes have been used, which may have com- 
pletely neutralized the acid. Hence, although it be not found in a free con- 
dition, the presence, for example, in any considerable quantity, of the sulphate 
of lime, when corroborated by the corrosive effects proper to the acid, will 
leave but little doubt of its having been used. It should be remembered, also, 
that if life have been at all protracted, the poison may have been eliminated 
in various ways. A case has been reported by Mr. Letheby, in which, during 
the first four days after an ounce of concentrated sulphuric acid had been 
swallowed, a large quantity was passed in the urine. This same fact has been 
established by Orfila, in experiments upon dogs. 

§ 528. Stains on clothing.—The stains on blue and black cloth, made by 
sulphuric acid, are at first red, and afterwards brown, and the stuff is corroded. 
The color of black leather is not altered, but the substance is partially de- 
stroyed. The stains on all textile fabrics remain moist for a considerable time 
if the acid have been strong, and, owing to the attraction of the acid for water, 
they have an unctuous feel. The acid may be detected in these stains after 
the lapse of many years. Dr. Taylor has detected it in spots made upon a 
black cloth dress twenty-seven years previously. The stain should be cut out, 
digested in distilled water, and then the liquid, after filtration, be tested by the 
reagents already mentioned. An unstained portion of the cloth should be 
submitted to the same test, since many articles of clothing yield slight traces 
of sulphates when boiled in water. Dr. Taylor has suggested a delicate test 
for sulphuric acid, founded upon its ready decomposition by organic matter 
when submitted to heat. About half a grain of the stained dress (cotton) is 
put into a small test-tube, and gently heated; a piece of paper saturated with 
‘starch, and moistened with a drop of iodic acid, being held at the mouth of 
the tube, the blue iodide of farina is immediately produced by the sulphurous 
acid generated.(g) The only source of fallacy is the occasional presence of 


(q) Taylor on Poisons, Am. ed. p. 180. 
489 


§ 5381] NITRIC ACID. _ [BOOK V. 


sulphur, as where mucus, serum, or blood may be mixed with the stain. Thus 
the test is inapplicable, for this reason, to woollen stuffs. 

6th. Aromatic sulphuric acid (elixir of vitriol).—Besides sulphuric acid, 
this preparation contains alcohol and aromatics. The proportion of the acid 
to the alcohol is as 1: 4.15 by weight (U. 8. P.). In an overdose, it pro- 
duces the same effects as sulphuric acid. 

§ 529. Tth. Sulphate of indigo.—This is a solution of indigo in Nord- 
hausen, or fuming sulphuric acid. In addition to the other symptoms of 
poisoning by a corrosive liquid, the deep blue and subsequently greenish color 
of the vomited-matters will at once betray the agent that has been used. In 
some cases the urine has had a bluish tinge. 


II. Netric Acid. (Aqua Fortis.) 


§ 530. Concentrated nitric acid, as met with in commerce, varies in color 
from a light yellow to a deep orange red, owing to the presence of nitrous or 
hyponitrous acid, but the pure acid is colorless. Red fumes of nitrous acid 
gas are given off, when a few copper filings are placed in it. It stains organic 
matter yellow or brown. 

§ 531. Ist. The symptoms produced by swallowing strong nitric acid, do 
not differ essentially from those which have been already mentioned as caused 
by sulphuric acid. There is the same intense burning pain in mouth, throat, 
and stomach, the same violent efforts to vomit, and urgent constitutional 
symptoms. ‘The lining membrane of the mouth is stained white, and then 
yellow or brown, and the enamel of the teeth is attacked. The soreness and 
swelling of the mouth and throat, the difficulty of swallowing and of respira- 
tion, the thirst and salivation, and the excessive pain and distress, are the 
prominent symptoms. If the person survive long enough, large portions of 
the lining membrane of the fauces and cesophagus become detached and are 
thrown up, together with altered blood and shreds of mucus. Similar matters 
may be discharged by stool. The diluted acid occasions the same symptoms 
in a more moderate degree. Although the immediate corrosive effects of the 
acid may be recovered from, death may occur subsequently from exhaustion 
and the injury done to the digestive powers. Dr. Black referred, in some 
remarks before the Royal Med. and Chir. Soc. of London, to the case of a 
girl who, ‘in a fit of despondency, swallowed some strong nitric acid. She 
left the hospital, but died many months afterwards, but so altered in appear- 
ance, that she resembled a woman eighty years of age. She was kept alive 
for seven weeks entirely by spring water.’ The cesophagus was nearly closed 
by the strictures which had resulted from the healing of the ulcerations pro- 
duced by the acid.(7) The period at which this poison proves fatal, varies 
therefore, according to its dilution, from a few hours to several months. The 
quantity required to destroy life cannot be certainly known, since, in many 
cases, it is impossible to ascertain correctly the amount really swallowed. 


Two drachms are probably sufficient. This was nearly the quantity swal- 


(r) Lancet, 1850. 
490 


— 


eee 


BOOK V.]| | SYMPTOMS.—POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [$ 532 


lowed, in a case reported by Dr. J. M. Warren. Death ensued on the 
fourteenth day. (It is stated that three drachms were taken into the 
mouth, but most of it was spit out.) Dr. Taylor refers to the case of a 
boy who died in thirty-six hours after taking two drachms of this acid. 
An instance, in which it was poured into the ear of a sleeping person, and 
caused death after some time, is related by Dr. Morrison.(s) Mr. James 
Haywood, a chemist, lost his life by inhaling the fumes of mixed nitric and 
sulphuric acids in consequence of the breaking of a carboy which held the 
mixture. The symptoms, which did not appear for more than three hours, 
consisted mainly of difficult respiration. Death took place in eleven hours. 
On examination, a considerable effusion of blood was found in the bronchial 
tubes, and their lining membrane and that of the trachea were congested. 
The larynx was not examined.(ss) As in the case of other corrosive poisons, 
death from nitric acid may occur within a few hours or after several months, 
according to the quantity and strength of the acid, and the vigor of the 
patient. 

§ 532. 2d. Post-mortem appearances.—The stains made by nitric acid 
upon the mouth and lips are usually of a deep yellow color; as these consist 
of a sphacelation of the lining membrane, they are easily detached and the 
subjacent surface is found even and glistening. If the person have survived 
several days, they may have been already cast off. The same appearance is 
found in the fauces, and more or less of it in the esophagus. The stomach 
is softened, sometimes perforated, its internal surface is of a greenish-yellow 
but sometimes of a black color, owing to the erosion of vessels and the. effu- 
sion of blood, and the mucous membrane is ulcerated or destroyed. In Dr. 
Warren’s case, the patient was a negress, who swallowed the poison with the 
hope of destroying her child, supposing that she was pregnant. She died on 
the fourteenth day. On dissection, there was observed great rigidity; upon the 
middle of the tongue, a large, yellowish, smooth patch; some redness of the 
epiglottis ; the cesophagus was healthy for the first two inches, but below this 
it was found exceedingly soft, of a greenish color internally, purple externally, 
and full of coagulated blood. The stomach was in a similar though much 
worse state; externally, it had the same purple color, and was universally 
adherent to the neighboring parts by recent lymph, except at the left extremity, 
where there were old and close adhesions to the spleen; internally, it was of 
a greenish-yellow color, emphysematous, and so perfectly softened and pliable, 
that it could not be separated from the surrounding parts without giving way 
in every direction; the anterior face became detached from the rest of the 
organ to a great extent when the abdominal parietes were raised ; its cavity 
was filled with recent, coagulated blood, and the open orifices of several ves- 
sels were distinctly seen on the inner surface. 'The intestine contained blood 
throughout the first two or three feet, but was otherwise uninjured.(f) In a 
case observed at the Hotel Dieu, at Lyons, the stomach was distended with 
gas, and perforated in the cul-de-sac; the opening, however, was partially 


(s) Dublin Journal, vol. ix. p. 98. (ss) Lancet, Apr. 1854, p. 429. 
(t) Extracts from Boston Soc. for Med. Improvement, Am. Journ. Med. Sci. July 
1850, p. 36. 


491 


§ 585] - NITRIC ACID.— CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, [BOOK V. 


plugged by the spleen, which had become adherent over it, but which itself 
was much corroded. In the small intestine, there were numerous sloughs. (w) 
In another case, where the person survived the poisoning fifty-four days, the 
stomach was converted into a vast abscess, with fungous walls made by adhe- 
sions among the adjacent viscera. The natural shape and structure of the 
organ could no longer be distinguished. (v) 

§ 5383. 3d. Chemical examination.—Nitric acid may be readily known by 
its physical properties already mentioned, and by the fumes of nitrous acid 
which are given off when it is poured upon copper, tin, or mercury. 

(1.) The diluted acid is not so readily detected as many other acids. Its 

compounds being very soluble, no precipitant can be found for it. Hence, it 
may be distinguished from muriatic and sulphuric acids by the absence of any 
reaction with the nitrates of baryta or silver. In order, however, to be able 
to affirm its presence, the following tests are recommended: The liquid should 
-be neutralized with carbonate of potash, and then slowly evaporated. The 
crystals thus obtained are nitrate of potash, and are prisms with dihedral sum- 
mits, permanent in the air. These should be powdered and mixed with copper 
turnings. If heat is now applied, and moderately dilute sulphuric acid added, 
the red fumes of nitrous acid become visible, which can easily be recognized 
by their odor. By this test, so small a quantity of nitrate of potash as one- 
tenth of a grain, and, consequently, one-twentieth of a grain of nitric acid 
may be detected. This test is therefore quite satisfactory, and others which 
are less perfect, are rendered thereby unnecessary. 

§ 534. (2.) It may not, however, succeed where the liquid to be examined 
contains the organic matters resulting from the presence of food, or detached 
portions of mucous membrane. In this case, therefore, the liquid must be fil- 
tered, to get rid of all insoluble substances, boiled with animal charcoal, and 
filtered a second time, or until it becomes tolerably clear. It should then be 
slowly concentrated by evaporation, and neutralized as before. As in the case 
of sulphuric acid, this acid may form other combinations in the stomach with 
the substances which have been administered as antidotes, and thus the diffi- 
culty of isolating it be increased. Or, again, the whole of it may have been 
vomited, or eliminated in other ways from the system. Fortunately, how- 
ever, for the ends of legal medicine, if nitric acid prove fatal, the appearances 
upon dissection are so unequivocal as to render a chemical analysis hardly 
necessary. 

§ 535. (8.) Stains on cloth.—The spots made upon colored cloth by nitric 
acid are more or less yellow, but become brown after a time, the texture of the 
cloth is destroyed, and the spot, unlike that made by sulphuric acid, soon becomes 
dry. To determine the presence of nitric acid, the stain may be cut out and 
digested in distilled water. If the liquid have an acid reaction, it should be 
then neutralized with potash, and allowed to crystallize. The crystals may be 
examined as before, by heating with copper-turnings, and moistening with 
sulphuric acid. An unstained portion of the cloth should be examined in the 


(u) Ch. Jantet, Gaz. Méd. de Lyon, p. 82, 1852. 
(v) Dr. Delaharpe, Canstatt’s Jahresbericht, fiir 1852, Bd. v. p. 101. 


492 


BOOK V.] HYDROCHLORIC ACID. [$ 5386 


same manner. Stains made by nitric acid will not furnish evidence of its pre- 
sence after a few weeks have elapsed, the acid being much less permanent than 
the sulphuric. Hence, the necessity of proceeding at as early a period as pos- 
sible to the examination of any suspicious stains upon adress. Dr. Chris- 
tison, however, has obtained evidence of the presence of the acid in stains on 
cloth made seven weeks before, and Dr. O’Shaughnessy after an interval of 
some months. (w) 


Il. Hydrochloric Acid—Muriatic Acid. (Spirit of Salt.) 


§ 536. Ist. Symptoms.—The reported cases of poisoning with this acid are 
few in number; but they present a strong analogy in their symptoms and 
post-mortem appearances with those of sulphuric acid poisoning. Imme- 
diately upon swallowing it there is a burning sensation from the mouth to 
the stomach, but especially in the throat, attended with a feeling of suffoca- 
tion and followed by uncontrollable vomiting. Deglutition is almost impos- 
sible, all efforts to swallow bringing on vomiting; the voice is low and the 
respiration frequent and labored. ‘The tongue and fauces are usually covered 
at first with a whitish pellicle, which afterwards becomes detached, exhibiting 
corroded spots underneath. In a case observed by M. Guérard,(#) a woman 
aged 24 years, who had swallowed about fifty-three grains of concentrated 
hydrochloric acid, presented the above symptoms. She however survived a 
considerable time. The matters vomited on the second night did not present 
any acid reaction, although no chemical antidote appears to have been admin- 
istered. Death took place two months after the poison had been swallowed ; 
and some time previous, portions of corroded mucous membrane had been dis- 
charged both by vomiting and by stool. Profuse salivation also was observed 
in- this case, and in the beginning, white vapors were exhaled from the mouth. 
The same symptoms and the same prolongation of life were noticed in a case 
which became the subject of judicial investigation in Belgium, and which is 
commented upon by Orfila.(y) In two cases referred to by Dr. Christison, 
and in another, of a child, by Orfila,(z) death took place within twenty-four 
hours. In this latter instance, the acid was poured down the child’s throat 
by its stepmother, as confessed by her after her condemnation. A case of re- 
covery after swallowing an ounce of strong hydrochloric acid, is reported in 
the Lancet for 1850. In this case the stomach pump was used, contrary to 
the usual caution enjoined in poisoning by mineral acids. A Hindoo, while 
intoxicated, swallowed about two ounces of hydrochloric acid, but rejected a 
portion of it by vomiting. Twelve hours afterwards he presented the follow- 
ing symptoms; the head was thrown backwards, the respiration frequent and 
moaning; the gums were pale and the teeth unaltered; the tongue also was 
pale, and, near its centre, deprived of its epithelium; the skin was cold, the 
pulse small and frequent, the epigastrium tender, and the urine scanty. There 
was neither vomiting nor purging. In twenty-four hours death took place, 
the mind remaining clear until the last. The urine contained a large propor- 


(w) Guy’s For. Med. (x) Ann, d’Hygiéne, tome xlviii. p. 415. 
(y) Ibid. tome xl. p. 35. (z) Ibid. 


493 


§ 588] | HYDROCHLORIC ACID.—CHEMICAL EXAMINATION. [BOOK V. 


tion of hydrochloric acid.(a) In a case under the care of Dr. Budd, a woman 
63 years of age died in eighteen hours from the effects of half a fluidounce 
of hydrochloric acid, taken with suicidal intent. Vomiting, collapse, whiten- 
ing and abrasion of the lips, mouth, and fauces were observed ; swelling of 
the throat and inability to swallow, with stridulous breathing and thick inarti- 
culate voice, and intense epigastric pain were also noted. Death, without loss 
of consciousness until near the last, took place by exhaustion.(b) 

§ 537. 2d. Post-mortem appearances.—These vary according to the length 
of time the person has survived, but bear a general resemblance to the effects 
produced by the other strong mineral acids. The digestive mucous membrane 
is covered with whitish superficial sloughs, which subsequently become of a 
darker color and are found in all stages, lying loose or partly detached, and 
the mucous membrane inflamed, softened or corroded. In some of the above 
cases, all the coats of the stomach were destroyed in spots, and perforations 
resulted. In Guérard’s case, there was slight peritonitis. It is important, 
however, to note that the peritonitis, resulting from perforation of the stomach, 
only occurred in those cases which survived along time. In Dr. Budd’s case 
the force of the poison was spent upon the mouth, fauces, and larynx. ‘The 
mucous membrane of these parts was whitened and softened, the soft palate 
and tonsil swollen, and a portion of the lining membrane of the larynx was 
entirely removed. , 

§ 588. 3d. Chemical examination.—If any of the liquid which has been 
taken remain, it will be easy, if it is hydrochloric acid, to detect its nature, 
since the physical characters and chemical reactions of this agent are very 
striking. It throws down, if sufficiently dilute, with nitrate of silver a dense, 
white, curdy precipitate of the chloride of silver, which assumes a violet color 
when exposed to light, and is completely insoluble in nitric acid, but dissolves 
readily in ammonia. Its detection, when mixed with organic matters, is not 
easy, owing to its tendency to adhere closely to them; but in medico-legal re- 
searches we are further exposed to the error arising from the presence, nor- 
mally, of free hydrochloric acid in the stomach. As the quantity of this 
natural constituent of the body is subject to many variations, and since as 
much as four or five grains of the pure acid have been obtained from a pint of 
the fluid of water-brash, it is evident not only that the detection of free hy- 
drochlorie acid in a case of supposed poisoning is no evidence that it has been 
swallowed, but that it is extremely uncertain what quantity it would be neces- 
sary to demonstrate before we could feel satisfied that it was not normally pre- 
sent. In the Belgian case, before referred to, it was supposed by the chemists 
that they had established the fact of poisoning by this acid, although the per- 
son had survived two months; a subsequent analysis, however, of the stomach 
of a person of the same age, who had died of phthisis pulmonalis, gave pre- 
cisely the same result. Moreover, if the mixture be neutral, it becomes neces- 
sary to use sulphuric acid to decompose the chloride which has been formed. 
But as chloride of sodium (common salt) is almost invariably present in the 


(a) Annales d’Hygiéne, 2éme sér. ix. 209. 
(6) Lancet, July, 1859, p. 59. 


494 


| 
| 
. 


eae 


BOOK V.] OXALIC ACID.—SYMPTOMS. [§ 541 


stomach, and is, indeed, a natural constituent of some of the secretions, the 
detection of hydrochloric acid will afford no indication of the manner in which 
it was introduced. 

§ 539. For these reasons, the chief evidence of poisoning must be obtained 
rather from the symptoms during life, and the post-mortem investigation, than 
from a chemical analysis. We merely subjoin, to complete the subject, the 
following process when the matter to be examined is acid, taken from Dr. 
Christison’s work on Poisons: ‘‘ Boil it with water, if necessary, filter and 
distil it with a gentle heat till the residue acquire the consistence of a very thin 
syrup. Subject the distilled liquor to the tests for diluted hydrochloric acid. 
It will seldom be found there, however, because it is apt to be retained by the 
coexistence of organic matter. If it be not found, add to the thin extract in 
the retort a slight excess of a strong solution of tannin, filter, and distil the 
filtered liquid by means of a hot bath of solution of hydrochlorate of lime 
(consisting of two parts of crystallized salt and one of water), taking care that 
the temperature of the bath never exceeds 240°, and stop the distillation just 
before the residuum becomes dry. Examine now the distilled liquor with the 
tests for diluted hydrochloric acid.” 


IV. Oxalic Acid. 


§ 540. Ist. Symptoms.—Oxalic acid is one of the most rapid and certain of 
ordinary poisons. Its intensely sour taste generally prevents its administration 
with homicidal intentions, but is not always an obstacle to its being taken ac- 
cidentally or for the purpose of suicide. Most of the accidents resulting from 
it have been occasioned by its being mistaken for Epsom salts. 

It is worthy of remark, according to Casper, that although this substance 
is extensively used in Prassia in cotton manufactures, cases of poisoning by it 
are extremely rare. In Berlin no instance of the sort has come to the know- 
ledge of this experienced toxicologist.(c) 

§ 541. After the hot and sour taste in the mouth, vomiting is usually the 
first symptom, and is attended with burning pain and constriction in the throat 
and stomach, although it does not always occur, and in some cases the pain is 
absent. The vomited matters are dark-colored, and contain blood and some- 
times membranous shreds. When the pain is severe, symptoms of collapse 
come on rapidly, the extremities are benumbed and drawn up, the surface 
is cold, and the pulse irregular or imperceptible. A degree of stupor or 
drowsiness is sometimes observed. The urgency of the symptoms depends 
upon the degree of dilution in which the salt is taken. In a case quoted by 
Dr. Christison, no vomiting occurred for seven hours, except when emetics 
were administered. The person had taken half an ounce dissolved in ten parts 
of water, and diluted immediately afterwards with copious draughts of water. 
In another case, a man swallowed an ounce, and immediately drank warm 
water; he was not seen until fourteen hours after he had taken the poison, 
and in the meantime had travelled a distance of ten miles.(d) 


(c) Gerichtliche Med. i. 404. (d) Lancet, Sept. 1845, p. 293. 
495 


§ 544] OXALIC ACID.—POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK V. 


§ 542. 2d. The rapidity with which a fatal result ensues, varies a great 
deal. In some cases the action of the poison is extremely rapid. Mr. Iliff 
reports a case in which death appears to have been immediate. The wife 
of a chemist drank a saturated solution of oxalic acid in her husband’s shop, 
she was found dead by the side of the counter, where she had probably fallen 
and died without a struggle. (a) 

Dr. Christison quotes a case in which a young man survived hardly ten 
minutes ; another, in which a woman, who swallowed two ounces, died in 
twenty minutes ; and Dr. Taylor refers to a case where death ensued in three 
minutes. The quantity taken in the last case could not be ascertained. Pe- 
reira also mentions a case which he examined, in which a man died in twenty 
minutes after swallowing oxalic acid in mistake for Epsom salts. Although 
death usually occurs within a few hours, cases are mentioned in which it was 
postponed for several days. Dr. Jackson reports one in which the poison did 
not prove fatal until the tenth day ;(b) and in a case described by Dr. Frazer, 
death occurred from its secondary effects upon the twenty-third day. Some 
instances of recovery are reported. An interesting one was observed by Dr. 
Didama, in which a woman dissolved two large tablespoonfuls of oxalic acid 
in mistake for Epsom salts, in a small quantity of water, and took it on an 
empty stomach. Some twenty minutes afterwards she vomited, at first the 
solution she had taken, and then a dark-colored, bloody-looking fluid, in which 
were numerous white membranous patches. Ipecacuanha and afterwards pre- 
pared chalk were administered to her, and in about an hour she was found 
quiet and nearly free from the intense burning pain in her stomach and throat. 
She subsequently vomited again, and discharged from her bowels a large 
amount of matter resembling that she had vomited. She soon recovered en- 
tirely, and returned to her work. A similar case, in which an ounce was 
taken, and the patient recovered in eighteen days, is reported in the Lancet ;(c) 
and a few others are referred to by Dr. Taylor. 

§ 548. 3d. The only manner in which the quantity capable of destroying 
life can be approximately ascertained, is by reference to such cases as have 
proved fatal in the absence of medical assistance. The smallest quantity which 
has proved fatal under these circumstances is stated by most writers at half an 
ounce. It, however, by no means follows that a smaller quantity might not 
be attended with a fatal result, since some persons appear to have been far 
more seriously affected than others by equal amounts of this poison. ‘This is 
proved by the case of a lad, sixteen years of age, who eat about a drachm of 
dry oxalic acid, and died in eight hours.(d) 

The binoxalate of potash, or salt of sorrel, produces the same symptoms as 
oxalic acid, and destroys life as readily. An instance is reported by Chevallier, 
in which death took place in ten minutes.(e) In another case, a third dose of 
a drachm and a half proved fatal in an hour.(/) 

§ 544. 4th. Post-mortem appearances.—It is stated that death may ensue 
from oxalic acid, and yet no traces of its action on the alimentary*canal be 


(a) Lancet, Oct. 1845. (>) Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xxx. p. 17. 
(c) July, 1846, p. 39. (d) Lancet, Dec. 1855, p. 521. 
(e) Ann. d’Hyg. 1850, vol. i. (/) Ibid. 1842. 


496 


BOOK V.] OXALIC ACID.—POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES, [$ 546 


observable on dissection; this occurred in a case where an ounce had been 
taken.(g) This is certainly not the ordinary result. According to Dr. 
Geoghegan, who examined the stomachs of three persons poisoned with this 
acid, the mucous membrane of the stomach was softened, with various shades 
of brown discoloration, and erosion or gelatinization ; there was a brownish- 
black ramiform vascularity of the submucous tissue, and the contents of the 
stomach were of the color of coffee-grounds, owing to the action of the 
acid upon the mucus and coloring matter of the blood. In Dr. Jackson’s 
case small ulcerations and thickening of the mucous membrane were observed, 
together with permanent redness. Hence the action of the acid may be chiefly 
expended upon the mucous coat of the stomach, no actual corrosion being 
observed. In an instance reported by Mr. Letheby, the coats of the stomach 
were so softened that it could scarcely be handled without lacerating it, and 
in another, referred to by Dr. Christison, it is said that this organ was perfo- 
rated.(h) In some of these cases, however, it is evident that the conditions 
spoken of may have resulted from the long contact of the acid with the coats 
of the stomach after death, since even so feeble an acid as that naturally con- 
tained in the stomach is capable of producing similar results. It is certainly 
not the ordinary effect of oxalic acid. The csophagus is also in many cases 
found altered, having a scalded or boiled appearance. It is pale, brittle, cor- 
rugated, and abraded in some places. 

_ More recently a case has been reported by Dr. A. Wood, in which the sto- 
mach presented a large irregular aperture. As sufficient details of the dissection 
are not given, and the viscera do not appear to have been examined in situ, it 
is possible that this hole may have been artificially produced. The autopsy 
was made thirty-five hours after death.(7) 

§ 545, Sth. Chemical examination.—The crystals of oxalic acid resemble, 
at first sight, those of sulphate of magnesia (Epsom salts), and the former 
substance has hence often been taken in mistake for the latter. They are per- 
manent, flattened, transparent, four-sided prisms, soluble in water and alcohol. 
They are also entirely volatilized by heat, which is not the case with sulphate 
of magnesia. The usual tests for oxalic acid are liéme-water and the soluble 
salts of lime, and netrate of silver. With lime-water, or even with a solution 
of the sulphate of lime, a white precipitate is obtained, nearly insoluble in an 
excess of oxalic acid, or in acetic acid, but readily dissolved by nitric acid. 
With nitrate of silver a copious white precipitate of oxalate of silver is 
obtained, soluble in nitric acid or in ammonia. If the precipitate be dried, 
and heated on the point of a knife over the flame of a spirit-lamp, it becomes 
brown on the edge, detonates feebly, and is entirely dissipated in a white vapor. 
In this manner it is distinguished from other white salts of silver, which give 
off white fumes, but leave a residue. 

§ 546. In liquids containing organic matter, as in matters vomited or in 
the contents of the stomach, the preliminary steps of diluting, filtering, and 
concentrating are required. If the liquid have an acid reaction, the acetate of 


(g) Lond. Med. Repos. vol. iii. p. 380. 
(h) Med. Gaz. vol. xxxv. p. 49; Lond. Med. Repos. vol. xi. p. 20. 
(i) Edinburgh Monthly Journal, March, 1852. 


32 497. 


§ 549] TARTARIC ACID.—ACETIC ACID. [BOOK V. 


lead should be added till the precipitate is no longer formed, for the purpose 
of separating the oxalic acid. If the resulting oxalate of lead be now diffused 
through distilled water, and a current of sulphuretted hydrogen be passed 
through the liquid for some time, a sulphuret of lead will be formed, and the 
acid remain in solution. It can then be examined by the tests already men- 
tioned. If, however, antidotes have been administered, such as chalk or mag- 
nesia, the supernatant liquid, after standing some time, may, if not acid, be 
thrown away, and the inorganic residue, after being suspended in distilled 
water, be mixed with a twentieth part of carbonate of potash, and boiled for 
two hours. Thus oxalate of potash will be formed, which should be filtered 
and then neutralized with diluted nitric acid. Add the solution of acetate of 
lead as long as any precipitate falls. Separate the oxalic acid by means of 
sulphuretted hydrogen passed through the mixture of oxalate of lead, and 
test its presence as before. If the acid have not been entirely neutralized 
by the antidotes administered, the supernatant liquid and the insoluble residue 
must be separately examined.(7) 

§ 547. The tests for binoxalate of potash in solution are the same as for 
oxalic acid. The crystals differ from those of oxalic acid in having a feathery 
appearance. They may be distinguished, also, by the action of heat, not being 
entirely dissipated like those of oxalic acid, but leaving an ash of carbonate of 
potash. Both the quadroxalate and the binoxalate of potassa are kept in the 
shops under the names of salt of sorrel and essential salt of lemons, and are 
employed for removing iron mould and ink stains from linen. 


V. Tartaric Acid. 


§ 548. The only case in which this substance incontestably proved poisonous 
is related in the Lancet, Jan. 2, 1845. A man took, by mistake for Epsom 
salts, an ounce of tartaric acid dissolved in half a pint of warm water. He 
immediately exclaimed that he was poisoned, and complained of a violent 
burning pain in his throat and stomach. Obstinate vomiting continued for 
nine days, when he died. Nearly the whole of the alimentary canal was found 
highly inflamed. ‘'Tartaric acid was detected in the dregs of the cup, and the 
druggist admitted that he had made a mistake. Another case is reported by 
Devergie, but the accuracy of his opinion and analysis is contested by Orfila. 
Christison mentions an instance in which six drachms of tartaric acid were 
taken in twenty-four hours, without the least inconvenience, and both he and 
Coindet administered it to cats without observing any injurious effect. An 
instance is on record in which the bitartrate of potash proved fatal by exces- 
sive purging, but the quantity swallowed, or rather eaten, is said to have been 
more than a quarter of a pound.(h) 


VI. Acetic Acid. 


§ 549. This acid in a concentrated form is highly irritant and corrosive. 


(j) For some remarks on the facility of detecting oxalic acid by means of the micro- 
scope, see report of a lecture on the Application of the Microscope to Toxicology, by 
Geo. W. Birkett, M. D., Med. Times and Gazette, April, 1855. 

(k) Lond. Med. Gaz. 1837-38,.i. 177. 


498 


BOOK V. | IRRITANT POISONS.—POTASH, SODA. [$ 551 


Only one fatal case of poisoning by it is reported. The liquid was swallowed 
by a young girl, and in a few hours afterwards she died in great agony. The 
post-mortem appearances resembled somewhat those produced by sulphuric 
acid, the surface of the tongue being brown and leathery, the mucous mem- 
brane of the cesophagus of a blackish brown color, and large black elevations 
marked the lining membrane of the stomach, the rest of the organs appearing 
inflamed. Hight ounces of a thick, blackish fluid were found in the stomach. 
In case of an investigation to detect this acid in the contents of the stomach, 
it must be remembered, that it is contained in the natural secretions of this 
organ, hence to be of any value, the chemical evidence must detect a con- 
siderable quantity of it. Also, as Christison suggests, vinegar is a common 
remedy with the vulgar for many diseases, and especially for poisoning. 

§ 550. Vinegar.—Dr. David, of Montreal, met with an instance in which a 
woman endeavored to destroy herself by drinking a quantity of common vine- 
gar. When seen three hours afterwards, her countenance was wild and the 
pupils dilated, the body was covered with a cold perspiration, and the breathing 
was laborious and hurried. Her tongue was dry and cold, the abdomen dis- 
tended, and she had acute pain in the epigastrium, which was increased by 
pressure. She was, moreover, delirious. She soon recovered after the ad- 
ministration of an emetic of sulphate of zinc. (/) 


CHAPTER III. 


IRRITANT POISONS(m)—-ALKALINE. 


I. Potash, Soda, de. 


§ 551. These two alkalies may be treated of together since their poisonous 
effects are similar. Our notice of them will be brief, as they seldom occa- 
sion poisoning, and when they do, it is almost necessarily accidental and its 
cause is readily known. They may prove fatal either by their immediate 
action or by their remote influence upon the system. When swallowed in 
large quantity and in a concentrated solution, the taste is exceeding nauseous 
and acrid, and a sensation of burning heat and constriction in the throat, 
cesophagus, and stomach is excited. When a considerable portion of the 


(1) Amer. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1848, p. 302. 

(m) Nearly all of the substances belonging to this class produce very different 
effects when they operate for a long time in minute quantities, and when they are 
taken in large doses at once. It is only in the latter case that the term irritant is 
strictly applicable to them. In the former mode of action they gradually undermine 
the health and may ultimately destroy life by interfering with the nutrition of the 
body. This effect may result either from their deleterious action upon the digestive 
organs, or upon the composition of the blood, or finally upon an impairment of that 
action of the tissues by which they appropriate for their own nutrition the organic ele- 
ments contained in the blood. Arsenic and most of the salts of mercury are actively 
irritant when applied to the tissues in a concentrated form ; but in minute quantities, 
and largely diluted, they slowly but surely sap the foundations of life, by wearing 
away old structures and preventing the substitution of sound materials for their 


repair. 
499 


§ 551] NITRATE OF POTASH. [BOOK V. 


solution has reached the stomach, there is great pain and tenderness in the 
abdomen, vomiting of mucus and altered blood, inability to swallow, copious 
diarrhea, and general collapse. If the patient survive a few days, the inside 
of the mouth is seen to be greatly inflamed, sloughs become detached from the 
throat, vomiting continues, there is a dysenteric condition of the bowels, and 
the patient dies from marasmus. 

Life may be, however, prolonged even for months and years, and the person 
finally die from the impairment of his digestive powers or from a stricture 
of the cesophagus which prevents the swallowing of food in sufficient quantity 
to sustain life. A case is related by Dr. Barham, in which a caustic solution 
of impure carbonate of soda (soap lees) was swallowed by mistake, and the 
patient died two years and three months afterwards of stricture of the ceso- 
phagus caused by it.(n) Several other instances of a similar kind are recorded, 
and Sir Charles Bell relates one in which death did not take place until twenty 
years after the accident. A more recent example is one furnished by Dr. 
Deutsch.(0) The quantity drunk was a “portion of a glass,” and was esti- 
mated to contain half an ounce of caustic potassa. The early symptoms were 
such as those described above, but recovery from them took place. Gradually, 
however, swallowing became difficult, and death took place in twenty-eight 
weeks after the accident. The lower part of the esophagus was found 
enormously thickened, so that its canal was nearly obliterated near the 
stomach. The increased thickness was entirely confined to the mucous mem- 
brane, the muscular coat, on the other hand, having nearly disappeared. 


I. Nitrate of Potassa. 


‘A German, who spoke English imperfectly, went into a store, and asked 
for ‘bitter salt,’ meaning sulphate of magnesia (bitter Salz). The attendant 
supposed he meant saltpetre, and gave him half-a-pound. The man took 
three ounces and a half at one dose. His bowels were opened three times 
within three or four hours. He complained: of a slight sense of heat in the 
epigastrium, and drank a good deal of water. About five hours after having 
taken the saltpetre, he suddenly fell out of his chair and died. 

“The marked peculiarity, in this case, was the absence of the painful symp- 
toms which usually follow the ingestion of irritant poisons; and the question 
arises, how was death produced? Certainly not by inflammation of the sto- 
mach, for he complained of nothing but a slight sense of heat in the stomach. 
The poison must have acted by destroying the vitality of the blood. There 
was no post-mortem examination. The rigor mortis was very imperfect, the 
lips of almost a natural pink hue, and the appearance of the countenance so 
life-like, that some persons who were present doubted the propriety of inter- 
ment on the third day.”’( p) 

This is the largest dose of nitre which we find recorded as having been 
taken, and its symptoms were, on that account probably, peculiar. There are . 


(n) Lancet, 1850, vol. ii. (o) Times and Gaz., May, 1858, p. 537. 
(p) New Jersey Medical Reporter, Jan. 1855. ; 


500 


BOOK V.]| AMMONIA. [§ 554 


numerous instances of death occasioned by an ounce or an ounce and a half of 
this salt, and in which the symptoms were those of a violent local irritant and 
a depressor, at the same time, of nervous power. Death may occur within 
two hours. On the other hand, recovery has taken place after doses of nitre 
varying from half an ounce to two ounces. The symptoms are vomiting, with 
extreme burning pain in the throat and abdomen, followed by coldness and 
collapse, and subsequently by bloody stools. In one case bloody vomiting is 
noted(a). Nervous symptoms, such as tremor, spasm, and hallucinations, 
have been observed. Recovery is slow, and the digestive function remains 
feeble or deranged. 

§ 552. Ist. Post-mortem appearances.—The mucous membrane of the 
stomach will, in recent cases, be found more or less acted upon by the salt. 
Thus it may be seen in some parts inflamed, and in others covered with brown 
sloughs of partially detached membrane. Perforation has even been observed. 
In chronic cases, the smooth and condensed structure peculiar to the cicatriza- 
tion of mucous membranes will be easily recognized. 

§ 553. 2d. Chemical examination.—Potash and its salts may be known 
by giving an orange-yellow precipitate with bechloride of platinum; tartaric 
acid also gives a white, crystalline precipitate, appearing sooner or later ac- 
cording to the degree of concentration of the liquid. In this way they may 
be distinguished from soda, which, on account of its generally forming soluble 
compounds with acids, has no very satisfactory test except that of communi- 
cating an intense yellow color to the outer flame of the blowpipe. The 
crystals of nitrate of soda are rhombic, those of nitrate of potash are long, 
fluted prisms. Caustic potash and soda form a brown precipitate with a solu- 
tion of nitrate of silver. These alkalies also give an unctuous feel to organic 
substances with which they are mixed. 


Ill. Ammonia and Sesquicarbonate of Ammonia. 


§ 554. This alkali has occasionally been used with homicidal purpose, but, 
in general, cases of poisoning by it are the result of accident. The vapor of 
strong ammonia has destroyed life, when respired too long a time by a person 
in a state of temporary insensibility. The effects produced by swallowing a 
strong solution of ammonia are somewhat similar, though more intense, than 
those of the other alkalies. Plenck relates that a man who had been bitten 
by a mad dog had administered to him a glassful of ammonia. His lips, 
tongue, and gums turned black immediately, and he died within four minutes. (6) 
In another case, strong ammonia was taken with suicidal intent. The symp- 
toms were collapse, serous and bloody diarrhea, and bloody vomiting, excru- 
ciating pain in the abdomen, and death in six hours. The mind remained 
clear till the last.(c) Two cases are reported in the same paragraph of 
children who were killed by accidentally swallowing a mixture of hartshorn 
and sweet oil.(d) A little boy, two years of age, took about half an ounce of 
very pungent spirits of hartshorn from a bottle. He immediately screamed 


(a) Journ. f. Pharmakodynamik, ii. 178. (b) Mitscherlich, Lehrbuch, ii. 277. 
(c) Annales de Thérapeut. iii. 443. (d) Times and Gaz. June, 1855, p. 353. 


501 


§ 556] AMMONIA.—CHEMICAL EXAMINATION. [BOOK V. 


__and was very sick, bringing up at first stringy mucus of a light color, and then 
some more which was dark. ‘The lips were swollen, the breathing was harsh, 
hurried, and somewhat obstructed, and afterwards became somewhat croupy. 
There was no insensibility nor any diarrhoea. He recovered.(e) In another 
case, reported in the same journal, an ounce was taken in milk, by a man who 
supposed it to be castor oil, having poured it out in the dark. He took im- 
mediately copious draughts of warm water, and vomited a quantity of matter 
like soapsuds. The inside of the mouth, upper lip, tongue and fauces were 
white, and other parts excoriated; there was great difficulty in swallowing. 
He said he felt as if he was on fire from his stomach to his mouth; his voice 
was husky, pulse small and frequent, and the surface cold. He was ordered 
dilute acetic acid and demulcent remedies, under which he soon recovered, 
There was no diarrhcea throughout the case.(/) A woman took a wineglass- 
ful of strong liquor of ammonia by mistake for the acetate, yet in a fortnight 
she was convalescent.(g) Dr. W. Reed has reported the case of a man who 
swallowed by mistake three drachms of the strong solution of ammonia, and 
as much of the sesquicarbonate dissolved in two ounces of oil. The symptoms 
resembled those above described, but they subsided and were removed under 
appropriate treatment, in about eight days. (h) 

Chevallier relates an instance of an attempt to poison with ammonia. The 
mistress of an officer, he being desirous of breaking up the connection, at their 
last proposed interview attempted to make him swallow a quantity of am- 
monia. A physician was sent for immediately. He found the lips excoriated, 
with phlyctenze, and the tongue swollen and deprived of its epithelium, and 
the mouth and palate abraded. The throat was so sore as to prevent swal- 
lowing, and pressure on this and the region of the csophagus was very 
painful. (7) 

§ 555. Ist. Post-mortem appearances.—In a case related by Nysten, 
where a man died from the inhalation of the vapor while insensible, the nostrils 
were blocked up with an albuminous membrane. The whole mucous coat of 
the air-passages was mottled with patches of lymph. There was a black 
eschar on the tongue, and another on the lower lip. In general, the liquid form 
of this poison produces marks of violent inflammation, sometimes of the pseudo- 
membranous form, in the fauces and cesophagus, redness, softening, or ulcera- 
tion of the gastric mucous membrane, and to some extent of the small intestine. 
The blood is generally liquid. 

§ 556. 2d. Chemical examination.—Ammonia gives with bichloride of 
platinum, and with tartaric acid, the same reactions as potassa; the precipi- 
tates have also a similar composition. Ammonia is recognized with ease and 
certainty, even in the presence of all the other bases, by its being set free in a 
gaseous state by the action of the caustic alkalies, or of the alkaline earths, upon 
its compounds. For this purpose it is best to use hydrate of lime. Ammonia 
.in the state of gas is distinguished by its peculiar smell, and by the white 
clouds which are formed when a glass rod, moistened with hydrochloric acid, 


(e) Tiff. Lancet, 1850, vol. i. 337, Am. ed.  (/) Ibid. 1852, i. p. 374, 
(g) Wilkins, Lancet, 1846, i. 385. (h) Times and Gaz. a p. 59. 
(7) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. ‘April, 1854, from Gaz. des Hopitaux. 


502 


BOOK V. | BARYTA. [$ 560 


is brought near the liquid to be examined. ‘This appearance is owing to the 
formation of chloride of ammonium. (7) 


IV. Baryta. 


§ 557. The only two preparations of baryta which have proved fatal are 
the chloride and the carbonate. 

Ist. Chloride of Barium.—A student of medicine took three teaspoonfuls 
of this salt in mistake for sulphate of magnesia. He was seized with tormina 
and vomiting, his extremities became cold, pulse irregular and feeble, and his 
hands and feet paralyzed. He recovered gradually in three days.(s) Two 
other cases are referred to by Dr. Taylor, in which it proved fatal.(¢) <A 
healthy young woman took less than a teaspoonful of chloride of barium, 
mistaking it for Epsom salts. In half an hour she had burning pains in the 
stomach and bowels, with vomiting and purging, followed by the symptoms 
of collapse above described, and a scarcely perceptible pulse, and these by 
great impairment of muscular power, labored respiration with bronchial 
effusion, coma, convulsions, and death, nineteen hours after the poison had 
been taken. Sensibility did not seem to be impaired.(é/) This salt seems 
to have a decided action in some cases upon the brain, producing vertigo, 
headache, deafness, and convulsions. 

§ 558. 2d. Carbonate of Baryta.—This salt is also said to have destroyed 
life in two cases.(w) In a case observed by Dr. Wilson, of London, the quan- 
tity taken was half a teacupful, but emetics were given and operated before 
any symptoms showed themselves. In two hours the patient complained of 
dimness of sight, double vision, headache, tinnitus, and cramps, with occa- 
sional vomiting and purging the next day. Recovery, however, took place. 

§ 559. 3d. Post-mortem appearances.—In one of the cases of poisoning 
by chloride of barium before referred to, the stomach presented a uniform red 
appearance, with clots of blood and bloody mucus scattered over it; near the 
cardiac end was a perforation about half an inch in diameter within, and half 
as wide outside, the edges swollen, and the mucous coat thickened. The small 
intestines also exhibited signs of inflammation. Without doubt, as is re- 
marked by Dr. Christison, the perforation was, in this instance, an accidental 
occurrence, not due to the chloride of barium. 

§ 560. 4th. Zests.—Baryta is thrown down completely in the form of sul- 
phate from all its salts, as well those soluble in water as those in acids, either 
by free sulphuric acid, or by any of the soluble sulphates. Most of the baryta 
salts impart a yellowish-green color to the flame of alcohol. The acids in 
combination may be determined by their appropriate tests; hydrochloric by 
the nitrate of silver, nitric by sulphate of potash, and acetic by the odor dis- 
engaged on the addition of dilute sulphuric acid. In order to separate the 
chloride of barium from an organic liquid, Dr. Christison says that the most 


(r) Will’s Chem. Analysis. 4 
(s) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1852. From Casper’s Wochenscrift. 
(t) Taylor on Poisons. (it) J. Walsh, Lancet, Feb. 1859, p. 211. 
(u) Parke’s Chemical Essays, ii. 219. 
503 


§ 562] PHOSPHORUS. [BOOK v. 


convenient method is to dissolve any carbonate of baryta that may have 
. been ‘formed, by a little nitric acid, to filter, throw down all in the form of 
sulphate by the sulphate of soda, and then calcine the precipitate with 
charcoal. A sulphuret of baryta will then be procured, which is to be dis- 
solved out by boiling water, and decomposed after filtration by muriatic acid. 
A pure solution, he says, is thus easily obtained. The chloride of barium, 
which is the salt most frequently taken, is soluble in water, and has an acrid, 
irritating taste. 


CHAPTER IY. 
IRRITANT POISONS—METALLOIDAL. 


I. PHosPHORUS. 


§ 561. This poisonous substance deserves more attention than is usually 
given to it, for quite a large number of cases of poisoning by it have occurred; 
its use for the preparation of friction-matches(wx) and for the destruction of 
vermin being everywhere common, and its detection by chemical means some- 
times attended with difficulty. In Germany it has been frequently given with 
homicidal intentions, and everywhere accidents are liable to arise from its em- 
ployment for the purposes mentioned. MM. Chevallier and Poirier give the 
whole number of deaths by phosphorus from 1854 to 1858, as 59. Criminal 
poisoning, 31; suicide, 18; accident, 10. 

§ 562. 1st. Symptoms.—These arise suddenly, but in most cases not until 
some time after the poison has been swallowed. Thus in two fatal cases given 
below, they did not appear until seven and twelve hours afterwards. They com- 
mence, as is usual with this class of poisons, with a burning heat in the sto- 
mach and painful retching. There is great restlessness, thirst, anxiety, and 
distress, with small, irregular pulse, cool extremities, convulsions, and hippo- 
cratic countenance. In males priapism has been observed. ‘The vomited 
matters have the odor of phosphorus, which is like that of garlic, and this 
odor may also be perceived upon the breath. The mode of death is sometimes 
quiet, with or without consciousness, but sometimes life terminates in convul- 
sions. 

2d. The quantity required to destroy life is very small. A young man died 
on the 12th day from the effects of a grain and a half.(v) Martin-Solon 
relates the case of a patient who died in two days from less than a grain in 
the form of emulsion.(w) An apothecary named Doffenbach, in experiment- 
ing upon the effects of this substance, took one grain, the next day two, and 
the following day three grains; three days after the last dose he was seized 
with violent vomiting, and died on the seventh day.(x) A child two years and - 


(uu) For the diseases which the manufacture of these articles occasions, see Beau- 
grand, Ann. d’Hygiéne, Avr. 1860, p. 349. 

(v) Worbe, Med.-Chir. Zeit. 1826. Bd. 4, p. 183. (w) Christison, p. 151 

(x) Froriep. Notiz. Nr. 493. 


o04 


BOOK V.| PHOSPHORUS.—SYMPTOMS, [$ 562 


a half old, died after swallowing the phosphorus on eight friction matches. (y) 
A child two months old is said to have died from the effects of two such 
matches.(yy) If of the average quality, they would contain about ;},th 
grain of phosphorus. | 

A seller of matches, aged 22, half an idiot, and accused of theft, was so much 
affected by the charge that he determined to poison himself. From want of 
other means he took about two thousand matches, placed them in a pot filled 
with water, and boiled them. He swallowed this extraordinary decoction. In 
about twelve hours he was seized with vomiting, and brought up bilious and 
greenish matters, containing portions of the matches. When seen two hours 
later, his countenance was much altered, his body cold, and the pulse small 
and slow. ‘The vomiting continued, and there was violent abdominal pain. 
The day after, the abdomen was swollen and fatal fainting fits occurred. (z) 
The matches used were of two kinds, one united with chlorate of potash, and 
the other with nitre and the peroxides of lead and manganese. It is pro- 
bable that, in boiling, the phosphorus was converted into phosphoric acid 
at the expense of the chlorate or the nitre. A very analogous case is 
reported by Nitsche, of Vienna. A soldier swallowed the ends of six packets 
of phosphorus matches. Within three hours there was vomiting followed 
by fever and headache. In the epigastrium there was slight tenderness and 
pain, which subsequently increased. ‘The urine was albuminous, the bowels 
confined, and a profuse sweat exhaled the odor of phosphorus. The face, 
which at first was congested and red, except in the median line, which was 
pale, became cyanosed; the sight was lost, the pupils widely dilated and un- 
affected by light; the hearing was also lost; the extremities were cool and the 
second sound of the heart inaudible. At the end of the fourth day death took 
place tranquilly and without any previous loss of consciousness.(zz) Another 
case, from its degree of resemblance to the last two, deserves to be referred to 
in this place. <A girl, twenty-two years old, took a portion of phosphorus 
scraped off from a small packet of lucifer matches. Sharp pain in the abdomen 
was followed by vomiting of matters luminous in the dark, and subsequently 
containing blood. On the third day the pupils were widely dilated and but 
feebly sensible to light; on the fourth or fifth day there was drowsiness and 
impaired consciousness, followed by convulsions. Death occurred on the sixth 
day.(a) In another case a drunkard took half a cupful of phosphorus-paste, 
part of it being spread upon bread. Between seven and eight hours after this 
fatal breakfast, he had violent thirst, and a feeling of heat in the throat and 
stomach, which were soon followed by violent pain and continual vomiting. 
He died on the third day in horrible agony.(aa) 

A singular case occurred at Berlin, in April, 1859. A healthy child eight 
- months old, was left for half an hour in charge of a servant girl twelve years 


(y) Schmidt’s Jahrbiicher, 1844. No. 6, Bd. xlii. 

(yy) Husemann, Journ. f. Pharm. ii. 169. 

(z) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1854, from Gaz. des Hopitaux. 

(zz) Zeitschrift der k. k. Gesellschaft der Aertze zu Wien, and Am. Journ. of Med. 
Sci. Jan. 1858, p. 290. 

(a) Lewinsky, Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. Oct. 1859, p. 529. 

(aa) Canstatt, Jahresbericht fiir 1851, Bd. iv. p. 264. 


505 


§ 563] PHOSPHORUS.—POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK VY. 


of age. It appeared that the ends of two friction matches were given by the 
- latter to the infant, in order to quiet it. This not succeeding, the servant 
burnt one or more matches near the child’s face, in order, as she averred, to 
amuse it with the flame. On the return of the parents the child was dead. 
Traces of corrosion were found in the stomach, but no phosphorus could be 
detected chemically. The more immediate cause of death was concluded to be 
congestion of the brain and lungs, or asphyxia, occasioned by the vapors of. 
phosphorus cutting off the supply of atmospheric air. (bd) 

§ 5638. 3d. Post-mortem appearances.—In the case of the drunkard men- 
tioned above, the mucous membrane of the stomach was of a crimson color, 
softened in many places, and easily detached ; near the pylorus was an ulcera- 
tion of the size of a quarter dollar, with brown everted edges, and the muscular 
coat underit bare. Another similar ulceration was found in the greater curvature. 
The whole of the small intestine exhibited signs of violent inflammation, but 
the large intestine was free from it, except in the rectum. In the case quoted 
before this, the mucous coat of the stomach and duodenum was so softened 
that the handle of a knife, passed behind it, readily detached it in a dissolved 
condition. Similar conditions have been found in other cases.(bb) These 
morbid alterations, therefore, resemble those of gastro-enteritis, arising from 
other causes. The agency of phosphorus in producing such changes must be 
ascertained not, only from the history of the case, but also from its detection 
by the senses, and by chemical examination. Krahmer states that phospho- 
rus after absorption, so affects the blood as to produce ecchymoses under the 
mucous membranes, skin, &e.(c) It should, however, be borne in mind, that 
fatal poisoning by phosphorus may take place without the stomach, or indeed 
any of the organs, displaying the slightest lesion. This is shown in Nitsche’s 
case, in which the dose of the poison was very large, in that quoted by Huse- 
man,(cc) in Lewinsky’s case,(d) and others. 

One of the most common alterations, and perhaps the most important of 
them, is a remarkable fluidity of the blood. Nitsche, Lewinsky, Krahmer, and 
Huseman, describe it. Of this point, Casper remarks, that we must admit 
phosphorus to be sometimes fatal by destroying the vitality of the blood. In 
the cases reported by him, the blood-disks had become transparent by the loss 
of their coloring matter which was diffused through the incoagulated plasma, 
giving it the appearance of a cherry-red fluid of syrupy consistence. Such 
changes prove the blood to be deprived of vital and nutritive qualities. 

The contents of the stomach or the matters vomited, may give a white in- 
flammable vapor, and be luminous in the dark. This was observed in Lewin- 
sky’s case, referred to above. They may also exhale a phosphoric odor. 
Flachsland reported a case in which the dejections obtained by enemata were 
Juminous in the dark, and pieces of phosphorus were found in them.(dd) It 


(6) Biinau, Casper’s Vierteljahrs. xvi. 305. 

(bb) In two cases, one of which was American, they were present in various degrees 
from light to dark injection, and thence to grayish and gangrenous ulceration. See 
Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. Nov. 1855, p. 323; and Nov. 1858, p. 343. 

(c) Handbuch, 2te Aufl. p. 462. (ce) Journ. f. Pharm. ii. 169. 

(d) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. Oct. 1859, p. 529. 

(dd) Med.-Chir. Zeit. 1826, iv. p. 183. 


506 


BOOK V.| PHOSPHORUS.—CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, [$ 564 


is said that the intestines, and even the flesh of animals poisoned by phos- 
phorus, have the odor of garlic, and appear luminous in the dark. In a 
woman who died while taking phosphorus medicinally, it was remarked that 
the whole of the viscera of the body were luminous; thus indicating the exten- 
sive diffusion of the poison.(e) Brera observed also, in opening the body of 
a woman to whom he had administered phosphorus both by the mouth and 
rectum, that a white vapor, having an alliaceous odor, and taking fire at the 
approach of a flame, arose from the stomach.(ee) In the report of a case by 
Dr. Bingley, in 1857, it is said, ‘‘on opening the stomach there was an escape 
of white smoke, accompanied by a strong smell of garlic.”’(/) Similar vapors, 
luminous in the dark, have been seen issuing from the rectum and even from 
the vagina.() Another case is interesting from the fact that, although the 
body had been buried fourteen days, phosphorus was discovered by means of 
its physical properties, in the stomach.(g) On the tenth day after it had 
been taken Mayer detected it in the contents of the intestine. 

§ 564. 4th. Chemical examination.— The appearance of phosphorus is 
familiar to every one. It is insoluble in water, but soluble in ether, alcohol, 
and the oils. It melts at 110°, and takes fire at a temperature a little above 
this. Sometimes it may be separated mechanically from the contents of the 
stomach, or from this organ itself. In a case of homicidal poisoning of 
a young actress in Berlin, the stomach was empty, there was no unusual 
smell, and only a few suspicious yellowish spots in the stomach, but no inflam- 
mation. In consequence of suspicions of the cause of death being aroused 
by the fact of the husband of the deceased having shortly before purchased 
phosphorus paste (under a special permit), the stomach was submitted to a 
chemical examination. Cut into pieces, and warmed in a dark place over a 
spirit-lamp, several shining points were observed in it, and afterwards, by 
directing a fine stream upon pieces of the stomach, removing fatty matters by 
boiling, and afterwards quickly cooling, the phosphorus was obtained in a 
globule of the size of the head of a pin.(gg) 

In another case of attempted poisoning, a woman prepared some soup for her 
husband. After he had taken a few spoonfuls, he was seized with pain in the 
stomach. In the evening his wife again pressed him to eat some more of it, 
but his suspicions were awakened, when, on taking it out of the warm and 
dark oven in which it had been put away, he observed that it was luminous. 
The bowl was therefore sent to the magistrate. On uncovering it, white 
vapors, with a penetrating odor, proceeded from it. When the contents were 
poured out on an evaporating dish, a transparent, shining globule, was ob- 
served at the bottom, and afterwards several more, which, when rubbed 
between the fingers, became luminous, and gave off white vapors. On boiling 
the soup over a spirit-lamp, bubbles rose to the surface, which inflamed spon- 
taneously. (h) 


(e) Taylor on Poisons, p. 244. 

(ce) Riflissioni Med. Pract. sul’uso interno del fosforo, &c. Pavia, 1778, p. 8. 
(f) Lancet, June, 1857, p. 600. (ff) Casper, Gericht. Med. i. 401 and 442. 
(g) Schiffer, quoted in Henke, Zeitschrift, 1851. KH, H. 43, p. 215. 

(gg) Schacht, Casper’s Vierteljahrs. 1852. April. 

(h) Henke’s Zeitschrift, E. H. Bd. xxvi. 8. 173. 


507 


§ 565] PHOSPHORUS.—CHEMICAL EXAMINATION. [BOOK V. 


The detection of phosphorus is, however, seldom so easy. Being mostly 
- taken finely divided in the form of paste, and being not always rapidly fatal, 
it may have been either removed by vomiting, or exist in too small quantity to be 
recognized with certainty. Nevertheless, as we have before stated, it has been 
detected in the body fourteen days after death. In another case, it was found 
ten days after death.(2h) And it is probable that in competent hands it may 
always be recognized, if really present. 

§ 565. Various processes have been recommended for the detection of phos- 
phorus in organic mixtures. The simplest plan is to evaporate partly the 
organic mass, and then place portions of it upon a heated iron plate. The 
phosphorus will then take fire, and burn with a yellow light and white smoke. 
If the quantity of phosphorus be very minute, this trial will still detect it, 
since, according to Orfila, it is applicable, even when the phosphorus forms 
but one-thousandth part of the mixture. Schacht recommends its separation 
by sulphuric ether; the details of this process will be found appended to the 
case above reported by him. The usual mode is to convert the phosphorus 
into phosphoric acid, by boiling in nitric acid. After evaporating to dryness 
over a water-bath, and slight dilution of the residue with water, a solution of 
nitrate of silver will produce in it, if previously neutralized with ammonia, 
a yellow precipitate. Another portion may be converted into hydrated 
phosphoric acid, by heating the residue, after evaporation, to redness. This, 
when cooled, may be dissolved in a little water, and will give, after being pre- 
viously neutralized with ammonia, a white precipitate with the nitrate of sil- 
ver. Care must be taken not to regard as an evidence of poisoning, the 
presence of phosphoric acid and of phosphates, which may have been derived 
from the food, or produced by certain diseases. 

This process is not sufficiently precise in its results to be employed in crimi- 
nal investigations, for the question is not whether phosphorous acid or phos- 
phoric acid existed in the stomach, but whether this organ contained phospho- 
rus itself. The former belong to the natural constituents of the body, the 
latter does not. ) 

The most certain mode of discovering phosphorus in organic mixtures, such 
as the stomach usually contains, is that employed by Mitscherlich.(7) The 
suspected liquid is contained in a flask with sulphuric acid and water, and on 
being heated, its vapors rise through a small glass tube, at first vertically, then 
horizontally, and finally downwards. The descending limb of the tube is 
enveloped to a certain height with a cold water bath, penetrating which it 
passes into a closed vessel below. As the vapors, in coming over, reach the 
cool portion of the tube, they are condensed, and become luminous in the dark. 
By this method, five ounces of a substance containing only one-fortieth of a 
grain of phosphorus, afforded three ounces of distillate in the course of half 
an hour, during all of which time the luminous zone was visible. 

Chronic poisoning by phosphorus is a disease “engendered by this substance 
in persons who are employed in its manufacture. Its principal organic lesions 
are caries and necrosis of the bones, with abscesses of the soft parts, added to 


(hh) Vid. Henke, loc. cit. (7) Casper’s Vierteljahrs. viii. 6. 
508 


BOOK V.] BROMINE. [$ 566 


which the digestion becomes impaired, and, after prolonged vomiting and diar- 
rheea, life is destroyed by hectic. (27) 


Il. Bromine. 


§ 566. From the constant use of Bromine in daguerreotyping, accidents 
may readily arise from it. It is a dark-red liquid, of a strong and unpleasant 
odor, and acid taste. Its vapors, which are given off at ordinary tempera- 
tures, are exceedingly injurious both to the eyes and to the lungs. According 
to Mr. Wurtz, it is highly destructive to organic matter. He placed a human 
stomach, with its contents, in a porcelain dish, covered it with water, and 
poured upon it an ounce of bromine. By the aid of a gentle heat, and occa- 
sional stirring with a glass rod, the stomach had entirely disappeared in less 
than half an hour.(j) Its corrosive properties have been heretofore observed 
only in animals. | 

The only case on record of fatal poisoning by bromine in man, has been 
reported by Dr. Sayre, of New York. A. H., aged twenty-four, of good 
health, and temperate habits, a daguerreotypist by profession, residing in 
Williamsburgh, near New York, swallowed one ounce, by weight, of bro- 
mine, for the purpose of destroying himself. The immediate symptoms, as 
reported by his medical attendants, were spasmodic action of the muscles of 
the pharynx and larynx, and great difficulty of respiration. This was soon 
followed by intense burning heat in the stomach, with great anxiety, restless- 
ness, and trembling of the hands. The pulse was. rapid, tense, and ‘corded, 
and the respiration greatly hurried. The stomach was entirely empty at the 
time of taking the bromine. Various means were used, unsuccessfully, for his 
relief, the symptoms above described increased in intensity; the hands and feet 
became cold, with failure of the pulse, &ec., until 2 P. M., when he died, seven 
and a half hours after taking the poison. 

The post-mortem examination was made seventeen hours after death. On 
opening the abdomen, the external surface of the stomach was found vividly 
injected, as was also the peritoneal coat of the duodenum, and of the mesen- 
tery. A portion of the latter nearest the stomach was stained of a deep yel- 
low color, as were also other parts lying immediately beneath the stomach. A 
softened ecchymosed spot, an inch and a half in diameter, and several others 
of a smaller size were also found upon the peritoneal coat of the stomach. 
The stomach contained about four ounces of thick fluid, resembling port-wine 
dregs, and exhaling faintly the odor of bromine. Its whole internal surface 
was covered with a thick black layer, resembling coarse tanned leather. The 
mucous membrane was very thin, and there was intense submucous injec- 
tion.(/) | 

Bromine may be separated from organic mixtures by agitation with ether, 


(ii) Accounts of this affection have been given by various authors, among whom 
may be mentioned Tardieu, Times and Gaz. Oct. 1856, p. 352, and Leudet, Arch. Gén. 
de Méd. Avr. 1857, p. 308. 

(j) Silliman’s Journal, N. S., vol. vi. p. 405. 

(k) New York Journ. Med. Nov. 1850. aa 


§ 570] TODINE.— CHLORINE. [BOOK V. 


which dissolves it. If a bromide has been formed, a few drops of a solution 
of chlorine should be added, to set the bromine free. 


Ill. Jodine. 


§ 567. Ist. Symptoms.—This substance is capable of acting in a deleterious 
manner upon the system, under two circumstances, viz., by the long-continued 
use of small doses, or by the administration at once of a large quantity. The 
symptoms occasioned by its too prolonged use are incessant vomiting and 
purging, pain in the abdomen, heat and dryness of the throat, headache, rapid 
emaciation, violent cramps, and a general febrile condition. A patient of 
Zink, a Swiss physician, after taking too large doses of iodine for about a 
month, became restless, had burning heat of skin, tremors, palpitation, very 
frequent pulse, violent priapism, copious diarrhoea, excessive thirst, emaciation, 
and occasional syncope. He died, after an illness of six weeks. Salivation 
is also an occasional result of the prolonged use of iodine. A case is related 
in which one drachm of the tincture of iodine, in about an ounce of spirit, is 
said to have proved fatal.(kz) Very often, however, large doses of this sub- 
stance are productive of no evil effects, nor are unpleasant results generally 
experienced from its prolonged administration. Dr. Christison quotes a case, 
in which a child, three years old, took three drachms of the tincture, and suf- 
fered only from thirst and slight vomiting. Dr. Kennedy, of Glasgow, gave 
to a girl 953 grains of iodine, in the form of tincture, during eighty days, 
withouteany effects upon the health ; and Mr. Delisser gave thirty grains a day 
to a patient, without any injury resulting. 

§ 568. 2d. Post-mortem appearances.—In the case related by Zink, redness 
of the intestines, in some places approaching to gangrenous discoloration, was 
the chief morbid alteration observed. 

§ 569. 3d. Chemical tests.—Iodine is usually met with in the form of soft 
micaceous scales of a grayish black color, metallic lustre, acrid hot taste, and 
disagreeable odor. It is sparingly soluble in water, but is readily dissolved by 
alcohol or ether. The best test for it in a free state is starch, as a very minute 
proportion of this substance will give a blue color to a solution of iodine. 
This blue color is destroyed by heat; hence in testing, the liquids employed 
should be cold. If iodine is combined with a base, it must be first set free by 
nitric or sulphuric acid. It may be detected in the blood and secretions of a 
patient under its use. 

4th. Iodide of potassium, although milder in its effects, is otherwise similar 
to iodine in its operation upon the system, and is usually preferred as a medi- 
cinal agent. 


IV. Chlorine. 


§ 570. Orfila has shown, by experiments upon animals, that a saturated 
solution of chlorine in water produces effects similar to those of the mineral | 
acids. No instances of its poisonous effects upon the human subject are 
recorded. 


(kk) Prov. Journ. June, 1847, p. 356. 
510 , 


BOOK V.] METALLIC IRRITANTS.—ARSENIC. [$ 571 


CHAPTER V. 
IRRITANT POISONS—METALLIC. 


I. Metallic Arsenic. 


§ 571. Metallic arsenic is known under the name of mineral cobalt, fly 
poison, and fly stone. It has a bluish-gray fracture and a metallic lustre, and, 
by exposure to the air, becomes gradually black, and loses its lustre. It is 
easily pulverized, and has neither taste nor smell. Exposed to heat, it gives 
out an alliaceous odor, and in the atmospheric air its vapors are changed into 
the white vapor of arsenious acid. It is readily oxydized by mineral and 
vegetable acids; it thus acquires poisonous properties. Accidental death is 
not uncommon from its use. A case is mentioned (Bost. Med. and Surg. 
Journ. vol. xxx. p. 17) in which a child, two years of age, died in consequence 
of taking it by mistake. F 

A highly interesting case of homicidal poisoning with it has been reported 
by Dr. Schiitte.(7) It is, we believe, with one exception, the only one on 
record.(m) The wife of a barber, named Dombrowsky, was suddenly attacked 
on the morning of the 11th of April with violent vomiting and purging, 
with pain and heat in the epigastrium, and excessive thirst. A physician was 
called to visit her in the evening, but being ignorant of the cause of the 
attack, prescribed simple remedies. She had no fever, her pulse was slow and 
soft, and the abdomen was not tender upon pressure. The vomiting, and 
especially the purging, still continued ; and although they afterwards abated, 
her strength sank rapidly, and she died on the sixth day. On the third day 
after death, an examination of the body was made. There was not found any 
natural cause of death. But on opening the stomach, it was observed to 
have no putrefactive smell; it was red in streaks, and the mucous membrane 
was softened. There were also several hemorrhagic erosions, especially in the 
neighborhood of the cardiac orifice. Some small black particles having a 
metallic lustre, were seen upon it. These were carefully detached washed with 
distilled water in a porcelain capsule, and then reduced on charcoal by means 
of the blowpipe. They gave out the well-known garlicky odor. The same 
odor was perceived when some were put in a reduction tube and exposed to 
heat, and both an arsenical crust and the small white octahedral crystals of 
arsenious acid, were obtained. Evidence of the presence of arsenic was also 
obtained by the usual liquid tests. By Marsh’s apparatus, arsenic was detected 
in the fluids contained in the stomach, and the amount obtained from this, 
and from the subsequent analysis of the stomach itself, was computed at 
nineteen grains. Additional circumstantial evidence which fixed the crime 


(1) Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, Oct. 1854. 
(m) Briand, Méd. Lég. 452. 


§ 578] ARSENIC. [BOOK Y. 


upon the husband, was derived from the examination of a few particles 
of a shining black powder found in the extreme end of his pocket, and also 
~ from the analysis of the dried spilled contents of a cup of sago, which, intend- 
ing to give to the deceased, he had placed in the stove to warm, but which 
had been cracked by the heat. It was also proved conclusively that he had 
himself purchased, at several times, portions of arsenic and of cobalt, which 
were found in the house. ‘This fact, it may be remarked, was clearly brought 
home to him by the commendable provision of the Prussian code, which requires 
that a person purchasing poison shall give a receipt therefor to the apothecary, 
containing his name, address, the date, and also the alleged purpose for which 
it is required. These receipts were produced upon the trial. ‘The prisoner 
was convicted chiefly upon this and the admirable and minute chemical investi- 
gation, and sentenced to be beheaded. 


II. Arsenious Acid. (Arsenic; White Arsenic.) 


§ 572. The poison which is generally known under the name of arsenic, or 
white arsenic, is an oxide of the metal, and has a slight acid reaction, whence 
it is called arsenious acid. It is met with in one of two forms, either as a 
white, vitreous, crystalline substance, or as a white opaque and granular pow- 
der. It is sparingly soluble in cold water (about one in fifty parts), but is more 
freely dissolved by boiling water, which takes up the acid in about the propor- 
tion of one of the acid to ten or twelve of water.(n) Dr. Taylor found, by 
numerous experiments, that a fluidounce of hot water took up, in cooling 
from the boiling point, nearly one grain and a quarter of white arsenic, but 
- that if boiled for an hour on the poison, and allowed to cool, the water held 
dissolved about twelve grains to the ounce. In some experiments made by 
Schroff upon the solubility of arsenious acid, he found that one part of the 
acid in 480 of water, the liquid being frequently shaken, was not fully dissolved 
in fourteen days, He boiled one part of arsenic with 100 of water, and found 
that complete solution took place after fifteen minutes’ boiling.(o) It is even 
less soluble in liquids containing organic matter. The different statements 
with regard to its solubility possibly depend upon the difference in this respect 
between the crystalline and the opaque powder. Its taste is not, as was for- 
merly represented, acid, but, on the contrary, is, when at all perceptible, rather 
sweetish. It is sometimes described as bitter, unusually rough, &c. As a 
general rule, it may be stated that it is without taste, except when in solution, 
when the taste perceived may be faint and sweetish. The sparing solubility of 
this substance is the cause of its want of taste, and also explains the fact 
why, in the majority of cases of poisoning by it, it is found in larger or 
smaller quantity in the matters vomited, or adhering to the mucous coat of the 
stomach. Its solubility is increased by the presence of an alkali or an alkaline 
carbonate. 

§ 573. 1st. Symptoms.—The symptoms occasioned by poisoning with arsenic 
do not always manifest themselves immediately upon its ingestion, and this is 


(n) Will’s Analysis. (o) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht for 1853, Bd. v. p. 52. 
512 


BOOK V.] SYMPTOMS OF ARSENICAL POISONING. [S$ 576 


particularly the case when the poison has been introduced into some article of 
food or drink, and taken at a meal. Still, they may occur immediately. A 
child, three years old, drank from a saucer some arsenious acid mixed with 
milk. It was seized ammediately with pain, vomiting, and diarrhcea.(p) In 
the case referred to by Dr. Taylor, the symptoms were proved to have attacked 
the deceased while he was in the act of eating the cake in which the poison 
was administered. In the case of Sager, tried in the State of Maine, in 
1834, quoted by Beck,( pp) extreme distress was immediately experienced 
after taking the poison. 

§ 574. Generally the symptoms are not perceived until a later period, which 
is usually stated at from half an hour to an hour after the poison has been 
swallowed. On the other hand, they have been,”in some cases of poisoning 
with arsenic, delayed in an unaccountable manner. In a case related by Dr. 
Ryan, where half an ounce of arsenic was taken in porter, the first symptom, 
which was vomiting, did not occur until nine hours afterwards. Mr. Clegg 
was called to see a girl who had taken a teaspoonful of arsenic, but who was 
supposed also to be addicted to the use of opium. Seven hours after she had 
taken it she appeared stupid, as if intoxicated, but no further symptoms of 
irritation occurred until near noon of the following day, when, although she 
had been cheerful all the morning, and was engaged in preparing dinner, she 
was suddenly seized with excruciating pain in the stomach, and died in half 
an hour, about twenty-four hours after taking the poison.(q) 

§ 575. Authentic instances are on record in which there has been also an 
intermission in the regular progress of the symptoms. Thus, in the case of 
the girl Davidson, reported by Dr. Maclagan, the vomiting diminished on the: 
fourth day, was trifling on the fifth, was absent on the sixth, but returned, 
accompanied by purging, on the night of the seventh. It is stated that there: 
could not have been a repetition of the dose. So also in the case of McVey, 
by the same author, the man was taken ill with the symptoms of irritant 
poisoning about half an hour after eating an oat “bannock.” Although he: 
appeared to be very ill in the mean time, he was not again seized with vomit-- 
ing until the morning of the fourth day, and died three days thereafter. ‘It: 
did not appear that anything had been given him which would have con-. 
tained a fresh dose of the poison.’’(r) Dr. Christison says: ‘A short re-- 
mission, or even a total intermission, of all the distressing symptoms has been 
witnessed, particularly when death is retarded to the close of the second or: 
third day. This remission, which is accompanied with dozing stupor, is most 
generally observed about the beginning of the second day. It is merely tem-. 
porary, the symptoms speedily returning with equal or inereased violence.” 

§ 576. The symptoms usually begin with a sensation of sickness, and a. 
burning heat in the stomach. There is also a sense of constriction and heat 


(p) Henke’s Zeitschrift, E. H. 43, p. 150. (pp) Vol. ii. p. 546. 

(q) Lancet, vol. ix. p. 31. A case is also related by Belloc, in which ten hours: 
elapsed after the taking of the poison before any symptoms showed themselves ; the 
vomiting was then slight, as also the pain in the abdomen, and no mention is made of 
the occurrence of diarrhoea. She died as from the effects of a narcotic poison. Cours. 
de Méd. Lég. p. 122. 

(r) Edinb. Month. Journ. Jan. 1853. 


33 513 


§ 578] SYMPTOMS OF ARSENICAL POISONING. [BOOK V. 


in the throat, with great thirst, and violent efforts at vomiting soon take 
place. The substances vomited have no peculiar color, as this depends both 
upon the matters that happen to be present in the stomach, the antidotes 
administered, and the length of time the vomiting continues. When the 
stomach is empty, mucus streaked with blood, and yellow or greenish bile will 
communicate a color to the contents of the basin. If powdered arsenic have 
been swallowed, it may sometimes be recognized in the ejected matters by its 
white and flaky appearance. The irritation of the poison being communicated 
to the lower bowels, diarrhoea usually supervenes, and is frequently thin and 
bloody and attended with much straining and distress, and cramps in the 
calves of the legs. When the latter symptoms are urgent, they are usually 
attended with an inability to pass the urine. These symptoms all increase in 
gravity till near the close of life. The general system also sympathizes with 
the disturbance of the digestive organs; the countenance is collapsed and 
anxious, the extremities and the surface generally ice-cold, the pulse almost 
imperceptible, the respiration accelerated, the voice oppressed, and convulsions, 
delirium and stupor not unfrequently usher in the closing scene. Such is a 
picture of the ordinary train of symptoms in a case of poisoning by arsenic. 

§ 577. It should be understood, however, that they are liable to many 
variations, and authentic cases are related in which the symptoms resem- 
bled, to a certain extent, those of narcotic poisoning. The system appears 
in such cases to be completely overpowered by the toxical effects of this sub- 
stance, and the most extreme faintness or depression is the most prominent 
~ symptom. ‘The pain in the abdomen and the vomiting are occasionally not 
urgent, except towards the close of life. These variations, when occurring in 
persons addicted to the use of opium or of ardent spirits, may be partially 
accounted for, but often they must remain unexplained.(s) 

§ 578. When, however, instead of one dose sufficient to destroy life, or 
several doses at short intervals capable of producing this effect, the poison is 
given in small portions at comparatively distant intervals, the symptoms are 
not so marked in their succession and are attended with phenomena different 
from those already described. The following may serve as an example: ‘A 
woman put daily into the soup of her fellow servant a very small quantity of 
arsenious acid in powder. Shortly after dinner, this person was seized with 
vomiting, which led to the rejection of the food and poison before the latter 
had caused any serious mischief. As this practice was continued for about 
six weeks, the stomach grew exceedingly irritable; there was pain in the bowels, 
and the woman became much emaciated. There was also spitting of blood, 
with such a degree of nervous irritability, that a current of air caused an attack 
of spasms and convulsions. When the patient found that she could not bear 
anything on her stomach, she left the place and passed two months in the 


(s) For cases illustrating these points, vide Christison on Poisons. Also, an in- 
teresting case by Dr. Ogston (Med. Gaz. 1851). In this there was headache, stupor, 
feeble pulse, cold extremities, nausea, and tonic and clonic spasms. Vomiting did 
not occur until several emetic doses of sulphate of zinc had been given, and then only 
two hours and forty minutes after the arsenic, amounting to three drachms, had been 
swallowed. The poison was discovered in the blood, liver, and contents of the stom- 
ach, the patient having lived six days. , 


o14 


BOOK V.] SYMPTOMS.—CHRONIC POISONING. [$ 580 


‘country. Her health became gradually restored there, and she returned to 
resume her usual occupations: The prisoner, however, renewed her attempts ; 
and to make sure of destroying her victim, gave her one morning, in coffee, a 
strong dose of arsenious acid in powder; violent vomiting ensued, and the 
poison was expelled with the breakfast. Arsenic was detected in the vomited 
matter, and the explanation of the cause of the long previous illness became 
clear. Under proper treatment, the patient recovered.”(¢) Christison re- 
lates a case somewhat similar, which, however, was not so protracted, and 
which terminated fatally.(w) It was by this means, probably, that the crime 
of secret poisoning was carried in the seventeenth century to such a fearful 
extent. The miserable woman who vended. the liquid, called after her, Aqua 
Tofana, confessed at her death that she had destroyed by it no less than six 
hundred persons. It is generally supposed that its active ingredient was 
arsenious acid. 

§ 579. Those who have partially recovered from the immediate effects of 
arsenical poisoning, are, moreover, liable to the secondary effects, above re- 
ferred to: salivation, chronic intestinal disorder, palsy, dropsy, and an irrita- 
tive fever soon prostrate the vital powers, and the fatal termination, although 
sometimes slowly attained, is, in the majority of cases, none the less certain. 
The period at which death supervenes cannot be definitely stated with refer- 
ence either to these cases or to those of acute poisoning. In the latter it 
usually takes place within twenty-four hours, it may be postponed for several 
weeks or months. The average period in twenty-two cases reported by Dr. 
Geoghegan, was seventy-seven hours and a half, the shortest was five and a half 
hours.(v) Cases are however known, in which death has taken place within 
two hours.(w) 

§ 580. Arsenic is equally noxious when ¢nhaled in the form of vapor, or 
applied externally to a denuded surface, or upon the mucous membrane of the 
vagina or rectum.(x”) Its effects are extremely rapid when it is inhaled, but 
when it is absorbed from a wounded surface the symptoms usually do not occur 
so soon as when it is swallowed. Being an ingredient in most of the pastes 
used by cancer-curers in the extirpation of scirrhous breasts, it is by this means 
not unfrequently introduced into the system, and has produced death with 
all the symptoms of arsenical poisoning. Even the small proportion of ar- 
senic which is contained in the stearine of some candles, has, when the latter 
has been used for the purpose of dressing a blistered surface, produced nausea, 
pain in the stomach, thirst, redness of the tongue, spasms of the muscles, 
weakness and irregularity of the pulse, and death within twenty-four hours. (y) 

Several cases are quoted by Christison from Fodéré and others, where 


(t) Taylor on Poisons, from Flandin, p. 257. (uw) Loc. cit. p. 250, Am. ed. 

(v) Dublin Quarterly Journ. Feb. 1851. 

(w) The following case will be found in the Lancet, Oct. 1845, by Mr. Iliff: “ E. 
D , the servant in a family, after placing the dinner on the table, retired to her 
chamber, and drank a glass of water,in which she had mingled as much arsenic as it 
would dissolve: she fell directly and died instantly ; no struggling whatever took place. 
I saw these two cases (referring to another published at the same time), almost im- 
mediately after the poison was taken.” 

(x) Vid. Christison on Poisons. 

(y) Med. Gaz, 1842-48, p. 351. 


515 


§ 583] ARSENIC.—POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES, [BOOK V. 


_ arsenic given by injection into the rectum proved fatal, and introduced inté 

the vagina caused death in less than twenty-four hours. It is said, moreover, 
to have produced violent symptoms when applied to the unbroken skin, as 
when used as a depilatory. 

§ 581. A case of death from the external application of arsenic to the head 
of a child two years of age, affected with porrigo favosa, is related by Dr. 
McCready, of New York. A woman obtained about half an ounce of arsenic, 
and mixing it with gin, rubbed it well into the heads of several of her children 
affected with this disease. It was followed by redness and swelling of the face ; 
in the child alluded to, however, it produced diarrhcea and tenesmus, with pa- 
ralysis of the lower extremities, but no signs of local inflammation. The 
mother stated that she had on one previous occasion applied the arsenic, and 
though the application was followed by some swelling, this soon subsided, and 
the head seemed much better.(z) Dr. Mitchell, of Liverpool, relates a case 
in which characteristic constitutional symptoms, as well as severe local inflam- 
mation, were produced by applying a mixture of arsenic and soft soap to the 
pubes and axilla for the purpose of destroying pedicule.(zz) 

§ 582. 2d. Post-mortem appearances.— The only reliable and tolerably 
constant changes produced by arsenic in the healthy appearance of the viscera, 
are found in the stomach and intestines. The mucous membrane of the sto- 
mach is usually of a uniform deep brownish-red color, sometimes it is ecchy- 
mosed in patches, and at others there are spots or streaks of effused blood. 
These often have the appearance of crusts, and being of a blackish color, are 
not unfrequently mistaken for gangrenous patches, and the slight depression 
under them for ulceration. But neither ulceration nor gangrene is an ordinary 
result of simple arsenical poisoning ; if found, these are probably merely con- 
comitant lesions, dependent upon other causes.(a) Perforation is exceedingly 
rare. Orfila says that he has never observed it.(b) The mucous membrane 
is also frequently swelled and thickened, possessing in some parts a fungoid 
appearance, and its structure is more frequently condensed than softened, owing 
possibly to a chemical union between the arsenic and the albumen. The pow- 
der, if the poison have been taken in this form, is often found imbedded be- 
tween the folds of the mucous membrane, and closely adherent to it in brilliant 
points, or in white and flaky patches. The matters contained in the stomach 
are evidently too variable in character to be enutherated, since the ingestion of 
different liquids, and of the many so-called antidotes which have been given in 
most cases, naturally destroys the possibility of drawing any useful inference. 

§ 583. The period of time requisite to develop the inflammatory condition 
of the stomach is altogether a matter of conjecture, since the mucous coat of 
the stomach has been found inflamed when death has followed the poisoning 


(z) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. July, 1851, p. 259. 

(zz) Lancet, Aug. 1857, p. 127. 

(a) In the Lancet for Sept. 1843, it is reported that the body of a man poisoned by 
arsenic was disinterred 141 days after death. The stomach and intestines were in 
perfect preservation. About the middle of the small intestine was found a small ul- 
cerated opening, through which some of the white powder was detected, similar to 
what was found in the stomach, and which proved to be arsenic. 

(b) Méd. Lég. vol. iii. 330, 


516 


BOOK Y.| POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES, [$ 586 


at only the short interval of two or three hours; and, on the other hand, 
where the quantity swallowed and the duration of life have been such as to 
lead to the natural belief that inflammation would be discovered, the stomach 
has been found nearly or entirely free of any such morbid change. Indeed, in 
a few cases the arsenic has been observed in immediate contact with the gastric 
mucous membrane, without any signs of inflammation. Nevertheless, as a 
general rule, the inflammatory appearances will be found developed in propor- 
tion to the protraction of the case. Jn a case reported by Dr. Letheby, the 
stomach was of a pale color. Ettmiiller reports the case of a girl in whose 
stomach arsenic was found, and yet neither in it nor in the intestines was there 
a trace of inflammation.(c) Orfila, in his work upon legal medicine, says: 
‘“‘The existence or non-existence of cadaveric lesions, the extent and seat of 
these alterations, can never enable us to affirm that poisoning has taken place, 
but can only serve to corroborate the conclusions drawn from the symptoms 
and the chemical examination of the suspected matters.”” 'These remarks are 
confirmed by observations of Mare and Chaussier.(d@) The inflammatory ap- 
pearances seldom extend further than the duodenum, although sometimes the 
small intestine and the rectum exhibit evidence of inflammation. In general, 
there are no other post-mortem changes at all characteristic of this mode of 
death. ‘The blood is said to be often syrupy in consistence. 

§ 584. The introduction of arsenic into the system by external application 
is usually followed by the same alterations in the stomach and intestines as 
when it has been brought into direct contact with the mucous membrane of 
these viscera. 

§ 585. 3d. The quantity of arsenic capable of destroying life in an adult 
is not precisely determined, but Dr. Taylor states, from the evidence of some 
cases which came under his observation, that there is good reason to believe 
that between three and four grains have proved fatal, and that ‘‘we are 
certainly warranted in asserting that a dose of three grains is very likely 
to prove fatal to an adult.” Dr. Letheby has reported a case in which two 
and a half grains proved fatal to a robust girl. More recently a case occurred 
in which two grains killed a woman.(e) Christison quotes the case of a child 
who died in six hours after swallowing four grains and a half in solution. 

But it is well known that smaller doses than these will produce alarming 
symptoms; and although no cases of death from a smaller quantity are re- 
corded, it remains a question whether, without the intervention of medical aid, 
some of them might not have terminated fatally. 

§ 586. It is evident that when large doses in the form of powder, or merely 
diffused through water, are taken, the poison, from its insoluble nature, is not 
readily absorbed; it is, therefore, probable from this fact, and from the circum- 
stance that as, even in fatal cases, a great deal of the arsenic is vomited, or is 
found after death in the stomach, the poisonous dose may be really trifling in 
amount, life being destroyed by that portion only which has been absorbed. 
In medicinal doses, the solution of the oxide of arsenic produces sometimes 


(c) Encycloped. der gesammt. Med. von Schmidt, 1848, Arsenik-Vergiftung, S. 166. 
(d) Orfila, Méd. Lég. vol. iii. p. 329; also Toxicologie, vol. i. p. 316. 
(e) Pereira, Mat. Med. vol. i. p. 633. 


517 


§ 587] EFFECT OF ARSENIC IN RETARDING PUTREFACTION. [BOOK V. 


_ serious symptoms, and cannot be increased without at once causing symptoms 
of poisoning. The medicinal dose is from one-sixteenth to one-twelfth of a 
grain, and half a grain is sufficient to produce very alarming symptoms. Phy- 
sicians are accustomed to watch the accession of conjunctivitis, swelling of the 
face, gastrodynia, and general depression, as indications of the dose being too 
great or too frequently repeated. 

§ 587. 4th. The facts relative to the effect of arsenic upon the cluscamnean 
process are of a very contradictory character. A number of cases are quoted 
by Dr. Christison, which appear to prove a remarkable antiseptic property in 
arsenic, by which not only the digestive organs, but the whole body, has been | 
preserved from the ordinary changes of putrefaction. There is no doubt of 
the preservative quality of an arsenical solution over organic textures placed 
and kept in it, and the experiments made by Klenck upon dogs seem to show 
that in cases of poisoning, also, this property may be witnessed. This physi- 
cian poisoned dogs with arsenic, and left them for two months, sometimes 
buried in a damp cellar, sometimes unburied in the same place, and the flesh 
and alimentary canal were red and fresh, as if pickled, at the end of this time. 
Dr. Kelch, of Kénigsberg, buried the internal organs of a man who had died 
of arsenic, and whose body had remained without burial till the external parts 
had begun to decay, and on examining the stomach and intestines five months 
after, he found that the hamper in which they were contained was very rotten, 
but that they had a peculiar smell, quite different from that of putrid bowels, 
were not yet acted on by putrefaction, but as fresh as when first taken from the 
body, and might have served for the purpose of anatomical specimens. The 
body of Chapman, supposed to have been poisoned by Mina, was disinterred 
two months after death. The face was livid and putrid, but the odor of the 
corpse was not offensive. The abdomen was of a pale white color, and Dr. 
Hopkinson, on cutting into it, was struck with its firmness and resistance. 
When the stomach was opened, a very peculiar smell was perceived, which he 
compares to that of pickled herring. The same remark was made by other 
medical witnesses.(/) The intestines were entirely empty, of a pale color, 
and apparently rather disposed to dry than to putrefy. In a case communi- 
cated by Dr. Traill to Dr. Christison, the body of a captain of a vessel was 
disinterred five months after death. The face and neck were swollen, black, and 
decayed, but the rest of the body was quite free from the usual signs of putre- 
- faction. The skin was white and firm, the muscles fresh, the lungs crepitating, 
the liver and spleen much shrivelled, the stomach and intestines entire through- 
out their whole tissues, and capable of being handled freely without injury. 
In this instance the coffin contained water, owing to its having lain in a sandy 
soil resting on clay. The remarkable preservation of the body of a woman 
supposed to have been poisoned by arsenic, for nearly fourteen years after her 
death, led to its disinterment, the indictment and trial of her husband. Arsenic 
was found in the body.(g) : 


(f) In two cases of poisoning by arsenic, observed by Dr. Sanborn, of New Hamp- 
shire, the same peculiar odor was distinctly observed. Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ. 
vol. xxxvii. 

(g) Webster, Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xxxix. p. 489. 


518 


BOOK V.]| EFFECT OF ARSENIC ON PUTREFACTIVE PROCESS. _[§ 589 


§ 588. On the other hand, Dr. Geoghegan has observed examples both of 
very tardy and of very rapid decomposition in cases of arsenical poisoning.(h) 
It would not be difficult also to find many cases in which, although death has 
resulted from other causes, the body has been as remarkably preserved as in 
those where arsenic was the cause of it. We have elsewhere enumerated the 
various causes which will retard putrefaction, as the dryness of the soil, and 
the depth at which the body has been interred, as well as individual pecu- 


. liarities, which do not always admit of explanation. We may quote here an 


observation which will show, that even under the most favorable circumstances 
for decomposition, this process may proceed very slowly. This is a case com- 
municated by Dr. Routier, of Amiens, to Orfila, in which an old woman was 
destroyed by a blow upon the head with an axe. This was in the middle of 
summer. The body lay buried in the clayey soil of a cellar between eight and 
nine months. At the end of this time, a judicial inquest was held. The skin 
was perfect, the muscles firm, red and distinct, the cerebrum was like that of a 
fresh corpse, and possessed its natural firmness and proper odor. The viscera 
of the chest and abdomen were perfectly well preserved; and in the stomach, 
which presented no sign of inflammation or other disease, a thick fluid was 
found in which the remains of articles of food were distinctly recognized. (2) 
The fact of the remarkable preservation of the brain in this case, is also of 
some importance, for it is well known that usually it putrefies rapidly, and 
because also in a case lately reported by M. Dieu, where the body of a man 
poisoned by arsenic was disinterred after the lapse of two years and a half, 
the comparative integrity of the brain wes attributed to the preservative powers 
of this substance. (j) 

§ 589. Hence the medical witness cannot be eiuthionized to assert that, be- 
cause the body has resisted more or less completely the progress of putrefac- 
tion, this preservation is due to arsenic, since it may be really attributable to 
other causes. One cause of the discrepancy in the observations upon this 
point, undoubtedly lies in the variable time occupied by the poison in pro- 
ducing its fatal effect, and the nature of some of the symptoms. It is reason- 
able to suppose, and observation also has shown, that if death have resulted 
from the ingestion of the poison at repeated intervals, in small doses, or not 
until several days have elapsed, that the arsenic has become disseminated 
through the system, and may thus exercise a more complete antiseptic influence 
in the dead body. If, again, the person has died within a short period after 
taking the poison, and after abundant and repeated vomiting and purging, we 
may be right in anticipating, that although the violent action of the poison 
has been the cause of death, little or none will have remained in the body. 
Hence, in the latter case, putrefaction will probably pursue its ordinary course. 
Thus, in a case examined by Dr. Geoghegan, of a person who died sixteen 
days after taking a large dose of arsenic by mistake, no trace of the poison 
could be found in any part of the body.(j/) 


(h) Dub. Quart. Journ. Feb. 1851. 

(7) Orfila, Traité de Méd, Lég. 4éme ed. vol. ii. p. 93. 
(7) Ann. d’Hyg. Jan. 1854. 

(jj) Med. Times & Gaz., April, 1857, p. 389. 


519 


§ 592] ARSENIC FOUND IN THE BODY. [BOOK ¥. 


§ 590. 5th. Arsenic found in the body.—It is fortunate for the ends of 
justice, that arsenic may be discovered either in the stomach, or extracted 
from the viscera, at a long period after death. It was found by MM. Oza- | 
nam and Idt, after the long interval of seven years. In a still more recent 
case, it was discovered after ten years. A man named Hichel fell sick on the 
15th of February, 1842, after eating his supper, and died on the evening of 
the 17th. Ten years and four months afterwards, in consequence of some tes- 
timony respecting the mode of his death, the body was disinterred, and a che- 
mical analysis instituted. The body was reduced nearly to the bones, although 
the brown and curly hair was still present. The bones were covered with a 
greasy, gluey substance, on which were numerous pasty spots of a yellowish-white 
color. The body gave out no smell. The ligaments no longer held the bones 
together, and the ribs and clavicles had fallen in. A dark greasy mass indi- 
cated the remains of the viscera, and in the abdominal organs as much as fen 
grains of arsenic were detected by chemical examination. The wife of the 
deceased was condemned to. death at Magdeburg, in 1853.(%) Dr. Webster, 
of Boston, succeeded in finding four grains of arsenic by chemical analysis, in 
the body of a woman alleged to have been poisoned by this substance fourteen 
years previously. The case was tried in Boston, in 1848, the husband of the 
deceased being the accused party. (/) 

§ 591. When arsenic in substance has been taken, it does not neue remain 
in the condition of the white oxide, but frequently becomes converted, by the 
sulphuretted hydrogen developed during decomposition, into the sesquisulphu- 
ret, which is of a yellow color. It may undergo this change in a short time 
after death. Dr. Taylor has found it as early as twenty-eight days after death. 
Tn the language of Dr. Christison, ‘it is the effect of a chemical test applied 
to the poison by nature.”’ 

§ 592. 6th. Chemical examination.—Arsenious acid in its chemical rela- 
tions, must be considered, 1st, as a solid, 2d, in solution, 3d, mixed with 
organic matter. 

(1.) As a solid.—It is entirely volatilized,by heat. Thrown upon ignited 
charcoal, it gives off. an alliaceous odor, which is due to the reduction of arse- 
nious acid to the sub-oxide, the arsenious acid having in itself no odor when 
heated; the smell of garlic is only perceived when it is deoxidized. This 
odor, although striking, is not a positive proof of the presence of arsenic, as 
a similar one may be given off by several other substances. If, however, we 
heat arsenious acid with dry acetate of potash, oxide of kakodyl is. disen- 
gaged, by the peculiar insupportable smell of which compound, even very 
minute traces of arsenious acid may be detected. This experiment may he 
conveniently performed by rubbing the substances together in a little mortar, 


(k) Casper, Vierteljahrsch. 1854, No. 2. . The case in detail is found in Bley’s Archiv. 
fiir Pharmacie (I. Bd. Ixxv. Hft. 2, Hanover, 1853). See also the same Journal © 
— (April, 1855) for an interesting report of a case in which a woman was accused of 
poisoning her father, brother, and sister, and in which arsenic was found in the remains 
of the three murdered persons after a lapse of eight weeks, and seven and eight years 
respectively. Hardly anything but the bones remained in the two last mentioned. 
The accused made a full confession some time after her sentence. 

(2) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xxxix. p. 489. 


020 


BOOK V.]| CHEMICAL EXAMINATION FOR ARSENIC. [$ 596 


and then heating them together in a test-tube, allowing the vapor, which is 
excessively poisonous, to be carried away by a current of air. 

§ 593. Heated in a narrow test-tube, or in the reduction-tube of Berzelius, 
with some freshly ignited (cold) charcoal, the same phenomena of deoxidation 
and evolution of odor occur as when it is placed on red-hot cinders in the 
open air; but in this case metallic arsenic is condensed by sublimation upon a 
cool portion of the tube, in the form of a metallic crust or ring, of an iron- 
gray color, brilliant and lustrous upon the outer surface, and crystalline upon 
the inner when seen under a low magnifying power. ‘There are usually two 
crusts deposited, an upper and a lower, the latter of metallic arsenic, and the 
other of a browner color, which is a mixture of the metal and its oxide. 

§ 594. The arsenical nature of the ring may be further proved by volatiliz- 
ing it by heat, in an open tube, by means of the flame of a spirit lamp; it is 
thus converted into arsenious acid which sublimes upon the tube in the form 
of octahedral crystals, which may be dissolved in distilled water, and subjected 
to the liquid tests ; or by dissolving them by means of nitric acid, and evapo- 
rating the solution to dryness, arsenic acid is formed, which is known by its 
giving a brownish-red precipitate, with nitrate of silver. When the quantity 
of arsenic is considerable, it is better to use a flux composed of the residue 
left by tartrate and acetate of soda, after incineration in a covered platina 
crucible, as recommended by Dr. Taylor. The volatilization of the crust may 
be accomplished either by applying heat directly to it, and chasing it up and 
down in the tube until it is all oxidized, or by carefully filing off that part of 
the tube in which it is contained, powdering it, and then introducing it into the 
end of another tube, which should in turn be subjected to heat. 

The metallic crust of arsenic may, moreover, be distinguished from the dis- 
coloration produced by charcoal, by the absence, in the dark stain of the lat- 
ter, of any metallic appearance; the inner surface of the charcoal discoloration 
being powdery, black, and dull. The possibility of error should however be 
guarded against, by the careful introduction of the charcoal into the tube 
through a funnel with a long stem. 

§ 595. The sublimate obtained by the reduction of the compounds of mer- 
cury, as calomel or corrosive sublimate, has indeed a metallic appearance, but 
may be distinguished, without using the liquid tests, by an inspection with a 
common lens, or even with the eye: the minute globules of metallic mercury can 
thus be readily seen, and by the point of a knife be made to run together. The 
objections that have sometimes been made to the reduction process, on the 
grounds that glass contains arsenic or lead, are theoretical only. Glass does 
not contain arsenic, for although used in its manufacture, it is entirely vola- 
tilized by the heat required in the process, and when the glass does really con- 
tain lead (which ought not to be the case in suitable chemical implements), 
the mere loss of transparency caused thereby upon the application of heat, is 
evidently in the substance of the glass itself, and cannot, with the slightest 
attention, be mistaken for the arsenical crust. 

§ 596. Moreover, the discoloration caused by the reduction of lead will be 
in the part of the tube to which the flame is applied. A crust weighing only 
a three-hundredth of a grain, a tenth of an inch broad, and four times as long, 

, 521 


$ 600] REDUCTION.—LIQUID TESTS. [BOOK V. 


may show characteristically all the physical characters of an arsenical sublimate 
a hundred times larger. It may therefore be safely laid down that the appear- 
ances exhibited by a well-formed arsenical crust contained in the minute quan- 
tity of the three-hundredth of a grain are imitated by no substance in nature 
which can be sublimed by the process for the reduction of arsenic.(m) 

(2.) In solution.—The liquid tests for the detection of arsenic in solution 
are three in number. They are applied to clear solutions of arsenious acid free 
from organic matter, and are extremely useful in corroboration of the tests by 
which it is obtained in a metallic state; the arsenical deposit having been first 
converted into arsenious acid by sublimation in an open tube. 

§ 597. (a.) Hydrosulphuric acid.—In the presence of free acid (hydro- 
chloric), hydrosulphuric acid throws down the tersulphuret of arsenic, which 
is of a demon-yellow color. This precipitate is soluble in ammonia. Dried, 
and heated with carbonate of soda in a reduction-tube, a metallic sublimate of 
arsenic may be obtained. 

§ 598. (b.) Ammonio-nitrate of silver.—This test should be carefully pre- 
pared. (To a strong solution of nitrate of silver add a solution of ammonia, 
until the brown oxide of silver which is thrown down is nearly but not entirely 
redissolved. When properly prepared, there should be no free ammonia given 
off.) The arsenite of silver, which is precipitated by this reagent, is of a 
lemon-yellow color. . 

599. (c.) Ammonio-sulphate of copper.—(This test is prepared in the same 
manner as the foregoing. No more than is actually necessary for precipitation 
should be used, as its intense blue color is very apt to mask the proper color 
of the precipitate. If, however, this has occurred, filtration will separate the 
green arsenite of copper from the uncombined portion of the liquid.) The 
color of the precipitate is a chrome green. When dried, and heated in a test- 
tube, arsenious acid is disengaged, and sublimes on the sides of the tube in the 
characteristic crystals, leaving a residue of the oxide of copper. Their nature 
may further be proved by dissolving them in distilled water, and submitting 
them to any other of the tests which may be desired. 

§ 600. The fallacies to which these tests are exposed are the following: 
Phosphoric acid gives a yellow precipitate with ammonio-nitrate of silver, 
exactly like arsenious acid; several organic acids cause a green precipitate 
with the copper test, and the soluble salts of cadmium yield, with sulphuretted 
hydrogen or hydrosulphuric acid, a yellow precipitate, similar in appearance 
to the sulphuret of arsenic. But doubts arising from these sources as to the 
true character of the precipitate may be corrected by a comparison of the tests 
and the production of a metallic or crystalline sublimate. Thus, phosphoric 
acid gives only a pale-blue precipitate with the copper test, and is not affected 
by sulphuretted hydrogen; and the pseudo-arsenical precipitate obtained by 
cadmium with sulphuretted hydrogen, or by organic acids with the copper test, 
when dried and heated in a reduction-tube, gives neither the metallic deposit, 
such as is obtained from the sulphuret of arsenic, nor the crystalline sublimate 
as obtained from the arsenite of copper. 


(m) Christison. 


522 


BOOK V.] ARSENIC IN ORGANIC MATTER, [§ 601 


It is obvious that other additional correctives may be employed by the use 
of Marsh’s or Reinsch’s process, but the above are sufficient when the proper 
precautions as to the purity of the materials used are observed in the beginning 
of the analysis. 

§ 601. (38.) Mixed with organic matter.—It should be remembered that the 
liquid tests are not applicable directly to liquids containing organic matter. 
The same colors which have been mentioned as indicating with probability the 
presence of arsenic may be obtained in liquids used as articles of food, contain- 
ing common salt or various colorless organic acids. Hence, unless the precipi- 
tate obtained can be made to yield arsenic by the other tests, there can be in 
an organic liquid no demonstration of its presence; the only method, therefore, 
free from objection, is to use the liquid tests in aid of the other processes of 
Marsh and Reinsch, or in liquids not contaminated by the various organic 
matters which may be present in the stomach, or remaining from the poisonous 
drink administered. 

We have been favored, by Dr. Jackson, of Northumberland, with a reference 
to a case(n) in which chemical evidence of this kind would have procured the 
indictment of a faithful and exemplary wife for the murder of her husband by 
poisoning with arsenic, had it not been for his interposition ; he showed not 
only that the man did not die with the symptoms of arsenical poisoning, but 
that the chemical investigation was both imperfect and fallacious. 

The following is an extract from the minutes of one of the examiners: 
“The contents of the stomach—about sixteen ounces, and principally fluid— 
were thoroughly mixed by agitation and stirring, and successive portions sub- 
mitted to the following tests: A small portion was put into a clean Florence 
flask, to which about four ounces of common water and a few grains of sub- 
carbonate of potash were added; this was submitted to the heat of a spirit- 
lamp until boiling commenced. Portions of it were poured into two clean 
wine-glasses, to one of which a small quantity of sulphas cupri was added ; 
this had the effect of changing the fluid, which had been of a light-hazel 
(owing to the color of the contents of the stomach) to a light-green color, 
resembling that of Scheele. The surface of the other glass a stick of lunar 
caustic was applied to; the effect was an immediate white cloudy appearance, 
which soon changed into a reddish-yellow or orange color, and, after standing 
a few hours, resolved itself into a reddish brown. * * * The next day, the 
remaining contents of the stomach having been dried, half an ounce of the sus- 
pected matter was boiled with snow-water in a flask until it rose to the top of 
the vessel; the fluid was suffered to cool, when a stream of sulphuretted hydro- 
gen gas was passed through it; this immediately changed the solution to a 
beautiful light golden-colored liquid ; after which a solution of arsenious acid 
was submitted to the same, and the result was precisely similar,” &c. Such 
rough and imperfect processes as these authorized, in the opinion of the exa- 
miners, the statement that the chemical analysis ‘clearly indicated the presence 
of arsenic.” They were equally unfortunate in their deductions from the state 
of the stomach, which, from the description, appears to have presented that 


(n) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Nov. 1829, p. 243. 
523 


§ 604] MARSH’S PROCESS. [BOOK V. 


appearance not unusual in an habitually intemperate person, as was the subject 
‘of the examination, but which they looked upon also as ‘clearly indicating 
that the patient had died in consequence of poison from arsenic.”’ 

§ 602. (a) Marsh’s process.—This process for obtaining arsenic from 
simple or compound mixtures, by which it may be afterwards tried by any or 
all of the tests above mentioned, is exceedingly delicate. According to Dr. - 
Christison, a solution containing only the millionth part of white oxide of 
arsenic, will part with it readily in the form of arseniuretted hydrogen, and the 
slightest trace of that gas in the hydrogen is indicated by this method. The 
process consists, essentially, in the disengagement of hydrogen gas by the ac- 
tion of sulphuric acid on zinc, in the presence of arsenious acid, the conse- 
quent evolution of arseniuretted hydrogen, and the deposition of metallic 
arsenic upon a porcelain plate held in the flame resulting from the combustion 
of the gas. 

§ 603. The various modifications of the simple apparatus of Marsh require 
no particular description here. The simplest form consists of a wide-mouthed 
bottle with a closely fitting cork perforated for two tubes, of which, the one 
furnished with a funnel dips beneath the liquid, and the other, bent nearly at 
right angles but sloping slightly towards the bottle, descends but a short dis- 
tance into the vessel. This tube is furnished with a cork for the reception of 
a detached horizontal tube of glass, free from lead, and drawn out at its ex- 
tremity into a point with a small aperture. In this apparatus, hydrogen is 
generated by pure zinc and dilute sulphuric acid, and the action is continued 
until the atmospheric air is completely expelled, and all risk of an explosion 
is thereby avoided. The freedom from arsenic of the materials employed, 
should be ascertained by holding a porcelain plate against the lighted hydro- 
gen gas—nothing but water will be deposited in case the gas is pure. When 
thus satisfied that the materials are pure, a portion of the suspected liquid 
may be poured into the funnelled tube, and the spirit lamp be immediately ap- 
plied to the horizontal tube, in order to obtain a metallic ring or incrustation, 
which, if arsenious acid is present, will be deposited at the distance of about 
half an inch from the part to which the flame is applied. Having procured 
this, the gas, as it issues from the fine end of the tube, should be inflamed, and 
deposits obtained on porcelain or glass. The two processes may be continued 
until a metallic deposit is no longer obtained. | 

§ 604. (6) The fallacies to which Marsh’s process may give rise, proceed 
from the contamination of the zinc or sulphuric acid with arsenic, the presence 
of antimony in the suspected liquid, or of imperfectly charred organic matter. 
The mode of guarding against the first has already been noticed. Antimo- 
niuretted hydrogen burns with a pale, bluish green flame, and deposits upon a 
porcelain plate held in it, a black stain. 

The antimonial is distinguished from the arsenical crust by the following 
characters :— 

First, the dark stain is less bright and metallic than the arsenical one, and 
when viewed by transmitted light is smoky black, whereas that of arsenic is 
hair brown. 

Secondly, if the flame be allowed to play on a solution of ammonio-nitrate 

524 


BOOK V.] ARSENICAL AND ANTIMONIAL STAINS. [$ 605 


of silver, placed on the under surface of a plate of mica, no yellow arsenite of 
silver is obtained. 

Thirdly, the greater volatility of arsenic and its conversion into octahedral 
crystals of arsenious acid, may serve, where the crust is in an open tube, to 
distinguish it from antimony. This may be best effected by a bath of olive 
oil; this liquid does not begin to boil until the heat rises above 600°. Arse- 
nic is completely sublimed under 500°, and the process begins at a much 
lower temperature ; but antimony is not at all affected by the heat required to 
boil olive oil. Hence, whether the stains of the two metals are mixed or not, 
their true nature can thus be readily ascertained. Dr. Maclagan says, that in 
his hands the process has proved ‘‘so simple and easy of execution, so deli- 
cate in the results obtained by it, so advantageous in excluding the necessity 
of any chemical reagent whatever,’? and “also in affording, when tubes of 
equal size are used, so easy a method of determining approximately the pro- 
portion of arsenic in different articles examined, that in operating on small 
quantities of material, or where little arsenic is present, I have of late eae 
in practice, adopted it in preference to any other.’’(0) 

Fourthly, the comparative solubility of arsenious acid, and the reaction of 
the before mentioned liquid tests on the solution, will distinguish it from oxide 
of antimony, which is insoluble. 

Fifthly, the metallic crust obtained by submitting a current of the gas to 
heat, presents some distinguishing characters; the arsenical crust is always 
deposited in the more distant or anterior part of the tube, whereas the anti- 
monial one is first deposited on the heated part of the tube.(p) 

Lastly, arsenical spots on porcelain may also be readily distinguished from 
those of antimony by the more rapid solution of the former in hypochlorite 
of soda. They are rapidly dissolved by it, and the porcelain becomes perfectly 
clean. If they are shining and thick, the process is somewhat longer, but 
does not occupy more than a few seconds. -Antimonial spots, on the contrary, 
completely resist the action of the hypochlorite of soda, unless they are quite 
faint and of a dull appearance. Furthermore, if any fluid containing both 
arsenic and antimony be introduced into the apparatus, the spots on the por- 
celain at first contain principally only arsenic, apparently in consequence of 
the antimony being less volatile; but if shining spots be produced upon the 
porcelain, which contain more antimony, these resist, more or less, the action 
of the hypochlorite of soda, and are often eaten away only around the edges, 
While, therefore, by this reagent, a slight trace of antimony cannot be distin- 
euished in spots of arsenical nature, arsenic, on the other hand, can by it be 
detected in antimonial stains.(q) 

Of all these tests, we think the last is the most uniformly successful; the 
rapidity with which the metallic arsenic disappears under its action is aston- 
ishing, and offers a striking contrast to the absence of all effect in the case of 
antimony. 

§ 605. The crusts resulting from the presence of imperfectly charred organic 


(0) Month. Journ. Jan. 1853. (p) Pereira. 
(q) Wackenroder, Chem. Gaz. Aug. 2,1852. This test was in use by Bunsen in 
1844. 


525 


$ 606] REINSCH’S PROCESS.—BLOXAM’S, [BOOK Vv. 


matter in the suspected liquid are not so readily soluble in nitric acid as are 
-the arsenical crusts, and do not, like the latter when so dissolved, yield a brown- 
ish-red precipitate with nitrate of silver. 

§ 606. (c.) Reinsch’s process.—This method of separating arsenic is ex- 
ceedingly simple and efficacious. A solution supposed to contain arsenic 
should be acidulated with hydrochloric acid and heated to the boiling point. 
A thin leaf of copper, or fine copper gauze or wire, bright and clean, should 
then be introduced, and if arsenic exists in the liquid it will be deposited in an 
iron-gray film of the metal upon the copper. The copper being removed after 
the deposit is formed, must be washed in distilled water, dried, and introduced 
into a reduction-tube. On the slow application of heat, arsenious acid will be 
sublimed and deposited on the sides of the tube in the form of minute octahe- 
dral crystals. These may be examined by a lens, and then dissolved in water 
and subjected to the liquid tests. These supplementary tests are requisite, 
since solutions of various metals give a coating not unlike that of metallic 
arsenic, and if the copper is put into the acidulated fluid before it is duly heated, 
a. stain will almost always occur in the presence of organic matters. In proof 
of the delicacy of this test, Prof. Rainey, of Glasgow, says, that ‘‘in repeated 
experiments’’ he has ‘found that one-thousandth of a grain of arsenious acid 
in one million times its weight of fluid, could be separated as a distinct deposit , 
on copper. The copper thus coated when heated gently in a small tube, yielded 
a slight but distinct sublimate, most obvious on a black ground, and which, 
with a magnifying power of ten to twenty diameters, was found to consist of 
crystals with triangular facettes, and which when dissolved in water yielded 
orpiment and the red arseniate of silver when treated with the appropriate 
reagents.” 

Bloxam’s process.—Professor Bloxam has applied the process of electro- 
lysis to the detection of arsenic. The apparatus proposed by him consists of 
a two or three-ounce bottle, the bottom of which has been cut off, and replaced 
by a piece of vegetable parchment, bound on by platinum wire. To the mouth 
of the bottle is fitted a cork with a bent tube and a piece of platinum wire, 
which passes through the cork, and turns up beneath in the form of a hook. 
A slip of platinum then hooks into the end of the wire, and passes nearly to 
the bottom of the bottle; it forms the negative pole of the arrangement. The 
bottle stands in an ordinary test-glass, and the positive pole, also of platinum, 
stands in the glass. Dilute sulphuric acid is put into the bottle, and also in the 
glass, so as to stand at the same height in both vessels. The substance to be 
tested is introduced into the bottle, the cork adjusted, and the wires connected 
by five cells of Grove’s battery; the heat of a spirit lamp is applied to the 
bent tube, and in the course of a quarter of an hour a distinct mirror is ob- 
tained, if arsenic is present. Standard solutions containing respectively a 
tenth, a hundredth, and a thousandth of a grain of arsenious acid, were pre- 
pared and examined by this process, and in every case a successful result was — 
obtained. 

The solutions were then mixed with organic substances, such as the 
ordinary articles of food—meat, eggs, milk, &c.—and the resulting matter 
examined. It was got into solution by means of chlorate of potash and 

526 


BOOK V.] ARSENIC IN ORGANIC MIXTURES. [$ 608 


hydrochloric acid, and the resulting fluid evaporated down by means of a water- 
bath, to a thick syrupy fluid. The arsenic was thus obtained in a state of 
arsenic acid, which does not give a certain result by the electrolytic process. 
Some sulphurous acid was therefore added, and the mixture introduced into 
the bottle, after expelling the excess of sulphurous acid by evaporation ; a 
drachm of alcohol was then poured over the surface, and the process put into 
operation. . . . Inall these experiments, of which a great number were made, 
the thousandth of a grain of arsenious acid was readily detected. 

The other metals which may be detected by this process are mercury, anti- 
mony, copper, and bismuth; lead is precluded by the sulphuric acid which 
is present. These are all precipitated in the metallic form upon a slip of 
platinum, and even in the case of antimony a mere trace of antimoniuretted 
hydrogen is formed, the metal being deposited on the negative pole.(qq) 

§ 607. (4.) Arsenite in organic mixtures. —Before the contents of the 
stomach, the liver, spleen, or the other organs containing arsenic by means of 
absorption during life, can be submitted either to the process of Reinsch or of 
Marsh, it is necessary to obtain a solution as free as possible from organic 
matter. Various means have been recommended for this purpose, those which 
are the least open to objection are the following :— 

If it be intended to separate metallic arsenic by means of Reinsch’s process, all 
the soft solids should be cut into small fragments, distilled water, if necessary, 
added, and also hydrochloric acid in slight excess. This mixture should be 
boiled gently for an hour until all soft solids are either dissolved or broken 
down into fine flakes or grains. Filter through wet muslin, heat the filtered 
liquid again to the boiling point, and then introduce a slip of copper as before 
described. 

§ 608. If, however, the apparatus of Marsh is to be used, the following 
process is recommended by MM. Danger and Flandin. Add to the organic 
matter contained in a porcelain capsule one-sixth of its weight of sulphuric 
acid, and heat until vapors of sulphurous acid appear. The matter is first dis- 
solved, but during the concentration it is charred. The liquor is to be con- 
stantly stirred with a glass rod. The carbonization is affected without any 
swelling or frothing, and is to be continued until the charcoal is friable and 
almost dry. A small quantity of nitric or of nitro-muriatic acid is to be added 
by means of a pipette when the capsule is cold. This converts the arsenious 
acid into the more soluble arsenic acid. The mixture is then to be evaporated 
to dryness, treated with boiling water, and the limpid liquor introduced in 
Marsh’s apparatus, in which it never froths. 

The following excellent process is described by Dr. Will, as being used in 
the laboratory of Giessen. Before the chemical examination, it is proper to 
examine carefully the contents of the stomach and intestines, for the purpose 
of obtaining if possible any undissolved portions of arsenic. This is best ac- 
complished by spreading out the mixture in porcelain vessels and diluting it 
with distilled water. If the white grains of arsenious acid should thus be dis- 
covered, they should be reduced on charcoal or tested by means of Marsh’s 


(qq) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. April, 1860, p. 527. 
527 


§ 610] ARSENIC IN THE SOIL OF CEMETERIES. [BOOK V. 


apparatus. If, however, the arsenic can no longer be separated by mechanical 
- means, the masses of organic matter, e. g., the stomach and duodenum with 
their contents, must be treated in the following manner. The liquid contents 
should be saturated at a gentle heat with chlorine gas, and then heated nearly 
to the boiling point to drive off the excess of chlorine, and filtered through 
paper free from smalt. The stomach and other viscera should be cut into 
small pieces and dissolved by the aid of heat in as small a quantity as possible 
of caustic potash, then saturated with dilute sulphuric acid and the coagulated 
mass treated with chlorine. Or, the mass may be heated in a water-bath and 
treated with hydrochloric acid, being stirred all the while, and then gradually 
small quantities of pure chlorate of potash added, until the liquid becomes 
thin, and acquires a clear yellow color. The heat should now be continued 
for some time, after which the liquid may be allowed to cool, and then be fil- 
tered. The undissolved matter upon the filter should be washed with boiling 
water. The filtered liquid should be concentrated to about a pound. Satu- 
rate it with hydrosulphuric acid by the aid of heat. The precipitate of sul- 
phuret of arsenic which is now obtained, after driving off the excess of 
sulphuretted hydrogen, is of a dirty brown color, owing to the admixture of 
organic matter. This should be washed and dissolved in caustic potash. This 
solution may be deprived of its sulphur by the oxide of bismuth and heat, 
and the filtered liquid after saturation with dilute sulphuric acid introduced 
into Marsh’s apparatus. | | 

Another and simpler process is that of Reinsch, already described. In order 
to apply it efficiently, the organic matters, after boiling in hydrochloric acid 
and water until they are reduced to a pulp, should be strained. Copper-leaf 
or gauze is then to be introduced into the liquid, which, after boiling, is 
allowed to stand until cool, to permit the deposit of arsenic upon the metallic 
surface. 

§ 609. It is hardly necessary to state that whichever of these processes is 
preferred, the previous examination of all the chemical reagents is necessary 
to provide against the accidental presence of arsenic. The necessity of these 
precautions is obvious, but the means of providing against them are equally so. 

§ 610. (5.) It was at one time supposed, upon the authority of Orfila, that 
arsenic was a natural constituent of the human body, but his own admission 
of his error, and repeated subsequent trials have proved that this is not the 
case,(r) that it exists neither in the bones nor in the soft parts. It has been 
found in the soil of cemeteries, but in an insoluble form, being separable only 
by concentrated sulphuric acid; the objection, therefore, that, if detected in 
the body, it may have been derived from this source, is not applicable, unless 
the coffin has been broken, and the soil become mingled with those portions of 
the body subjected to analysis. In this case a portion of the soil taken from 
the adjacent earth may be examined, for the purpose of ascertaining whether 
the arsenic is really derived from it. Where the coffin has been entirely disin-— 
tegrated, and the earth is thus undistinguishable from the human remains 


(r) Vid. Lehmann’s Physiol. Chemistry, vol. i. p. 449. Translated by George E. 
Day. 


528 


BOOK Y.] ARSENIC IN THE SOIL OF CEMETERIES. [$ 611 


contained in it, a chemical analysis can hardly be demanded. But when, on 
the contrary, the body is in a tolerable state of preservation, and the earth 
has gained access to it only through crevices in the coffin, without coming in 
contact with the stomach and other viscera, it is evidently an unwarranted 
and fanciful idea to attribute the origin of arsenic found therein to the minute 
trace which may possibly exist in the surrounding soil.(s) 

Nevertheless, in the following case a competent chemist thought that there 
was good reason for supposing that arsenic must have been administered. <A 
verdict of wilful murder having been returned by a coroner’s jury against a 
woman named Rebecca Smith for causing the death of her infant child by 
poison, the bodies of two of her other children who had also died in infancy, 
were disinterred and sent to Mr. Herapath, of Bristol, for examination. The 
soft parts of the bodies were entirely gone, and the bones were all separated 
from each other. The coffins were decomposed and penetrated in all directions 
by the roots of a tree. The roots of trees as large as the little finger had 
passed through the head and skeleton, and had followed the bones in all 
directions. He found arsenic in the bones, in the black mould under the head, 
and a greater quantity in the black mould under the ribs. One of the bodies 
had been interred five and the other eight years. In his testimony before the 
coroner, Mr. Herapath, said: ‘I have never found arsenic in a body which 
was in its natural state.””.... ‘I have made experiments on hundreds of bodies 
of human beings and brutes, but have never discovered arsenic, unless it had 
been administered medicinally or for a criminal purpose. I have also made 
experiments upon soils and I believe the statement of Orfila to be a mistaken 
one. My opinion is, that arsenic was administered to both these children 
during life, and that it was the cause of death ; it existed in too great quantity 
to have been administered for a medicinal purpose.’’ The jury without hesi-. 
tation returned a verdict, ‘‘ That the deceased children died from the effects of’ 
arsenic, but how or by whom administered there is no evidence to show.’’(¢): 
In the absence, however, of any statement of the process by which the arsenie 
was obtained from the bones and the mould, this case cannot be considered of 
great importance. 

§ 611. The experiments of Orfila, in 1839, have since been confirmed by 
numerous observations, and the fact is well established that arsenic in the 
combination in which it exists in the soil is completely znsoluble and conse- 
quently cannot be carried by the percolation of rain into the organs of the, 
body. Boiling water does not dissolve the slightest trace of it, and it is only: 
by the prolonged action of boiling sulphuric acid that it can be separated. 
from the earth containing it. In illustration of these remarks we append the- 
following: In 1844, Nicolas Noble and a woman named Jerome, both of’ 
whom died with the symptoms of poisoning, were buried in the cemetery of 
Epinal, the earth of which contains arsenic. ‘Their graves were two yards 


(s) Walchner has discovered arsenic in many ferruginous earths, and in the deposits 
of certain mineral springs. Will and Scherer and others have made the same obser- 
vations. Becker examined the soil of a churchyard, and found that every. part of it 
contained arsenic.— Canstatt’s Jahresbericht, 1846, 1847. Bd... v.. 

(t) Lancet, 1849, p. 253, Am. ed. 


o4 529 


§ 613] SUB-OXIDE OF ARSENIC. [BOOK V. 


apart. The bodies were ordered to be disinterred ; in the woman there was 
not found the slightest trace of arsenic, but it was discovered in the stomach 
and intestines of Nicolas. Six months later the bodies were again exhumed ; 
the result. was the same, although the body of the woman had been, after the 
first examination, immediately replaced in the grave without any coffin, and 
covered with the soil which had been thoroughly soaked by an abundant rain. 
There were reunited here all the conditions of putrefaction and moisture sup- 
posed by some to be most favorable for the formation of an arsenite or 
arseniate of ammonia and the imbibition of the body by it; nevertheless the 
soil treated with boiling water did not give up a trace of any arsenical salt, 
and no arsenic was found in the woman’s body. In that of the man, on the 
contrary, it was found in the liver, after it had been carefully washed. ‘The 
correctness of the inferences from the chemical analysis was soon fully esta- 
blished by the confession of the criminal. 

‘Another case, occurring in the year 1851, in France, is not less remarkable. 
On that occasion, M. Barse, a distinguished chemist, gave the following 
opinion when called upon by the government. ‘“ Arsenic exists in the soil 
only in an insoluble state; hence it cannot be communicated by means of 
infiltration to the bodies. contained in such soils; and therefore if arsenic is . 
found in such bodies, it must have been derived from other sources.’? He 
examined other bodies contained in the same cemetery, and found that in none 
of them was there a trace of arsenic, although it existed in the soil.(w) 


III. Suboaxide of Arsenic. (Fly Powder.) 


§ 612. This substance, which is often sold under the name of cobalt, has 
been the source of many cases of accidental poisoning upon the continent of 
Europe. The symptoms and effects are precisely similar to those of arsenious 
acid. In this and other countries, paper soaked in a sweetened solution of 
this or some equivalent compound of arsenic is in use for destroying flies. 


IV. Arsenic Acid. 


§ 613. Arsenic acid is seldom met with out of the chemical laboratory ; 
it has been proved by experiments upon animals to be poisonous, and may be 
recognized by the brownish red precipitate it gives with nitrate of silver, its 
solubility in water, and in yielding a metallic crust or deposit, by the apparatus 
of Marsh or Reinsch. 


V. Arseniate of Potash. 


Dr. Christison is the only author who refers to cases of poisoning by this 
article. He quotes two cases of accidental poisoning by it. 


{u) Vid. Briand, Méd. Lég. p. 520. 
530 


BOOK V.] '  SULPHURETS OF ARSENIC. [$ 616 


VI. Arseniate of Soda. 


§ 614. The only instances reported of poisoning by this preparation are 
quite recent. Two young men sent to a chemist for doses of tartrate of soda, 
in place of which the arseniate of soda was sent by mistake and taken. In 
about five minutes they were attacked with violent cramps in the stomach, 
which speedily became very intense. One died in consequence, and the other 
remained in a dangerous state.(v) 


VII. Sulphurets of Arsenic. 


§ 615. There are several of these compounds known in commerce as realgar 
of an orange-red color, orpiment which is yellow, and (it is said also) another 
preparation, bearing the same name, which is a compound of a pure sulphuret 
and arsenious acid. The pigment known as King’s yellow, contains a sul- 
phuret of arsenic and a considerable proportion of lime and sulphurets. Cases 
of intentional and accidental poisoning with orpiment are known. A female 
was poisoned with it in England in 1835, and the poison found in considerable 
quantity in the stomach of the deceased fourteen months after death. Its 
character was satisfactorily proved by chemical analysis, and led to the appre- 
hension and conviction of the murderess, who was afterwards executed.(w) 
Another case, in which it was mixed in porridge, in mistake for turmeric, is 
related by Dr. Jochner. An old man and his nephew, both partook of the 
food without immediately discovering the mistake. The prominent symptoms 
were continual vomiting, burning pain in the stomach, and gradual collapse. 
The old man died in twenty-two hours; the boy escaped. Evidence of violent 
inflammation was found in the esophagus and stomach, the mucous coat of 
the latter being softened and thickened. There was a sphacelated spot, one 
inch in diameter, in the cesophagus, and another in the stomach of three 
inches in extent. (a) 

The sulphurets of arsenic may be analyzed either by the sublimation of 
metallic arsenic from them in the reduction tube with an appropriate flux, or 
by testing with Reinsch’s or Marsh’s apparatus. They may he separated from 
organic mixtures, by adding caustic ammonia to dissolve them, and then 
precipitating them by hydrochloric acid, or they may be separated mechanically 
by mere subsidence, filtration and drying. 


VIII. Arseniuretied Hydrogen. 


§ 616. This gas is colorless, has the smell of garlic, and is exceedingly 
poisonous. Several cases are related in which chemists, in experimenting 
with it, have perished in consequence of accidentally inhaling it. The symp- 
toms were similar to those usually seen in poisoning with arsenious acid, viz., 


(v) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1852, p. 553, from the Journ. de Méd. and Chirurgie, 
June, 1852. : 
(w) See the case quoted in Beck, vol. ii., p. 560. 
(x) Henke’s Zeitsch. Erg. H. 43, p. 162. ' 
53 


§ 618] ARSENITE OF POTASH—OF COPPER. [BOOK V. 


giddiness, vomiting, pain in the stomach, and collapse. In the case related 
‘by Dr. O'Reilly, death ensued on the sixth day, and Gehlen, the German 
chemist, died in nine days. (y) 

The gas inhaled was, in the first of these cases, supposed to be pure hydro- 
gen, but was contaminated with arsenic, owing to the impurity of the sulphuric 
acid used in generating it. The mode of obtaining it and of testing its pro- 
perties has been already described. 


IX. Arsenite of Potash. 


§ 617. These and other compounds of arsenious acid with alkaline bases 
are poisonous. The solution of Arsenite of Potash is of much use in medi- 
cine, especially in the treatment of chronic skin diseases and intermittent fever. 
It receives its taste and color from the spirit of lavender, as officinally pre- 
pared, and contains four grains of arsenious acid to the fluid ounce, the usual 
dose of which is, for an adult, ten drops, three times a day. From the occa- 
sional adulteration of arsenic with the sulphate of lime, this preparation is no 
doubt sometimes weaker than the officinal strength. Two cases of fatal poi- 
soning by it have been before referred to. In one of them the dose did not 
amount to more than two grains in five days. In the other the amount 
swallowed was not ascertained. The symptoms are the same as those pro- 
duced by arsenious acid. The dose, however, which will produce poisonous 
effects is very uncertain. This liquid may be tested after acidulation with 
hydrochloric acid, by means of hydrosulphuriec acid, which will precipitate a 
brownish-yellow sulphuret, or it may be tested by Reinsch’s method and the 
liquid tests. 


X. Arsenite of Copper. (Scheele’s Green. ) 


§ 618. As this article owes its poisonous properties rather to the arsenic 
contained in it than to the oxide of copper, we have ranged it with the arse- 
nical compounds. It has frequently occasioned accidents in England and on 
the Continent from its use as a coloring ingredient in confectionery. In 1850, 
Dr. Letheby reported three cases of poisoning by Scheele’s Green, which came 
under his notice; and he states that between thirty and forty children were 
poisoned at the same time by sweetmeats sold to them by a confectioner in 
Petticoat Lane. He stated, moreover, that as many as seventy cases of poi- 
soning had been traced to a similar source within three years.(z) 

A child was given a green card to play with, and soon afterwards was 
seized with the symptoms of arsenical poisoning. It was found that the 
glazing of the card, which contained lead, was colored with Scheele’s Green. (a) 

The symptoms produced in the cases reported have been violent colic, vomit- 
ing, and diarrhoea, intense thirst, and retraction of the abdominal parietes. In 
some cases jaundice has occurred. 


(y) Dublin Journ. vol. xx. p. 422; Buchner’s Toxicologie, p. 476. 
(z) Brit, and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. July, 1851. 
(a) Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xxxvii. p. 107. 


532 


BOOK V.] CORROSIVE SUBLIMATE. [$ 621 


Emanations from walls painted with this green color, or hung with paper 
stained with it, are capable of producing unpleasant symptoms. 

Since the first edition of this work a very large number of cases of poisoning 
in this manner have been reported. The most common symptoms produced 
are headache, great depression, faintness, dryness of the throat, nausea, 
vomiting, and abdominal pain. Even paralysis has been occasioned. <Ac- 
cording to Dr. Taylor, a square foot of paper hangings stained with the 
aceto-arsenite of copper may yield from twenty-eight to seventy grains of the 
arsenical pigment.(aa) The last case referred to in the note is that of a watch- ° 
maker, who became affected with ulceration of the mouth and salivation in 
consequence of his using a shade painted green to cover the gaslight by which 
he worked. 

§ 619. The process for obtaining this salt from organic mixtures is the 
following, as described by Dr. Christison. The arsenite should be dissolved 
by heating the mixture with a little hydrochloric acid, and then stirring it. 
After being allowed to cool, it should be filtered. A stream of hydrosulphuric 
acid gas will now cause a dark-brown muddiness or precipitate, which is a 
mixture of sulphuret of copper and sulphuret of arsenic. The precipitate 
being separated after boiling, and properly cleansed by the process of subsi- 
dence and affusion, or if it is large, by washing on a filter, the two sulphurets 
are to be separated by ammonia, which dissolves sulphuret of arsenic, but leaves 
the sulphuret of copper; and the sulphuret of arsenic may be recovered from 
the filtered fluid by expelling the ammonia with heat. Being thus separated, 
each salt may be tried by the appropriate tests enumerated under the heads 
respectively of Arsenic and Copper. 


XI. Corrosive Sublimate. (Bichloride of Mercury.) 


§ 620. The corrosive chloride of mercury is white and crystalline in appear- 
ance, and has an exceedingly acrid, styptic, metallic, and durable taste. It 
dissolves in about ten parts of cold water, and in three of boiling water. It 
is soluble also in alcohol and ether. (Wood and Bache.) 'The very poisonous 
nature of this substance is familiar to every one. It is seldom if ever taken 
in large doses, except by mistake, or with suicidal intentions, 

§ 621. 1st. The symptoms which it produces are of the most urgent and 
alarming character, and generally supervene very soon after it is swallowed. 
At the moment of being swallowed there is usually an involuntary constriction 
of the throat, which has in many cases prevented the whole of the draught 
from being taken. Vomiting of a bloody and frothy liquid soon occurs, and 
continues throughout the case, attended with violent purging, but the latter 
symptom is sometimes absent. There is excessive pain in the abdomen, not 
always increased upon pressure, and also burning and smarting in the throat. 
The general symptoms are at first those of febrile excitement, with great thirst, 


(aa) The reader desirous of investigating this subject, may consult the following 
articles: Times & Gaz. Feb. 1857, p. 177; Ibid. May, 1857, p. 520; Ibid. Jan. 1858, 
pp. 64, 76; Jan. 1859, pp. 5, 43, 94,169; Brit. & For. Med.-Chir. Rev. April, 1859, 
p- 519; Lancet, July, 1859, p. 95; Jan. 1860, p. 85. 

533 


§ 622] | POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK Vv. 


and are followed by exhaustion and collapse, a cold and clammy skin, small 
and frequent pulse, and difficult respiration. In most cases the urine is either 
entirely suppressed, or very scanty and difficult to void. 

The duration of the case is very variable, sometimes terminating in a few 
hours, and in others being prolonged beyond a week. In a case reported by 
Dr. Coale, death took place on the eleventh day; and in another, by Dr. 
Jackson, on the thirteenth day.(b) Death may not occur until later, from the 
consecutive effects. Such was the case in an instance reported by Dr. Ware, 
where the patient died of dysentery on the fifteenth day.(c) 

2d. The smallest quantity capable of destroying life is not ascertained with 
precision; children have been killed by three grains; and Dr. Taylor considers 
that the average fatal dose may not differ widely from that of arsenic, 7. e. two 
or three grains. 

In Dr. Coale’s case less than ten grains were swallowed. Dr. Frisselle 
reports a case which is remarkable for the indifference to the symptoms upon 
the part of the patient. A woman took a drachm of corrosive sublimate in 
solution. She was immediately seized with a burning sensation in the throat, 
and copious vomiting of a dark, frothy substance, which was followed in about 
an hour by purging, which continued till the next day. She still, however, 
attended to her domestic duties, and no remedies were given internally until 
thirty-six hours afterwards. She died on the sixth day, with vomiting of a. 
dark grumous matter.(d) 

§ 622. 3d. Post-mortem appearances.—In the case just mentioned no 
appreciable lesion was discovered. In one reported by Dr. Williams,(e) 
the stomach, which was contracted in the shape of a dumb-bell, presented 
patches of dotted injection, of a bright crimson tint. There was no ulceration 
nor ecchymosis, but the mucous membrane was a little softened in the neigh- 
borhood of the most vivid red patches. Similar patches were seen throughout 
the small intestine. The bladder was contracted, and contained about a drachm 
of turbid urine. The other organs were healthy. The dose in this case was 
thirty grains, and the patient lived two days. In an instance reported by Dr. 
Herepath, the stomach seemed to have escaped the action of the poison, but 
the caecum was of a deep black-red color, and portions of it were in a sphace- 
lated condition.(/) The mucous membrane of the mouth and fauces usually 
exhibits traces of the action of this corrosive poison, being changed to an ashy 
blue color; but in the first two cases here noted, and the following one, in 
which a drachm was taken, the mucous membrane of the mouth and cesopha- 
gus was perfectly healthy. The principal effects of the poison were observed 
in the stomach, its mucous and muscular tissues, commencing at the cardia, to 
the extent of three inches and a half, and about the same in breadth, were 
converted into a gangrenous mass, having a corroded, ragged appearance, of 
a dusky-brown color, approaching to black. The mucous coat, to some extent, 
around this gangrenous portion, was of a brownish red, but the lining mem- | 


(6) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1851. (c) Ibid. 
(d) Boston Med. and Surg. Journal, 1850, p. 279. (e) Ibid. 
(f) Lancet, Dec. 1845. 


534 


BOOK V.] CHEMICAL EXAMINATION. [$ 624 


brane of the pyloric half of the stomach, except a few slightly red patches, was 
quite healthy. The bladder contained only half an ounce of urine, although 
none had been passed for twenty-four hours before death. The lungs were 
extremely congested.(q) 

Other cases are mentioned, similar to those of Drs. Coale and Williams, in 
which, although the quantity taken has been large, and the signs of suffering 
in the stomach and the general symptoms presented the most violent character, 
the traces of a corrosive poison have been comparatively insignificant.(h) The 
period of survivance seems to make little difference in the aspect of the altera- 
tions found post-mortem. Dr. Coale’s patient lived eleven days, and the two 
reported by Taylor between four and five days. 

§ 623. A few cases of death from the external application of corrosive 
sublimate are on record. In one the subject was a child, and the severest 
constitutional effects were produced. It died in about a week.(z) In two 
others, also children, of seven and eleven years respectively, an ointment com- 
posed of two drachms of corrosive sublimate to an ounce of tallow was rubbed 
into the scalp. The children were affected with porrigo favosa. Excessive 
suffering was the almost immediate consequence, and in forty minutes they 
were completely delirious. They vomited continually a green-colored matter, 
had great pain in the bowels, with diarrhcea and bloody stools. In the 
youngest there was complete suppression of urine. Death occurred in one on 
the seventh, in the other on the ninth day. There was no ptyalism.(j) Ina 
case in which from fifteen to twenty grains of corrosive sublimate were injected 
into the vagina, there occurred, besides local symptoms, vomiting, bloody purg- 
ing, coldness of the extremities, spasms of the fingers and toes, and salivation. 
Recovery took place. (x) 

We take the following lucid exposition of the chemical analysis for corro- 
sive sublimate from Dr. Guy’s work on Medical Jurisprudence. 

4th. ‘‘ Tests.—We may have to examine the poison in the solid form, in 
solution, and in organic liquids. ' 

§ 624. (1.) ‘“Corrosive sublimate in the solid form.—On the supposition 
that we are ignorant of the nature of the substance submitted to analysis, we 
first heat a small quantity on platinum foil. It is completely volatilized. It 
may therefore be arsenic, corrosive sublimate, or calomel. The great solubi- 
lity of corrosive sublimate in water distinguishes it at once from the other 
two substances. The addition of a few drops of liquor potasse places the 
nature of the substance beyond a doubt. Corrosive sublimate is changed to 
a yellow color, while arsenic undergoes no change, and calomel is turned 
black. We may obtain still further assurance by the following tests: 1. 
Hydrosulphuret of ammonia changes the powder toa black. 2. A solution 
of iodide of potassium turns it to a bright scarlet. 3. Moisten a clean rag 
with dilute muriatic acid (one part of the acid to two of water), sprinkle 


(g) Wade, Lancet, June, 1848, p. 498. 

(h) Vid. Taylor on Poisons, and a case by Dr. Hodges, Am. Journ. Jan. 1855. 
(i) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. July, 1844, p. 259. 

(j) De Ricci, Dub. Quart. Journal, Aug. 1854. 

(k) Butcher, Dub. Quart. Journal, Feb. 1856, p, 242. 


535 


§ 625] TESTS FOR CORROSIVE SUBLIMATE. . [BOOK V. 


upon it a small quantity of the powder, and rub it on a clean plate of copper. 
A silvery stain is formed, which is readily volatilized by heat. 4. Mix one 
part of the poison with three or four parts of calcined carbonate of soda; 
place the mixture in a reduction tube and apply the heat of a spirit lamp, 
having previously dried the upper part of the tube. A ring of globules will 
be formed on the cool sides of the tube.(/) 

§ 625. (2.) “ Corrosive sublimate in solution in water. Sulphuretted 
hydrogen.—On the supposition that we are ignorant of the contents of a 
liquid submitted to analysis, we test for a base by sulphuretted hydrogen. 
Corrosive sublimate is one of those which yields a black precipitate, first giv- 
ing a milky-white appearance to the liquid. With liquor ammonie it gives, 
in common with lead and bismuth, a white precipitate, but with liquor 
potasse, a yellow (the hydrated peroxide). By this we recognize a per-salt 
of mercury. The supernatant liquor contains chloride of potassium, and if 
we add to it nitrate of silver, we obtain the white chloride of silver, which 
proves that the salt of mercury is a chloride. This precipitate being collected, 
washed, and dried, and heated in a reduction tube, gives a well-defined ring of 
mercury.” By using the other precipitates in the same way, a similar result 
will be procured. The following are additional tests. 

(a.) “ Protochloride of tin.—A solution of this substance throws down a 
white precipitate, turning rapidly to gray, and from gray to black. This con- 
sists of minutely divided mercury, from which the supernatant liquor may be 
decanted, or separated by filtration. On introducing into the tube containing 
this precipitate a plug of blotting-paper, and pressing it firmly against the 


bottom of the tube, the globules are made to coalesce, so as to form a mirror 


of mercury. 

(b.) “ Metallic test.—Acidulate the liquid with a few drops of muriatic 
acid, and introduce a narrow slip of clean copper. <A gray film will be formed 
on the surface of the metal. This being carefully dried, may be introduced 
into a reduction-tube, and heated with the flame of a spirit-lamp. A ring of 
metallic globules will be deposited on the upper part of the tube. Pure tin, 
zine, or silver, may be substituted for copper. ‘The latter is to be preferred to 
any other metal. 

(c.) ‘Galvanic test.—Take a narrow strip of sheet zine of a size conve- 
nient for introduction into a reduction-tube; moisten it, and take up as much 
gold leaf as will adhere to it. Introduce this into the solution, slightly acidu- 
lated with muriatic acid; the gold will soon be covered with a gray film. 
Remove it from the solution, and dry it carefully in the heated air, above the 


(J) Dr. Arthur Morgan proposes a new and exceedingly convenient test for mer- 
cury. Adda strong solution of iodide of potassa to a minute portion of any of the 
salts of mercury on a clear bright plate of copper, and the mercury is immediately 
deposited in the metallic state, appearing as a silvery spot, which cannot be mistaken 
for anything else. Corrosive sublimate may be detected in this way in a drop of 
solution. The disadvantage is, that although it allows the detection of minute por-— 
tions of mercury, it requires that it should be concentrated. It will detect the 1-1000 
of a grain of corrosive sublimate in a drop, but not in a drachm, but this may be reme- 
died by evaporation. The explanation is, that the iodide forms a soluble and easily 
decomposed salt with various salts of mercury, that is an iodide soluble in excess of 
iodide of potass.— Chemical Gazette, June, 1852. See § 626. 


536 


LE 


BOOK V.] TESTS FOR CORROSIVE SUBLIMATE. [$ 627 


flame of a spirit-lamp. Introduce the dried metal into a reduction-tube, and 
apply the flame of a spirit-lamp. A ring of metallic globules will be formed. 
This test is one of extreme delicacy, and will give a characteristic result, when 
all other tests fail. It is that which should be preferred for the discovery of 
very minute quantities of the poison. The metallic deposit may be readily 
obtained by placing a drop of the acidulated solution on a surface of clean 
copper or gold, and touching the moistened metal with a fragment of zine or 
iron. Dr. Wollaston once employed a key and a sovereign for this purpose. 
The acid in combination with the mercury may be shown to be the hydro- 
chloric, by testing the fluid from which the mercury has, by any of the fore- 
going methods, been precipitated. On the addition of the nitrate of silver, 
we obtain a white precipitate, the chloride of silver, which is insoluble in nitric 
acid. 

§ 626. (3.) “ Corrosive sublimate in organic liquids.—As the poison is 
very soluble, it is rare to meet with it in a solid form. But when it has been 
taken in the mass, it may sometimes be separated, by merely stirring the 
liquid, at the same time adding, if it be very viscid, distilled water. The cor- 
rosive sublimate, from its great weight, will subside, and may be collected. 
As the poison is decomposed by the secretions of the body, by the mucous 
membrane, and by several articles of food, it might not be found in solution 
in the stomach, even though no antidote had been given. We must, therefore, 
expect to find it in one of two states; in solution, or in combination with the 
solid contents of the stomach. In the former case we procure a clear liquid 
by diluting with distilled water, boiling if necessary, and filtering. In the 
latter case, one of two processes may be adopted. We may boil the solid 
matters in distilled water, and in this way bring the soluble salt of mercury 
into solution; or, if the solid matters treated in this way yield no trace of 
mercury, in consequence of the soluble salt having been decomposed, evaporate 
to dryness, and digest the dried residue in warm nitromuriatic acid. ‘The in- 
soluble compound of mercury is thus reconverted into the soluble bichloride. 
This acid liquor must be evaporated to dryness, and the, residue be dissolved 
in distilled water, and filtered.” The corrosive sublimate may now either be 
dissolved out by ether, or at once tested by the protochloride of tin, or by the 
galvanic test. 

§ 627. A new test has been proposed. If a strong solution of iodide of 
potassium be added to a minute portion of any of the salts of mercury, placed 
on a clean bright plate of copper, the mercury is immediately deposited in the 
metallic state, appearing as a silvery stain on the copper, which cannot be 
mistaken, as no other metal is deposited by the same means. By this method, 
it is said, corrosive sublimate may be detected in a drop of solution, unaffected 
either by caustic potash, or iodide of potassium. In a mixture of calomel 
and sugar, in the proportion of one grain to two hundred, a distinct metallic 
stain will be obtained with one grain, which contains z3,th of a grain of calo- 
mel; in like manner, ;3,th of a grain of peroxide of mercury may be detected, 
although the mixture of sugar is not in the least colored by it. 

With the preparations of mercury in the undiluted state, this process acts 
with remarkable accuracy; the smallest possible quantity of calomel or per- 

537 


§ 631] NITRATE OF MERCURY. [BOOK V. 


oxide of mercury, such as would almost require a magnifying glass to perceive, 
placed on copper treated with iodide of potassium, will give a distinct metallic 
stain. The only precaution which this process seems to require is, that the 
— liquid to be examined should be concentrated by evaporation.(m) 

§ 628. 5th. Where corrosive sublimate has undoubtedly been the cause of 
death, it has not always been found in the body of the deceased. ‘Thus, in a 
case reported by Dr. Wegeler, of a young man who poisoned himself with three 
drachms of this substance, and died on the sixth day thereafter, none of the 
poison could be detected in the stomach or intestines.(n) In another, by Dr. 
Taylor, where two drachms were swallowed, and the man died in four days, no 
mercury was detected in the stomach or tissues. (0) 

§ 629. 6th. Orfila (the nephew of the distinguished toxicologist) undertook 
numerous experiments for the purpose of ascertaining what length of time was 
required for the disappearance of certain poisons from the system. With re- 
spect to corrosive sublimate, he states, that when it has been administered for 
some time, it will generally disappear from the organs in eight or ten days, 
and he found it but once on the eighteenth day, after its discontinuance. An 
individual had undergone a course of treatment with corrosive sublimate, and 
died four months after ceasing the course. He was poisoned with a mercurial 
preparation. On analysis, mercury was found in his organs. Hence, accord- 
ing to this author, the mercury could not have been derived from the prepara- 
tions taken four months before death. He also says, that if a man survives 
fifteen days after being poisoned with corrosive sublimate, it is quite probable 
that the experts will find no trace of mercury. They will, however, commit a 
gross error, if they conclude from this, that there has been no poisoning.( p) 


XII. Nitrate of Mercury. 


§ 630. A case of homicidal poisoning, attributed to the administration of a 
portion of this salt in a pudding, is related in Henke’s Zeitschrift for 1849. 
The symptoms were very similar to those of poisoning by corrosive sublimate; 
the man survived five days in great agony, and the post-mortem inspection 
revealed softening and inflammation of the mucous coat of the intestines and 
stomach. 'The most curious feature of this case was, that mercury was found 
in the metallic state in the stomach and intestinal canal, and had been voided 
also with the discharges during life. This circumstance was attributed by the 
examiners to the readiness with which the acid, in this combination, is separa- 
ble from the base, especially under an elevated temperature. A case of suicide 
by the acid pernitrate, is reported by Mr. Bigsley, in the London Medical 
Gazette. (q) 

The concentrated salt is used as a caustic in surgery, and is exceedingly 
active. It is stated that symptoms of mercurial poisoning have arisen from 
its use in this form. 

§ 631. Other salts of mercury, such as the white and red precipitates, cin- 


(m) Pharm. Journ. Feb. 1852, | 

(n) Canstatt’s Jabresbericht fiir 1846, Bd. v. p. 81. (o) Ibid. p. 322. 
(p) Am. Journ. Med Sci. from Comptes Rendus, Jan. 15, 1852. 

(q) Vol. vi. 329. 


038 


BOOK V.] CANCRUM ORIS. [§ 638 


nabar, the bicyanide, and turpeth mineral, are all poisonous, but it is not 
necessary to enlarge upon them in this place. They act as irritants or corro- 
sives, and the post-mortem appearances in the cases reported are not unlike 
those found in poisoning by corrosive sublimate. 

The presence of mercury may be detected as already mentioned, or by the 
use of Smithson’s battery, which consists of a plate of tin lined with one of 
gold, in the form of a spiral; or, as has been recommended by Mr. Morgan, 
of Dublin,.by the silvery stain which will immediately appear on a bright 
plate of copper, when touched with a strong solution of iodide of potassium, 
if mercury be present, either in solution or in the solid form. (7) 


XIV. Deleterious Effects of Mercurial Preparations. 


§ 632. The subject of chronic poisoning by mercurial preparations, and the 
discussion of questions arising out of the specific effects of them upon the sys- 
tem, involves too many considerations to be profitably introduced here. We 
therefore refer the reader for information on these points, to Dr. Christison’s 
treatise, and to the standard works on Pathology and the Practice of Medicine. 

We cannot forbear, however, to call the reader’s attention more particularly 
to those forms of disease known under the name of cancrum oris, gangre- 
nopsis, and mercurial sore mouth, especially in reference to children. 

§ 633. Ist. That death may occasionally result from the action of mercury 
upon the mouth, there can be no doubt. It is extremely important, however, 
to know, if this can be distinguished from those forms of inflammation and 
gangrene of some portion of the buccal cavity, which are the result of certain 
depressed and diseased conditions of the system, independent of the action of 
mercury; and also, whether mercury given to a patient whose vital force is 
thus reduced, and whose blood is already depraved, may not be the exciting 
cause by which the tendency to gangrenous ulceration becomes developed. It 
is much to be feared that the inappropriate administration of this drug, has 
in some cases been followed by serious, and even fatal, disorganization of the 
mouth ; while, on the other hand, physicians may be unjustly blamed for con- 
sequences which were really not the result of their imprudence, but of other 
causes which they were unable to control. 

We purpose first, by a few cases, to contrast the appearances presented by 
the effects of mercury on the mouth, with those which are due to disease. 

A boy about ten years old, supposed to be suffering under bilious colic, was 
given twenty grains of calomel, which purged him in four hours; he took, in 
twenty-four hours, tea grains more with the same effect, but without much 
relief. On the morning of the fourth day (medical treatment having been 
continued, but no calomel or any of the acids used) all the symptoms of the 
early stage of ptyalism set in; the inflammation and swelling of the salivary 
glands rapidly increased, so that by the day following, there was a general 
swelling of all the soft parts of the face usually affected by severe ptyalism. 
On the next morning, a small gangrenous spot, of a dark brown color, was 


(r) See note to § 624. 
539 


§ 634]  GANCRUM ORIS. [BOOK Y. 


discovered on the middle and inner surface of the lower lip, which rapidly 
spread until the seventh day; at this time, the entire lower lip, the inside of 
both cheeks, and surface of the tongue, were completely gangrenous, the 
lower lip and tip of the tongue were wanting, having been destroyed by mor- 
tification. The ptyalism increased, a stream of viscid saliva was constantly 
running out of the mouth, and the patient presented a most piteous spectacle. 
The breath was very fetid and offensive. Death occurred on the twelfth day. 
In another case, a little girl, ten years old, who received a fracture of the 
head from a fall, was given some calomel for the purpose of opening the 
bowels, but it did not operate. Her mouth became sore, and got rapidly 
worse, notwithstanding every effort was made to relieve it. The throat and 
face became immensely swollen, the teeth became loose and several came out, 
and the whole inside of the mouth, tongue and all, had a very black appear- 
ance, emitting a constant flow of a dark putrid saliva of intolerable fetor. 
The greater part of the mouth and tongue mortified, and part of the tongue, 
the under lip, and part of one side of the face, sloughed off, presenting a most 
horrible spectacle, and one exquisitely distressing to the parents and friends of 
the little patient—the more so, as the child continued to live some days after 
these parts had become detached.(s) 

§ 634. That form of disease due to the action of mercury upon a depraved 
constitution, may be illustrated by the following cases.(¢) A boy, aged thirteen 
years, after suffering from influenza and partially recovering, was attacked 
with gastro-enteritis, from over-indulgence in animal food. The bowels were 
moved daily with about two grains of calomel, followed by a teaspoonful of 
castor oil when necessary. He amended under this treatment; but, about 
three weeks after the commencement of his sickness, it was discovered that 
mortification had commenced under the tongue, near the third molar tooth, on 
the left side; it extended around all the molar teeth of that side, embracing 
the gum and a portion of the cheek. The cheek was slightly swollen, and 
the left eye was opened with some difficulty. The mortification spread rapidly, 
notwithstanding the use of caustics, a dark spot appeared on the outside of 
the cheek, and the patient died on the third day. It is stated that the boy 
had dug out a piece of a tooth with a knife, a few days before the mortification 
began, at the place where it commenced. About twenty grains of calomel 
were taken during the first week of the disease, and none afterwards. The 
glands were not affected; and the mouth, when the mortification commenced, 
presented a healthy appearance. 

Dr. 8. Jackson (late of Northumberland) says: ‘I applied mercurial oint- 
ment to the face of a child, about three years old, to prevent the pitting of 
confluent smallpox; in a few days the gums were swelled and the teeth 
loosened, but only on the side upon which the patient continually lay. The 
gums soon mortified, the gangrene spread to the cheek, bringing on a fair case 
of gangrenopsis, and she died of her twofold disease in a very few days. 
This,” he says, “was not a case of salivation, for the other side of the jaw 


(s) Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xxxii. pp. 459 and 517. 
(t) Ibid. p. 342. 


540 


BOOK Y.| CANCRUM ORIS. [$ 636 


remained sound, and the teeth on that side firm in their sockets.”’(u) In the 
same manner were fatal ulceration and gangrene developed, in a case reported 
by Dr. Marshall Hall. A child four years of age, with hooping-cough, took, 
according to a prescription furnished from a dispensary, three grains of 
calomel, on the 29th of October, and the same dose four times thereafter until 
the 7th of November. About this time the right cheek became much swollen, 
and there was great difficulty in opening the mouth, with very offensive 
breath. The gums and inside of the cheek became ulcerated, and on the 16th 
a sphacelus appeared on the right cheek, of about the size of a shilling, which 
rapidly extended to the size of a crown. ‘The child continued to get worse, 
and died on the 23d. On post-mortem examination, there was found pleuro- 
pneumonia of the lower lobe of the right lung; there was an extensive eschar 
in the right cheek; its size, externally, was two and a half inches in length 
by one and a half in breadth. It penetrated through the entire cheek, and 
occupied an equally extensive space on its internal surface; the contiguous 
gum was in a similar state of sloughing, the alveolar processes were denuded, 
one or two teeth had disappeared, and several adjacent ones were loose. On 
the left side there was incipient gangrene of the cheek internally, and also of 
the contiguous gum, and the teeth were loose. ‘The rest of the mouth was 
not affected. ) | 
§ 635. 2d. Cases of true gangrene of the face, however, have a different 
origin and course. A single example will suffice. It is taken also from Dr. 
M. Hall’s Observations in Medicine. A little girl, aged three years and a half, 
had been affected with fever about fourteen days, and was apparently conva- 
lescent, when the left side of the face and lips was observed to be swollen, and 
to have a red and glistening appearance. About the same period, three spots 
were observed, one on the gum of the lower jaw, and the other two on the left 
cheek. These spots became dark-colored, and gradually spread. A slough 
separated from the cheek, and exposed the inside of the mouth. The contigu- 
ous teeth fell out. The breath and the exhalation from the ulcer were ex- 
tremely offensive. The child lingered about fourteen days, and sank gradually. 
Having thus seen the various forms of disease of the mouth which may 
give rise to a suspicion of poisoning by mercurial preparations, it only remains 
for us to point out the means by which the symptoms caused really by such 
preparations, may be distinguished from others which are spontaneous in their 
origin. 
§ 636. All authors agree that mercury does not produce salivation in chil- 
dren as readily as inadults. Dr. Clarke says, that although he has prescribed 
mercury in very large quantities in a great number of cases, he never produced 
salivation, except in three instances, in any child under three years of age: 
Dr. Warren, of Boston, observes: ‘‘ That he has never known an infant to be 
salivated, notwithstanding he has given, in some cases, large quantities with 
this view.” Mr. Colles, of Dublin, says: ‘‘ No man in the present day requires 
to be told that mercury never does produce ptyalism or swelling and ulcera- 
tion of the gums in infants,”’ Drs. Evanson and Maunsell say: ‘‘ Mercury 


(u) Trans. Coll. of Phys. Philad. U. §. vol. ii. No. 3. 
541 


§ 637] GANGRAZNOPSIS. [BOOK Y. 


does not seem capable of salivating an infant; we have never seen it do so, 
’ nor are we aware of any such case being on record.”(v) Dr. West, of London, 
says: ‘‘ In infants under five years of age, the gums hardly ever become affected 
by mercury, though most energetically employed; and it has never yet oc- 
curred to me to meet with an instance of profuse salivation or dangerous ul- 
ceration of the gums. Such accidents, however, do now and then occur, and 
have been known to terminate in fatal gangrene of the cheek or necrosis of 
the jaw.”’ Yet, when salivation does occur, there is quite sufficient testimony, 
which it is unnecessary to quote, that the most disastrous consequences may 
follow. In this fact, however, appears to lie the great distinction between the 
disease resulting exclusively from the use of mercury, and that which is spon- 
taneous or merely called into action by it. Dr. Hall says: “It is well known 
to every observer that the effect of calomel, when it does take place, is wni- 
Jormly diffused over the gums, tongue, and internal parts of the cheek.” 
Further, ‘it is diffused and is totally different in many respects from the ctr- 
cumscribed form of the gangrena oris.’’ In other words, the mercurial dis- 
ease commences in the gums and tongue; they swell, ulcerate, and slough, 
and the disease may then extend itself to the lips and cheek. The disease is 
therefore different in its early manifestations, is attended with salivation, is 
slower in its progress, and at first confined to parts which in true gangreenopsis 
are only secondarily affected. | . 

§ 637. We take the following description of gangrezenopsis from the ad- 
mirable monograph of Dr. Jackson, which we have already referred to :— 

“TY. The gangrenopsis attacks the cheek, the lip, or the nose, sometimes the 
fauces; most frequently in children, but sometimes in adults. 

“TT. It begins in those soft parts, and never in the maxilla, often where no 
mercury has been used, in a debilitated and-febrile state of the system, as in 
idiopathic fevers and dysentery. Van Swieten saw it in scurvy, and Huxham 
in measles. Dr. Marshall Hall says (p. 178): ‘In all the cases which came to 
my knowledge, this affection had been preceded by fever, acute disorder of the 
digestive organs, inflammation of the lungs, variola, rubeola, or scarlatina.’ 
An exhausted state of the vitality, with cachectic fever, is, therefore, the pre- 
disposing cause. \ 

“TIT. The exciting cause is any injury done to the parts. I saw it evidently 
started in two cases by the child’s lying continually on one side, with a hand 
under the cheek, thus pressing the mucous membrane against the molar teeth; 
a protuberance of this membrane being caught between the teeth, was continu- 
ally bruised, and a point of gangrene was thus established in an exanimate 
state of the whole system. 

“TV. It is sometimes the result of severe cases of cancrum oris, the irritation 
spreading from the gums to the cheek.’’ 

It is well known that cancrum oris and the gangrene which attacks the 
cheek often occur in cases where no mercury has been given. We think that 
there is between these two essentially little pathological difference; the most 
tangible distinction being, as it appears to us, that the canker sore-mouth of 


(v) Beck’s Essays on Infant Therapeutics, p. 48. 
542 


BOOK V.] ) GANGRANOPSIS, [$ 640 


children (as it is called) sometimes prevails endemically in low, unhealthy 
situations, and among the poorer classes, being frequently seen in the hospitals 
for children, and occurring without being necessarily preceded by disease ; 
whereas the gangrene of the cheek is commonly a sequel of exanthematous 
or other prostrating diseases. Both are allied closely to the gangrene of the 
genitals in female children, elsewhere referred to. (Vid. RAPE.) 

§ 638. It is evident, we think, from what has been said, that the diagnosis 
of the cause of these various forms of disease is not always easy. It depends 
chiefly upon the possibility of ascertaining the manner in which the disease 
first manifested itseli—whether by swelling and ulceration of the gums gene- 
rally, with an increased flow of saliva, or whether it commenced in the mouth 
or cheek with a hard red swelling, rapidly running into gangrene. The cha- 
racter of the disease under which the child was siaiiohl and its hygienic 
conditions, must also be known. 

If an opinion is required only after death, or at an advanced period of the 
disease, it may be impossible to know whether it can be attributed to mercury, 
or whether, in case it is known that mercury has been exhibited, it can be 
fairly attributed to it. Dr. Taylor does not admit the validity of the criterion 
that mercurial poisoning can be known by the uniform diffusion of the disease 
over the gums, tongue, and internal parts of the cheek, as advocated by Dr. 
Hall; and Dr. Christison, he says, has recorded a case in which, although the 
gangrene resulted from mercury, it was observed to occur on the skin near the 
mouth, on each side, whence it spread over the whole cheek, and destroyed life 
in eight days (p. 319). He also gives a case in which a charge was made 
against a medical practitioner, of having caused the death of a child aged four 
years by administering an overdose of some mercurial preparation. The child 
was laboring under hooping-cough, and some medicine was prescribed; on the. 
fourth day the child complained of soreness of the mouth, the teeth became 
loose and fell out, the tongue and cheek were very much swollen, and the child 
died in the course of a few days from gangrene in the left cheek. The answer 
to the charge was that not a particle of mercury had been exhibited; a fact 
clearly proved by the production of the prescription-book of the medical 
attendant. 

§ 639. In the midst of these conflicting opinions and observations, the only 
path for the physician to follow is that we have already pointed out, viz., a 
careful inquiry into the early history and symptoms of the case; and we con- 
sider that should these prove that the child was already laboring under a 
prostrating disease, the most reasonable conclusion that can be drawn will be 
that this was the true cause of its death, whether mercury was exhibited or 
not. If, on the other hand, the child was not affected by any such disease, it 
must be shown that the early symptoms were either those of mercurial ptyalism 
or epidemic canker. Upon these grounds, we do not think that it will be 
difficult to form a probable opinion. 


XIV. The Salts of Lead. 


§ 640. Ist. Form.—Acetate or sugar of lead is a white crystalline salt, of a 
sweet, astringent taste, and soluble in water and alcohol. The solution in 
543 


§ 642] SALTS OF LEAD—POISONING. [BOOK V. 


ordinary water is turbid, owing to the formation of the carbonate of lead. It 
- resembles loaf-sugar in appearance, a circumstance which has sometimes led to 
its being swallowed in mistake for it. Its constant use in medicine, and the 
facility with which it can be procured, are the chief causes of the frequent 
cases of poisoning observed from it. 

§ 641. 2d. Symptoms.—Acetate of lead is by no means an active poison. 
In general, its poisonous effects arise gradually, and become slowly developed 
after its long-continued use. When taken, however, in a large quantity at 
once, it is capable of producing symptoms analogous to those caused by other 
irritant poisons. It is eliminated from the system by the urine, by the per- 
spiration, and by the milk. The constitutional effects of lead have been thus 
described by Tanquerel des Planches :—(w) 

1st. Saturnine coloration of the gums, of the buccal mucous membrane, and 
of the teeth. A narrow leaden-blue, or slate-blue line, from one-twentieth to 
one-sixth of an inch in breadth, is formed on the margins of the gums nearest 
to tWo or more teeth (usually the incisors) of either jaw. The inner part of 
the lips and cheeks is sometimes stained blue. The blue discoloration is sup- 
posed to depend upon the formation of the sulphuret of lead. 

2d. Saturnine taste and breath. 

3d. Saturnine jaundice. 

4th. Emaciation most evident in the face. 

oth. Slowness, smallness, and irregularity of the pulse. 

The true saturnine diseases which follow may either exist alone or be com- 
plicated with each other. ‘They are: 1st. Lead or painter’s colic. 2d. Lead 
rheumatism. 38d. Lead palsy, often accompanied with loss of sensation in 
the part affected. 4th. Disease of the brain—encephalopathia saturnina— 
manifested by delirium, coma, or convulsions, and the loss of one or more 
senses. | 
§ 642. Dr. Wm. Norris, of Stourbridge, gives an account of the poisoning 
of a vast number of persons, by acetate of lead accidentally mixed with flour. 
About thirty pounds of this salt were mixed with sixty or eighty sacks of 
flour, which was retailed to a great many persons in the neighboring villages. 
Nearly a thousand persons suffered from the poisonous effects of lead. The 
persons who ate the bread, after a few weeks complained of a peculiar taste ; 
some compared it to soda, others to rusty needles or copper. ‘The tongue was 
covered with a darkish cream-colored mucus, and was soft and flabby; the 
gums were swollen, with a blue line on the margin, and in many cases the blue 
tinge extended nearly over the gums, and occasionally on the inner side of the 
lower lip, and in a faint degree over the mucous membrane of the mouth and 
towards the fauces; the tonsils were in some cases enlarged, and in other cases 
there was salivation. These symptoms were accompanied by loss of appetite, 
nausea, vomiting, flatulency, and obstinate constipation, with a sense of con- 
striction in the throat and epigastrium, and a violent spasmodic pain and 
twisting around the navel, which was retracted; the pain was sometimes in- 


(w) Traité des Malad. de Plomb, Paris, 1839. 
544 


— sane 


~ 


BOOK Y.| ACUTE POISONING BY LEAD. [$ 644 


creased by pressure, and when the paroxysms were violent, the muscles of the 
abdomen were contracted spasmodically, and a most frequent symptom was 
pain in the loins about the situation of the lumbar fascia, and in the deltoid 
muscles. The patients were chilly, with great languor and lassitude; the skin 
dry; the intellect was clear, but there was general depression, and the pulse 
was low and feeble; the features were sallow and shrunken; and the muscles 
flabby ; the fluid vomited was often mixed with bile and occasionally, a coffee- 
ground secretion ; the feces were dark and highly offensive, with scybala; the 
urine scanty and of a dark red color almost like porter.(v) It is well known 
that the acetate of lead is frequently administered in disease in small doses, 
for a considerable length of time without any symptoms of poisoning arising 
from it. 

§ 643. An interesting case of imputed poisoning by acetate of lead, may be 
found in Dr. Maclagan’s “ Contributions to Toxicology,” in the Ed. Month. 
Journ. for Dec. 1848. Although the falsity of the charge was shown by 
many circumstances, which it is not here necessary to relate, there was one 
which in itself would have had great weight in its refutation. The acetate of 
lead was said by the prosecutor to have been given to him in coffee. Now 
acetate of lead is the very agent employed to decompose and decolorize coffee, 
in preparing its characteristic constituent caffeine. The precipitate which the 
lead salt forms in its infusion, if it is allowed to rest, subsides, and leaves a 
pale-colored fluid in no respect resembling that which people are accustomed 
to drink as coffee. One ounce of ordinary coffee was boiled for ten minutes 
in the coffee-pot, which had -been used, with six cupfuls of water. It was 
allowed to settle for five minutes, and then poured off. It had the ordinary. 
appearance of unclarified coffee, dark brown, and slightly turbid, and depositing: 
some coffee grounds. ‘ Half an ounce of sugar of lead being the same propor-. 
tion to this bulk of fluid which was found in the coffee got from the prosecu-- 
tor was now added; the coffee was boiled again and allowed to settle for five. 
minutes after removal from the fire. Another similar portion, being decanted, 
was now found to be a clear transparent liquid, with hardly any color, except 
a faint shade of green, and more resembling a weak infusion of green tea than 
coffee. It was obvious, therefore, that if, during the breakfast, the coffee-pot 
remained at any time at rest for five minutes, the next cupful poured off must. 
have been so different in appearance from ordinary coffee as at once to attract 
attention.’’ This decolorizing property of the sugar of lead should therefore 
not be lost sight of in any future case of alleged poisoning by its mixture. 
with coffee. 

§ 644. Occasionally, however, symptoms of poisoning are seen, and, in a: 
case reported by Dr. Letheby, with a fatal termination. A child six years of 
age was given one-fifth of a grain two or three times a day for nearly nine 
weeks. It became emaciated, had colic and constipation, the stools were black. 
and offensive, the breath fetid, and towards the last it became drowsy and its: 
limbs were paralyzed. Upon the day of its death it had convulsions, and 


(x) Prov. Med and Surg. Journal, June 27, 1849. 
39 545 


§ 616] POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK V. 


shortly before death, fell into a state of coma.(y) An instance of recovery 
from an ounce and a half of sugar of lead, swallowed in mistake, is related 
by Dr. Taylor.(z) The woman fell ill almost directly, had a nauseous metallic 
taste in her mouth, with a burning heat in it, the throat, and the stomach. 
On taking some water to wash away the taste, vomiting was brought on. 
The mouth became very dry; she had great pain at the pit of the stomach, 
and excessive vomiting. Two hours afterwards, she felt sleepy and stupid— 
alternately perspiring and shivering; she complained of violent colic, which 
was relieved by pressure. With great languor, she had also cramps in the 
thighs, and numbness over the whole body, with giddiness. The gums were 
tender, and had, apparently, a blue line on their edge; there was some saliva- 
tion, and the breath was foul. There were other symptoms such as have been 
before detailed. She was relieved by treatment in a few days. Several other 
cases of the same kind are reported, which it is needless to describe. They all 
recovered. 

§ 645. The symptoms which follow the introduction of the carbonate or 
other slightly soluble salts of lead into the body, are precisely similar to those 
already mentioned ; occurring soon when the dose is large, and gradually when 
entering the system by water, wine, cider, or other liquids which are apt to be 
impregnated with them, and also when inhaled by the lungs. The subject of 
chronic poisoning by lead in these ways is one which has indeed its interest: 
for the physician, in its relation to medical police, but the facts relating to it 
are too fully detailed in the comprehensive works on poisons and the treatises 
upon the practice of medicine, to require elucidation at our hands.(a) The 
character of the poisoning differs so completely from that of the irritant 
poisons, that no mistake on this point can ever be made; the only embarrass- 
ment which ever presents itself being the discovery of the particular way in 
which the lead had been introduced into the system. (aa) 

§ 646. 3d. Post-mortem appearances.—There are few poisons productive 
of so much suffering, and, when fatal, of such violent symptoms towards the 
close of life, and yet leave in the body such indistinct traces of their action as 
these. In a case which terminated with the symptoms of saturnine encephalo- 
pathia, viz., delirium, insensibility, and tetanic convulsions, Empis and Robinet 
found no anatomical alterations of any importance. Lead was discovered, by 
incineration, in the brain and liver.(b) Likewise, in another case examined 


(y) Pharm. Journ., Dec. 1845. (z) p. 348. 

(a) Besides the chief authorities which may be consulted on this subject, are the 
following: Tanquerel des Planches, Traité des Maladies du Plomb. (also translated 
by Dr. Dana, of Boston) ; Dr. Burton, Med.-Chir. Trans. vol. xx.; Gueneau de Mussy, 
Dub. Quart. Journ. vol. vii. p. 405; Dalton, Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1849; Alb. 
Smith, Month. Journ. March, 1853; Bois de Loury, Rev. Méd. Juillet, 1852; Alderson, 
Lancet, July, Aug. Sept. and Oct. 1852. For some cases of poisoning by visiting cards 
(glazed with lead), vide Med. News, 1854; or Med. Times and Gaz. July, 1854, Hich- 
mann. 

(aa) For additional illustrative cases, consult Lepage, Annuaire de Thérap. 1857 
p. 224; Inman, Liverpool Journal, Jan. 1857, p. 26; Meyer, Am. Journ. of Med. Sci. 
Oct. 1857, p. 542 (in this case the poison was mixed with snuff); O’Connor, Dublin 
Quart. Journ. May, 1859, p. 482; Lindsay, Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. Oct. 1859, 
p. 532; Times and Gaz. March, 1858, p. 296; Aldis, Jan. 1860, p. 33; and ibid. p. 60. 

(b) Arch. Gén. Sept. 1851, p. 67. 


546 


BOOK V.]| LEAD.—CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, [$ 648 


by Dr. Hopfgartner, of Vienna, lead was found in the same organs, but no 
pathological alterations, except that one of the lateral columns of the spinal 
marrow appeared to be wasted.(c) In Dr. Letheby’s case, lead was freely 
detected in the contents of the stomach, in the brain, muscles, liver, intestines, 
blood, and in the serum of the cerebral ventricles. The stomach and intestines 
were pale and nearly empty, and the latter contracted, and in some places in- 
vaginated. | , . 

§ 647. 4th. Chemical examination.—Sugar of lead is very soluble; it 
has an astringent and sweetish taste, and a slight odor of vinegar. In the 
solid state it may be reduced in the blowpipe flame with carbonate of soda, 
globules of metallic lead being immediately formed with a yellow incrustation 
of the oxide. In solution, it may be detected by several reagents: hydro- 
sulphuric acid throws down the black sulphuret of lead, and chromate of 
potash a yellow precipitate of the chromate of lead. These latter tests pro- 
duce the same results with bismuth ; but the basic oxide of bismuth is precipi- 
tated by a large quantity of water alone, while the oxide of lead is completely 
precipitated by sulphuric acid. In organic mixtures, however, as acetate of 
lead forms insoluble compounds with albumen and other animal principles, 
these must be redissolved by a little nitric acid and the mixture filtered. It 
should then be tested by hydrosulphurie acid, and if a dark-colored precipi- 
tate is formed and the precipitate is reduced before the blowpipe flame on a ° 
piece of charcoal, a malleable globule will be thus procured if lead be present. 
Although this test is quite satisfactory and easily applied, another one may 
be employed as recommended by Dr. Christison. The black sulphuret of lead 
should be collected on a filter, washed and dried, and then heated to redness 
in a tube, and digested with nitric acid by the aid of a gentle heat. ‘The 
lead is thus dissolved without the sulphur being acted upon. ‘The solution is 
then to be diluted with water, filtered, evaporated to dryness, and gently 
heated, to expel the excess of nitric acid.”? It can then be tested by the re- 
agents before mentioned. Care must be taken to expel all the excess of nitric 
acid, because an excess will strike a yellow color with the hydriodate of potash, 
though lead be not present. The same process may be used for any of the 
soluble salts of lead. 

In the tissues, lead may be detected by incineration in a crucible with black 
flux. It will, of course, if present, be found at the bottom, in the metallic 
form. There is no reason to suppose that it may not be detected several 
months after death. It appears to be the opinion of the most eminent toxi- 
cologists, with the exception of Orfila, that this metal does not exist as a nor- 
mal constituent of the tissues of the body. 


XV. The Salts of Copper. 


§ 648. It is seldom that these poisons are designedly administered with 
homicidal intentions, since their detection, both by the color and taste, is too 
easy to permit it. A husband attempted to poison his wife by adding verdi- 


(c) Wiener Zeitsch. Sept. 1852. 
DAT 


§ 649] POISONING BY COPPER. [BOOK V. 


.. gris to a dish of beans. The bad taste prevented her from eating them. He 
buried the cooked mess in his garden, from which it was disinterred, and then 
examined by chemists. They proved the certain presence of the metal. He 
was condemned to hard labor for life.(d@) Cases of poisoning from these salts 
may then be divided into those in which a large dose is swallowed, either by 
‘accident, or with a view to suicide, and those which proceed from the contami- 
nation of food by copper vessels, or by the salts of copper used as coloring 
matters for confectionery, &c. 

Ist. The symptoms come on, in the first instance, much sooner after the 
ingestion of the poison than in the latter. There is violent headache, vomit- 
ing and purging, severe colicky pains, eructations, salivation, cramps in the 
limbs, and finally convulsions and insensibility. Sometimes jaundice is ob- 
served. In a case related by Dr. Percival, two drachms of sulphate of copper 
produced fatal convulsions. In another, where the same salt was swallowed, 
there were no convulsions. The child, which was sixteen months old, died in 
four hours.(e) Those cases which have terminated fatally, have lasted a 
variable period. ‘Thus, in one reported by Pyl, a woman who swallowed two 
ounces of verdigris, died in three days; in another, by Neumann, half an ounce 
destroyed life in sexty hours ; and in another, in which an ounce of blue vitriol 
was taken, death ensued within twelve hours.(f/) In most cases, however, of 
poisoning with these salts, the patient has recovered, when timely and efficient 
means have been used. 

In those cases in which the poison has been conveyed accidentally, through 
articles of food, into the system, the symptoms have been the same as those 
mentioned, although they have usually not come on until a few hours after- 
wards. They are thus described by Orfila: ‘‘ An acrid, styptic, coppery taste 
in the mouth ; parched and dry tongue; a sense of strangulation in the throat; 
coppery eructations ; continual spitting; nausea; copious vomiting, or vain 
efforts to vomit; shooting pains in the stomach, which are often very severe ; 
horrible gripes ; very frequent alvine evacuations, sometimes bloody and black- 
ish, with tenesmus and debility ; the abdomen inflated and painful ; the pulse 
small, irregular, tense, and frequent; syncope, heat of skin, ardent thirst, 
difficulty of breathing, anxiety about the preecordia, cold sweats, scanty urine, 
violent headache, vertigo, faintness, weakness of the limbs, cramps of the legs, 
and convulsions.” Such are the symptoms which, it is said, are produced by 
the ingestion of articles of food contaminated with copper salts. How far 
they are really due to this cause we shall presently inquire. (//’) 

§ 649. 2d. Post-mortem appearances.—The mucous membrane of the sto- 
mach and intestines is inflamed and thickened, in some places eroded, and in a 
. case quoted by Orfila, the small intestine was perforated. If the patient has 
not survived long, the mucus of the intestines will be found tinged of a green 


(d) Journ. de Chimie, Chevallier, 1854. (e) Med. Gaz. vol. xviii. p. 742. . 

(f) Quoted by Beck. 

(ff) In avery instructive article by Dr. Hénerkopf (Casper’s Vierteljahr. viii. 212), 
it is maintained that sulphate of copper cannot in a strict sense be considered a poison. 
He refers to numerous cases in which this medicine was taken in large or repeated 
doses without harm, and usually with benefit, and shows that the greater number of 
symptoms ascribed to it are not really observed. 


548 


2 an 


te 


BOOK V.| POISONING BY COPPER UTENSILS. [$ 650 


color. No other changes worthy of note have been observed. A fatal case 
is reported by Mr. Cockburn,(g) in a woman who swallowed two or three 
drachms of sulphate of iron, with seven of sulphate of copper. The symp- 
toms were such as are described above, and death took place in about twenty- 
four hours. Yet there was no disorganization whatever of the mucous coat 
of the stomach and intestine. 

The salts of copper which are stated most frequently to give rise to acci- 
dents are the sulphate (which is sometimes used for the purpose of procuring 
abortion), the subchloride, the subacetate or verdigris, and the arsenite, or 
Scheele’s green, which last is elsewhere considered.(gg) It is seldom that the 
case can be so doubtful as to render a chemical investigation necessary, except 
when one or more persons having been taken ill after partaking of a meal, it 
is suspected that some poison may have been intentionally introduced into 
their food or drink. 

§ 650. The use of copper utensils in the preparation of food has occasion- 
ally given rise to serious consequences, on account of the impregnation of the 
food by some poisonous salt of this metal. If the vessels are bright and clean, 
very little harm can possibly result from this cause, if ordinary articles of 
food are boiled in them and not allowed to remain in them after they become 
cool. Saline, acid, or oily matters act, however, upon copper vessels, and if 
these are not clean, having been already exposed to moist air and become co- 
vered with the carbonate, the food may be impregnated with this poisonous 
salt, in sufficient quantity to produce alarming symptoms. Such will be 
especially the case if articles of the kind have been allowed to remain in the 
vessels to cool. It need hardly be stated that tinning the vessels is the only 
certain mode of preventing such effects. 

There can be little doubt, we think, that the frequency of accidents from 
this cause is much exaggerated, and that in many cases the sudden illness 
which is mistaken for the symptoms of copper poisoning, is really due to the 
unwholesome nature of the food eaten, or to other causes. We are led to this 
belief not only from a consideration of the extremely small quantity of copper 
that in most cases can be dissolved, but also from the reflection that unwhole- 
some food is capable of giving rise to a set of symptoms very nearly similar to 
those produced by copper, and finally, from the fact that in several cases of 
suspected poisoning by copper this metal could not be detected, by chemical 
analysis, in portions of the food used. 

Prof. Langenbeck, of Géttingen, reported an instance of the poisoning of 
thirty-one persons, who had eaten a portion of beef sausage. This sausage 
meat had been fried in lard which had stood for two days in a badly tinned 
copper vessel, and was said to have become green in consequence. ‘The poison- 
ing was therefore attributed to copper. Dr. Paasch, in order to estimate the 
amount which each person in this instance must have taken, makes the fol- 
lowing calculation. He assumes as barely possible that one scruple of metallic 
copper could have been dissolved by means-of the fatty acids existing in the 
lard. This amount would correspond with twenty-five grains of oxide of cop- 


(g) Lancet, Aug. 1856, p. 248. (gg) Vid. Arsenic. 
549 


: 


§ 650] POISONING BY COPPER UTENSILS. "BOGE Ver 


-per, or fifty-seven and a half grains of anhydrous, or sixty-three grains of 
crystallized acetate of copper. Supposing that the whole of this had been 
taken up by the food, and entirely consumed, each person would have 
swallowed éwo grains of verdigris.(2) That so small an amount should be 
capable of producing alarming symptoms of poisoning is hardly possible, 
when we reflect how much larger doses of this, and other equally poisonous 
salts of copper, have been given without harm, in medical practice. Gerbier 
is said to have given the subacetate in doses amounting to twenty and even 
thirty grains in the twenty-four hours, and Solier de la Romillais ten to twelve 
grains aday.(7) The sulphate of copper is frequently given in doses of fifteen 
grains at a time, for the purpose of procuring emesis, in narcotic poisoning. 
Richmond gave as much as a scruple of carbonate of copper daily, to patients 
suffering with obstinate neuralgic affections, and Key, for the same purpose, 
administered as much as half an ounce daily, divided into three doses, con- 
tinuing the treatment for a fortnight, with no other result than the cure of 
the disease.(j) Pereira says that he administered six grains of the sul- 
phate of copper thrice a day for several weeks, in an old dysentery, without 
any other obvious effect than slight nausea and amelioration of the disease for 
which it was given. If the symptoms arising from the use of unwholesome 
food, such as sausages, old cheese and the like, be now compared with those 
which are ascribed to poisoning by copper, a very great similarity will be found 
between them.(Z) Dr. Paasch relates instances in which the conviction was 
so strong that the symptoms of poisoning must have been due to a salt of 
copper, that a chemical investigation of the food’ was undertaken, which 
resulted, however, in the fact that not a trace of copper could be discovered. (7) 
Dr. Taylor, in his work on poisons, states that he was required to examine 
the following case: ‘In an extensive poor-law union, a number of the paupers 
had been seized with diarrhcea and dysentery, and several of them died. There 
was no apparent cause for this sickness and mortality; and it was suspected 
that the soup, which was daily prepared in large copper boilers, might have 
become impregnated with the metal, and have given rise to the symptoms, 
although these were scarcely indicative of irritant poisoning. I ascertained 
that the copper vessels were cleaned out daily, that the soup was made with 
salt and other vegetables, but was poured into other vessels to become cool.” 
The soup, however, gave no trace of copper, by the iron test, was unaffected 
by a current of sulphuretted hydrogen gas, and the incinerated residue, after 
evaporation and calcining, gave no sign of the existence of copper to any of 
the tests. 

While these considerations throw doubts upon the frequency of poisoning 
by food impregnated with copper, from the use of cooking utensils of this 
material, they do not, of course, destroy the well-attested fact of its occasional 
occurrence. It appears evident, however, that the slightest attention to clean- 


(h) Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, Jan. 1852. 

(7) Guersent, Dict. des Sci. Méd. art. Cancer. 
(j) Dict. de Méd. art. Cuivre. 

(k) Vid. Poisonous Food. (7) Loe. cit. 


550 


BOOK V.] EDIBLES COLORED BY SALTS OF COPPER. [$ 652 


liness in the keeping of such articles is all that is necessary to secure immunity 
from danger. | 

The use of verdigris or other salts of copper for the coloring of confectionery 
or of other edible articles is manifestly a very pernicious practice. A highly 
interesting case, in which a whole family was poisoned, and two of its members 
died, from the use of vegetables thus colored, is reported by Kramer.(m) Dr. 
Percival found a strong impregnation of copper in pickled samphire, of which 
a young lady ate one morning a considerable quantity, and which proved fatal 
in nine days. Dr. Falconer once detected so large a quantity in some pickled 
cucumbers, bought at a great London grocer’s, that it was deposited on a plate 
of iron, and imparted its peculiar taste and smell to the pickles. It seems, 
indeed, to have been at one time the custom to make a point of adulterating 
pickles with copper; for in many old cookery-books the cook is told to make 
her pickles in a copper pan, or to put some half-pence among the pickles, to 
give them a fine green color.(n) Many of the cases of poisoning by confec- 
tionery are due to the arsenite of copper, or Scheele’s green, which we have 
elsewhere treated of.(0) 

§ 651. Numerous cases are related in which copper coins have been swal- 
lowed, with the symptoms of copper poisoning resulting. On the other hand, 
a case is mentioned by Dr. Jackson, of Boston, in which a half-cent swallowed 
by a child produced nausea and vomiting, another by Dr. Budd and others,( p) 
and another by Dr. Hartshorne, in which a boy five years old died with all the 
symptoms of poisoning by copper, just two years after having swallowed a 
brass button.(q) A curious case is related by Deutsch, of a boy six years old, 
who swallowed a number of small copper coins. His medical attendant pre- 
scribed vinegar and other organic acids! In consequence of this singular 
treatment, he was seized with alarming symptoms, violent colic, and vomiting 
and purging of greenish-colored mucus. Finally he was enabled to throw up 
the coins by means of an emetic of ipecacuanha, but recovered very slowly from 
the effects of the poison.(r) A curious question might well arise in such a 
case as this. Metallic copper is usually acknowledged to be not poisonous ; 
the poisonous salt, viz., verdigris, was here formed in the stomach by the ad- 
ministration of vinegar. @. Was the poison administered ? 

§ 652. 3d. Chemical examination.—The salts of the oxide of copper may 
be made to yield metallic copper when heated with carbonate of soda upon 
charcoal before the blowpipe. In this way very minute traces of copper can 
be detected. The ferrocyanide of potassiwm produces, even in very dilute 
solutions, a dark purple-red precipitate of ferrocyanide of copper. Ammonia 
precipitates a pale-blue or greenish salt, which, in excess of the reagent, is 
dissolved, and acquires a beautiful azure-blue color. When the quantity of 
copper is very small, this color is only perceived by looking through a con- 
siderable body of the fluid. Hydrosulphurie acid precipitates the sulphuret 
of copper, of a black or chocolate-brown color. Jron will throw down copper 


(m) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht, fiir 1851, Bd. iv. 5. 269. 

(n) Christison, p. 352. (o) Vid. Arsenite of Copper. 
(p) Vid. Beck. (q) Taylor, Am. ed. p. 112. 
(r) Canstatt, 1851, Bd. iv. 269. 


dol 


$ 653] TESTS FOR COPPER. [BOOK V. 


from its solutions, in the metallic state. If a bright iron rod be immersed in 
a neutral or slightly acid solution of a salt of copper, it will soon become 
coated with copper. So if a solution supposed to contain copper is placed in 
a platina capsule, and acidulated with sulphuric acid, copper, if present, will 
be deposited in a metallic form whenever a piece of zinc is brought into contact 
with the surface of the capsule. This test is peculiarly applicable to liquids 
derived from organic mixtures. 

In organic mixtures it may usually be separated as a sulphuret, after pre- 
vious dilution and filtration. The precipitate should be carefully collected, 
dried, and then boiled with a little nitric acid to convert the sulphuret-into the 
sulphate. This liquid will acquire a rich blue color, and may then be subjected 
f> the tests above mentioned. , These processes will generally suffice for all 
cases in which the copper is not so excessively minute in quantity that it may 
become a question whether, if discovered, it is not due to some accidental im- 
pregnation of the reagents, or of the animal tissues. With reference to the 
latter point, it may be stated that Orfila has detected traces of copper in the 
bodies of animals not poisoned by any of its preparations, and Wackenroder 
has obtained it from human blood. It has also been found in coffee, wheat, 
and flour, by M. Sarzeau and others.(s) It is therefore unnecessary, for medico- 
legal purposes, to push the investigation any further, if the above-mentioned 
processes yield no evidence of the presence of the suspected poison. 


XVI. Tartrate of Antimony and Potassa. (Tartar Emetic.) 


§ 653. 1st. Symptoms.—This salt is capable of producing violent and alarm- 
ing symptoms, and occasionally also fatal effects. Its immediate action upon 
the stomach appears to be irritant, since it produces a burning pain in the 
stomach, excessive vomiting, and diarrhea. The large doses which have been 
tolerated in some febrile affections, such as pneumonia, rheumatism, and mania- 
i-potu, have thrown some doubt upon its irritant properties, and its speedy 
rejection from the stomach in other cases defeats, in a measure, both its local 
and constitutional poisonous effects. 

The phenomena of acute poisoning by this agent may be thus described : 
The patient is attacked with pain in the stomach, followed by incessant retch- 
ing, precordial cramps, and burning heat, distension of the epigastrium, severe 
colic, watery and frequent stools, dryness of the throat, difficult deglutition, 
an unpleasant metallic taste in the mouth, and sometimes a copious discharge 
of saliva. The muscles of the neck, jaws, abdomen, and extremities are more 
or less rigid,(ss) and sometimes there is active delirium. Generally the skin is 
pale and cool, and covered with clammy perspiration ; there is complete pros- 
tration of the strength, and sometimes repeated fainting or prolonged insensi- 
bility; the pulse is small, weak, and contracted, and after being at first 


frequent, it falls, perhaps, to thirty-four in the minute, and afterwards becomes 


(s) Vid, Bley’s Archiv fiir Pharmacie, Oct. 1853; also Christison on Poisons, Am. 
ed. p. 356. hy: 
(ss) Elliotson, Times and Gaz. July, 1856, p. 6. 


j02 


" 


BOOK V.]| TARTAR EMETIC.—SYMPTOMS. [$ 654 


rapid, thready, and almost imperceptible. In this condition death may take 
place. 

The amount requisite to endanger life is not accurately known, although a 
ease is related by Dr. Beck, in which fifteen grains of tartar emetic killed a 
child a few weeks old, and in a case reported by Mr. Hartley, ten grains 
killed a child in a few hours. In several of the fatal cases collected by Dr. 
Beck, the dose did not exceed a quarter of a grain, but the patients were 
already weakened by disease. Two grains have proved fatal to an adult.(¢) 
Dr. Pereira refers to a case in which death ensued in four days after forty 
grains had been swallowed. A case is related in which four grains nearly 
proved fatal. Violent pain in the abdomen, vomiting and purging took 
place, and were followed by convulsions: the man became speechless, no pulse 
could be perceived, and the skin was quite cold; in short it was supposed he 
was dead. Stimulating frictions and cataplasms were employed, and he slowly 
recovered in about fourteen days.(¢¢) An Italian courier died in eleven hours 
after swallowing, by mistake, one drachm of tartar emetic.(w) In a case 
related by Dr. McCreery, U. 8. N., a physician took, through a mistake of 
the apothecary, half an ounce of tartar emetic. In little more than half an 
hour he experienced nausea, which was followed by distressing vomiting and 
purging, with most violent cramps of the legs, and slighter ones of the wrists. 
Copious draughts of green tea, large doses of tannin, and other appropriate 
remedies were used, which did not, however, immediately mitigate the symp- 
toms. He remained very much prostrated, but recovered in a few days.(v) 
In a case observed by Dr. J. T. Gleaves, of Tennessee, where a tablespoonful 
was taken, these symptoms ensued, but reaction was brought about in seven 
hours. On the third day the fauces were covered with pustules, and on the 
following day the skin also. The patient recovered.(w) A case is related 
by Deutsch, in which a woman, who took by mistake ‘a scruple of tartar 
emetic, was brought exceedingly low by its violent action, and died in the 
course of a year in consequence of its irritant effects upon the intestinal 
canal.(x) From a tabular view of thirty-seven cases of acute poisoning by 
tartar emetic collected by Dr. Taylor,(xa) it appears that sixteen proved fatal. 
Boudet observed local irritant effects upon the fauces twenty-six times out of 
one hundred and forty-four cases of pneumonia treated with tartar emetic.(y) 
Difficulty of swallowing and copious perspiration have also been frequently 
observed. Applied to the skin in the form of ointment, it produces a crop of 
painful pustules, which in weakly subjects may occasionally give rise to ulcera- 
tion. It may cause nausea and vomiting even when thus used. 

§ 654. 2d. Post-mortem appearances.—These have been observed in but 
few cases. In those cases before referred to as having been seen by Mr. 


(t) Archives Gén. xxvi. 262. 
(tt) Taylor on Poisons, p. 389. See also two cases in the Union Médicale, 1852, 
No. 61, p. 245. ‘ 

(u) Monthly Journ. May, 1850. 

(v) Am. Journ. Med Sci. Jan. 1853, p. 131. 

(w) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. vol. xv. from West. Journ. of Med. and Surgery, Jan. 1848. 
(x) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht fiir 1851, Bd. iv. p. 270. 
(ax) Guy’s Hospital Reports, 3d ser. iii. 409. 

(y) Canstatt, 1853, Bd. v. p. 148. ee 


§ 654] TARTAR EMETIC.—CHRONIC POISONING. [BOOK V. 


Hartley, in which two children of the ages respectively of five and three years, 
swallowed each ten grains of tartar emetic, the following appearances were 
noted. The bodies were examined between four and five days after death. 
“Tn that of the boy there was effusion of serum in the right pleura; the 
lower lobe of the right lung posteriorly was redder than natural, and the 
peritoneum was injected from recent inflammation. The mucous membrane 
of the duodenum was inflamed and covered with a whitish-yellow viscid secre- 
tion; this was observed throughout the intestinal canal, although the color 
was of a deeper color in the colon and rectum; there was no ulceration. 
The peritoneal coat of the stomach was inflamed. The mucous membrane of 
this organ was much inflamed, especially about the larger curvature and at 
the cardiac orifice; there was no ulceration. The contents (about two ounces 
and a half of a dark grumous fluid, having a slightly acid reaction) were very 
adherent to it; and in one place there was a patch of lymph. The tests used 
did not indicate the presence of antimony. With regard to other appear- 
ances, the tongue was covered with a white fur and appeared soddened; the 
fauces were not inflamed; the trachea and csophagus had a natural appear- 
ance. On opening the cranium, the dura mater was found very vascular; the 
longitudinal sinus contained a coagulum of lymph, and but very little blood. 
The vessels of the surface of the brain were very much injected with dark 
blood, the whole surface having a deep purple color. Every portion of the 
brain, when cut, presented many bloody points. The cerebellum and medulla 
oblongata were also extremely vascular ; there was no effusion in the ventricles 
or at the base of the brain. In the body of the girl the morbid appearances. 
were similar; there were also patches resembling the eruption of scarlatina 
on the arms, legs, and neck. The arachnoid membrane was more opaque 
than usual; and on the mucous membrane of the stomach, where the inflam- 
mation was greatest, were two or three white spots, each about the size of a 
split pea, which appeared to be the commencement of ulceration.’’(z) The 
body of a woman who died in seven hours after taking an unknown quantity 
of tartar emetic, and was examined thirty-nine hours afterwards, presented 
no lesions whatever in the stomach or elsewhere.(a) But when life is pro- 
tracted after the ingestion of the poison the changes will usually be found like 
those in the two cases above described. In other words, an aphthous condi- 
tion of the mouth, fauces, and cesophagus; softening, inflammation, or ulcer- 
ation of the stomach, and to some extent, also, of the intestines ; and generally 
a dark color and a liquid state of the blood. 

Chronic poisoning.—The poisonous effects of tartar emetic when used in 
small doses for a long time, have been carefully studied by Mayerhoffer(b) and 
by Dr. Taylor. The latter toxicologist renders it probable that the secret 
poisons which from time to time have produced so many victims, and have 
rendered so many names infamous in history, were antimonial. The following 
description of chronic poisoning by tartar emetic is furnished by Dr. Taylor.(e) 


‘ OR from Lancet, Ap. 25,1846, p. 460. See also a case by Mr. Beale, Lancet, 
an. 21, ; 


(a) C. Ellis, Bost. Journ. Dec. 1856, p. 400. 
(6) Beitrage zur Heilkunde, ii. 372. (c) Guy’s Hosp. Reports, 3d ser. iii. 388. 
5d4 


BOOK V.] CHRONIC POISONING. [$ 654 


If tartarized antimony be given in small but increasing doses for a long | 
period, there is uneasiness, nausea, and retching, followed by vomiting; the 
stools are pasty, and diarrhoea, attended with thin bilious and mucous dis- 
charges, gradually sets in; the abdomen at the same time is distended and 
tense. The voidance of the urine is more frequent and violent. The region 
of the stomach is tender and painful; that of the liver appears fuller, and is 
sensitive to the touch. There are griping pains in the bowels, with stiffness 
and pains in the lower limbs. The warmth of the skin is at first increased ; 
there is itching or irritation with alternation of heat and cold. The appetite 
is suppressed, and when any substance is eaten there is nausea, with an 
immediate disposition to vomit. A roughness or rawness is perceived in the 
throat, with painful swallowing; the tongue is covered with a dirty mucus, 
and the mouth is clammy. The head feels full and heavy. At a still later 
period the feces contain much mucus, and are frequently strongly colored 
with bile. The blood gradually loses its fibrin, and becomes almost liquid, 
and dark-colored. It contains an increased proportion of fluid and saline 
matters, with traces of antimony. If the use of the substance be longer con- 
tinued, there is slowness, with a loss of power in the heart and pulse; the breath- 
ing is difficult, the complexion dusky; there is complete depression of the vital 
powers, with great debility and emaciation ; the legs become heavy and stiff, 
as if paralyzed, and death may follow as a result of the noxious impression 
produced on the more important organs of the body. Small doses act more 
powerfully when dissolved, than when administered in the form of powder. In 
addition to the above symptoms, the vomiting, from which the patient suffers, 
is either attended or followed by the distension of the abdomen, and flatulence; 
liquid bilious motions, with colicky pains, paleness and sunken appearance of 
the countenance ; cold perspiration, giddiness, great prostration of strength, 
incapability on the part of the patient of raising himself to the erect position, 
disposition to rest and sleep, loss of strength, fulness and frequency of the 
pulse, faintings, in many cases a feeling of coldness, accompanied with a heat 
or flushing of some parts of the body, e. g., the face. If there is a recovery 
from this condition, pain in the stomach is felt for a long time afterwards, and 
inflammation of the stomach to a greater or less degree is set up. After the 
vomiting there remains, for a longer or shorter period, an unwillingness to 
take food, and nausea in partaking of it. Among other effects, the perspira- 
tion and the urinary secretion are observed to be greatly increased. 

If the use of tartarized antimony be continued in increasing doses when the 
poison has been already carried into the blood, the secretory organs are more 
strongly stimulated, and absorption as well as secretion, especially of the serous 
liquids, is greatly augmented. , 

If vomiting does not take place after large doses, the following symptoms of 
poisoning are observed: metallic taste, nausea, retching, and bilious vomiting ; 
burning pain in the throat, gullet, and stomach; spasms of the jaw and neck; 
pain and flatulent distension of the abdomen, with frequent watery motions ; 
coldness, pallor, and clamminess of the skin, sometimes great heat of skin; diffi- 
cult breathing, painful sobbing, giddiness, stupefaction, loss of consciousness, 
delirium, spasms of the arms and legs, with complete prostration of strength. 

559 


§ 656] TARTAR EMETIC.—CHEMICAL EXAMINATION. [BOOK VY. 


Death.appears to result from the impression produced on the nerves of motion, 
as well as on the nerves of the lungs and heart; leading either to asphyxia 
or paralysis. 

§ 655. 3d. Chemical examination.—It is proper to bear in mind, as Dr. 
Taylor remarks, that antimony given in a large dose, or repeatedly in small 
doses, is rapidly absorbed and eliminated chiefly by the urine. It is at the 
same time deposited in a greater or less quantity in the tissues and organs. 
Under recent administration, if in sufficient quantity, it may be found in the 
stomach and bowels, and little or none may be present in the liver. After a 
variable time it disappears from the stomach and bowels, although it may be 
present in the feces, while the liver, kidneys, and spleen, may contain it in 
large, and the other organs in small quantity. In certain diseased states of 
the system, the complete elimination of the metal may require a period of 
twenty-five or thirty days or longer; but in a healthy subject, to whom only 
ordinary medicinal doses have been given, the antimony is quickly expelled. 

The double tartrate of antimony and potassa (tartar emetic) is readily solu- 
ble in water, even when it contains uncombined cream of tartar. 

1. A crystal or two dropped into a solution of hydrosulphurie acid will 
be covered with an orange-colored deposit of the tersulphide of antimony. 
This is readily soluble in potassa and in the sulphide of ammonium, sparingly 
so in ammonia, and insoluble in bicarbonate of ammonia. 

2. Exposed to the reducing flame of the blowpipe with carbonate of soda, 
white incrustations and globules of antimony are obtained, known by the 
needle-shaped crystals with which they are beset, their metallic brilliancy and 
brittleness. ) 

3. Nitric acid throws down from the solution a white precipitate, which is 
soluble in an excess of the reagent, and also in tartaric acid. It is also solu- 
ble in a solution of potassa. 

4, Ferrocyanide of potassium causes no precipitate. 

5. If the solution be introduced into Marsh’s apparatus and the gas evolved 
and inflamed, spots may be obtained upon porcelain which are blacker and 
less brilliant than those of arsenic, and which do not undergo any change by 
dropping upon them a concentrated alkaline solution of hypochlorite of soda. 
Nitric acid-converts this sublimate into the white oxide of antimony; a drop 
of nitro-muriatic acid dissolves it completely, and the solution, carefully freed 
by evaporation from the excess of acid, gives with hydrosulphuric acid an 
orange-red precipitate. With sulphide of ammonium the precipitate is of an 
orange color, and is soluble in an excess of the reagent. A metallic antimo- 
nial ring may also be obtained by applying the flame of a spirit-lamp to the 
tube while the stream of antimoniuretted hydrogen gas is passing through it. 
The metallic globules of antimony, recognizable by a lens, may be obtained 
from the ring by a sufficient increase of heat. No odor of garlic is perceived 
in this operation. All vegetable substances containing tannin decompose the 
salts of antimony. 

§ 656. Detection of antimony in organic liquids.—No better process has 
been devised than that recommended by Dr. Turner. “Add to the suspected 
liquid a little muriatic and tartaric acid; the first with a view of coagulating 

596 


BOOK V.] DETECTION OF ANTIMONY IN ORGANIC LIQUIDS. [$ 656 


any animal principles which may be present, the latter in order to dissolve all 
other precipitates formed with tartar emetic except the sulphuret. Filter the 
resulting liquid, and transmit sulphuretted hydrogen through it. Collect, 
wash and dry, the precipitate, and introduce it into a horizontal tube connected 
with a vessel in which hydrogen is generated. Transmit the gas freely till all 
risk of an explosion is passed, and apply the flame of a spirit-lamp to the part 
of the tube containing the precipitate. The metal is redueed, remaining in the 
place of the sulphuret if the stream of gas is slow, but undergoing a spurious 
sublimation if it is rapid, and collecting on the sides of the tube in the form 
of detached crystals, or of a crystalline crust. The metal is apt to be con- 
cealed by the presence of animal or vegetable matter. In this case it should 
be heated in an open tube, when it oxidates and sublimes as a glimmering 
white powder, which, unlike arsenic, is not crystalline; or the antimony may 
be dissolved by nitric acid, the resulting solution neutralized, and the orange- 
red sulphuret be again thrown down by a stream of sulphuretted hydrogen.’’(d) 
Or the sulphuret, when dried, may be dissolved by boiling hydrochloric acid. 
A dense yellowish-white precipitate of oxychloride of antimony falls down, on 
adding this solution to a large quantity of water. Although a white preci- 
pitate is produced also by the salts of bismuth when added to water, the color 
produced in the liquid by sulphuretted hydrogen at once will distinguish the 
two bases; bismuth yields a black, and antimony an orange-red precipitate. 

If an examination of the tissues is required for the purpose of detecting 
absorbed antimony, the liver should be selected as the organ most likely to 
contain it. Orfila has been able to detect antimony in the tissues by the em- 
ployment of Marsh’s apparatus. The organ supposed to contain the antimony 
should first be cut into small fragments and dried, and these added gradually 
to boiling nitric acid until dissolved. This liquid should then be evaporated 
to dryness and carbonized, and the ash boiled in muriatic acid, to which a 
small quantity of nitric acid is added. The antimony is thus converted into 
the chloride which may be introduced into Marsh’s apparatus, or subjected to 
the tests already described. M. Lassaigne states that in certain cases the 
presence of antimony contained in organized matter is sometimes very faintly, 
or not at all revealed by Marsh’s apparatus.(e) He has proved this to be 
the case by subjecting the residue to a new test. His plan of procedure is 
the following: fifty grammes of the suspected liver were burned in a new 
porcelain crucible, and the resulting carbon calcined and kept for several hours 
at a cherry-red heat. The ash, collected and reduced to a fine powder, was 
successively treated by weak nitric acid, and afterwards by pure hydrochloric 
acid. The last solution, diluted with a weak solution of tartaric acid, was 
filtered and brought into contact with three times its volume of hydrosulphuric 
acid. This reagent immediately rendered the liquid turbid, and threw down 
an orange-yellowish flaky precipitate of hydrated sulphuret of antimony. Its 
color and volume compared with those produced in a standard solution of tar- 
tar emetic, rendered it possible to estimate the proportion of this salt con- 


(d) Guy’s For. Med. p. 499. 
(e) Annales D’Hygiéne, Jan. 1859, p. 192. : 
9) 


§ 659] CHLORIDE OF ANTIMONY. [BOOK V. 


tained: in the hepatic tissue submitted to examination. Antimony may be 
separated from liquid organic mixtures by Reinsch’s process also, viz., by boil- 
ing with muriatic acid and water in the presence of copper. This metal 
acquires a bluish-gray color from the disposition of metallic antimony. The. 
grounds of distinction between this and the deposit made by arsenic under 
similar circumstances have already been more appropriately given in the chap- 
ter upon the latter poison. 

§ 657. It is evident that the presence of antimony, either in the stomach or 
absorbed in the other organs, may be due to the proper medicinal administra- 
tion of the salt. The forms under which it is given, and the occasions on 
which it is prescribed, are numerous, and it is not unfrequently administered 
in cases of poisoning with other substances, without a thought of the compli- 
cations it may, in case of a death, place in the way of the chemist. Hence, 
unless the possibility of its introduction into the system under any of these 
circumstances be fully excluded, the object of the medico-legal inquiry may be 
entirely frustrated. 

§ 658. 4th. Chloride of antimony. (Butter of antimony. )—This substance 
is highly corrosive in its action. The following case will be sufficient to illus- 
trate its effects. ‘‘An army surgeon swallowed, for the purpose of suicide, 
from two to three ounces, by measure, of chloride of antimony. About an 
hour afterwards he was seen by Mr. Mann. ‘There was entire prostration of 
strength, with coldness of the skin and incessant attempts to vomit. The 
most excruciating griping pains were felt in the abdomen, and there was a fre- 
quent desire to evacuate the bowels, but nothing was passed. In the course 
of a few hours reaction took place, the pain subsided, and the pulse rose to 
120. There was now a strong disposition to sleep, so that he appeared as if 
laboring under the effects of a narcotic poison. In this state he continued 
until he died, ten hours and a half after he had swallowed the poison. On 
inspection, the interior of the alimentary canal, from the mouth downwards 
to the jejunum, presented a black appearance, as if the parts had been charred. 
In general, there was no mucous membrane remaining either on the stomach 
or elsewhere, only a flocculent substance, which could be easily scraped off with 
the back of a scalpel, leaving the submucous tissues and the peritoneal coat. 
All these parts were so. soft that they could be easily torn with the fingers. (/) 
The symptoms have been similar in some cases which recovered. Poisoning 
with this substance is, however, very rare, and mostly happens from mistake, 
or it is taken with suicidal intentions. The tests are the same as for tartar 
emetic. 


XVII. Salis of Zine. 


§ 659. Ist. Oxide of zinc has been of late years used as a substitute for 
white lead, with the view of avoiding. the dangerous effects of the latter on 
the workmen. It has been supposed to be innocuous, and this idea appeared 
to be confirmed by some experiments made by M. Flandin. He rubbed animals 
over with ointments of oxide of zinc, of carbonate of lead, and sulphate of 


Lig ; (f) Taylor on Poisons, Am. ed. p. 397. 
908 


BOOK V.] OXIDE AND SULPHATE OF ZINC. | [$ 660 


lead ; the last two were found always to produce poisonous effects, but the 
animals rubbed with the ointment of oxide of zine continued to enjoy their 
usual health. A case has, however, been recorded by Dr. Bouvier, of the 
Hopital Beanjon, at Paris, in which a laborer who had been employed for 
fifteen days in barrelling oxide of zinc, and who in other ways had handled 
this substance, and breathed an atmosphere loaded with its powder, was 
attacked with vomiting, colic, and constipation. These symptoms persisted, 
and increased in intensity so much that he rolled on the floor in agony. 
The vomited matters were bilious, he rejected his food almost immediately 
after swallowing it, and he had been constipated for five days. From the 
whole history of the case, it was considered to be one of genuine zinc colic. 
He was cured by the remedies usually employed for painters’ colic. The par- 
ticles adhering to his body were examined, and found to consist of oxide of 
zine.(g) Landouzy and Maumené have seen workmen, who were obliged to 
inhale an atmosphere loaded with particles of oxide of zinc, affected with 
inflammation of the mouth and throat, salivation, general distress, colic, and 
diarrheea, or obstinate constipation. (h) 

Cases of zinc-poisoning, arising from the inhalation of the oxide of zinc, 
have also been observed among the workmen engaged in twisting and beating 
the iron wires galvanized with zinc used for securing champagne corks. Four 
had symptoms of general depression, with sore throat, swelling and ulceration 
of the tonsils, salivation, fetid breath, colic, and diarrhcea. In one case there 
was colic and obstinate constipation. These symptoms subsided readily on 
abandoning the occupation, and did not return when the work-people resumed 
their work, with wires better prepared, and free from loose oxide or carbonate 
of zine.(7) M. Blandet has described as effects of breathing the vapors of 
zine fused at the temperature required to melt copper, chilliness, trembling, 

headache, fainting, vomiting, buzzing in the ears, contusive muscular pains, 
&e.(7) 

§ 660. 2d. Sulphate of zinc.—The prompt emetic action of sulphate of zine 
(white vitriol) is the cause of its seldom producing serious effects. The dose 
usually administered with a view to its emetic operation is from fifteen grains 
to half a drachm, and unpleasant results have seldom been witnessed from this 
amount. Dr. Babington once gave thirty-six grains three times a day, for 
several weeks, without any sickness or other untoward effect being produced ; 
but cases in which the stomach would tolerate such doses as these must be very 
rare.(k) That it is capable of acting violently as an irritant poison, there can 
be no doubt. Dr. Christison quotes a few cases which sufficiently prove this. 
The best-marked cases are, however, those which have been reported as occur- 
ring at Pavia. The first case occurred in the person of a strong woman, who 
took, by mistake for Epsom salts, a solution of an ounce and a half of sulphate 
of zinc. She instantly vomited, and then became affected with almost incessant 
retching and purging for half an hour, which continued afterwards, at short 


(g) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1850, from the Comptes Rendus. 

(h) Briand, Méd. Lég. 6éme éd. p. 433. 

({) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1850, from Monthly Journ. Aug. 1850. 

(j) Journ. de Méd. 1845, p. 76. (k) Guy’s Hosp. Rep. vol. xii. p. 17. 


559 


S$ 660] TESTS FOR ZINC. [BOOK Y. 


intervals, for three hours, and then gradually diminished. The pulse was fre 
. quent and small, and extreme prostration existed, accompanied with distressing 
restlessness and anxiety; the temperature of the skin was diminished; great 
pain in the abdomen, limbs, &c., existed, as well as a sense of burning in the 
throat and stomach. She died thirteen and a half hours after taking the 
poison, retaining her intellectual faculties to the last. On examination, forty 
hours after death, the following were the chief “appearances observed: great 
lividity of the skin, congestion of the brain and its membranes, congestion of 
the lungs, flaccidity of the heart, the inner surface of the stomach covered 
with a yellowish pultaceous matter, on the removal of which a uniform yellow, 
ochrous color was observed, except towards the great curvature, where it became 
reddish ; a gelatiniform ramollissement of the mucous membrane prevailed, 
exposing in some parts the submucous cellular tissue. The small intestines 
were somewhat injected, and contained yellowish matters. In the second case 
a similar dose was taken, followed by nearly the same symptoms, but the pa- 
tient recovered. In the third case a quarter of an ounce was taken, which 
produced the same symptoms of irritant poisoning, ending in recovery. In 
the fourth case, of which little account is furnished, but which proved fatal, 
it is stated that ‘two drachms of sulphate of zinc were detected in the liver 
and blood, the fluids of the alimentary canal furnishing but little.’’(/) 


One case, in which the sulphate of zinc was supposed to have been given © 


with criminal intentions, became the subject of judicial inquiry in France. An 
old man died somewhat suddenly, having suffered from severe pain and great 
heat in the chest and abdomen, with violent vomiting and purging. He was 
not seen by a physician. On inspection, the stomach and bowels were found 
highly inflamed, and sulphate of zinc was found in the contents of the stomach, 
and detected in the tissues. The body of a woman who had died two months 
previously, was also disinterred, and sulphate of zinc found in the viscera.(m) 
Violent enteritis was also observed in a case reported by Krauss.(n) Dr. 
Gibb has reported the case of a lady who took by mistake about sixty-seven 
grains of sulphate of zinc in solution. She recovered, and her more serious 
symptoms were probably owing to two grains of tartar emetic ignorantly 
administered to her.(0) A case has been recorded by Dr. Ogle, of a drunkard 
who attempted to commit suicide by cutting his throat. It was believed, 
but upon no direct evidence, that he had been in the habit of swallowing a 
strong lotion which he wag, using for inflamed eyes. The immediate cause 
of death was not determined, but the reporter states that an examination of 
the body revealed the presence of sulphate of zinc in the stomach, a white 
and shrivelled appearance of the mouth and fauces, a condensed, indurated, 
and tripe-like appearance of the lining membrane of the stomach, and to some 
degree of the small intestine, and an unusually contracted state of the colon 
and rectum.(p) Two more recent cases are recorded by Dr. Niemann.(q) In 
the first, a sickly man died with violent gastric pains and vomiting, after a 


(1) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. April, 1849. 

(m) Journ. de Chimie Méd. 1845, p. 529. (n) Canstatt Jahresbericht, 1853. 
(o) Lancet, May, 1850, p. 540. (p) Lancet, Aug. 1859, p. 210. 
(q) Henke’s Zeitschrift, lxxviii. 219. 


560 


> 


— ee 


BOOK V.] ‘CHLORIDE OF ZINC. [$ 662 


dose administered to him by his wife, and sulphate of zine was found upon 
chemical analysis of the contents of the stomach. The second case was one 
of suicide.. In neither was the quantity of the poison determined. 

§ 661. Chemical examination.—Sulphate of zine is a white, crystalline 
substance, bearing considerable resemblance to sulphate of magnesia, readily 
soluble in water, and having a disagreeable styptic taste. From its solution, 
if pure, the oxide is thrown down by the caustic alkalies, in the form of a 
white hydrate, which is easily soluble in an excess of the precipitant. The 
sulphide of ammonium gives a white milky precipitate, and also sulphuretted 
hydrogen, provided there is no free acid in the solution. Carbonate of am- 
monia precipitates carbonate of zinc, also white, which is readily dissolved in 
an excess of the precipitant. Lerrocyanide of potassium also causes a white 
precipitate. The sulphide of ammonium is the most characteristic and un- 
objectionable of these tests, for zinc is the only metal, with the exception of 
aluminum, the salts of which are thrown down white by it.(r) Having dis- 
covered the base, the presence of sulphuric acid in the combination may be 
easily detected, by testing with chloride of barium. 

The following is the process recommended by Christison, for the detection 
of sulphate of zinc in organic mixtures. The mixture having been strained 
through gauze, is to be acidulated with acetic acid, and filtered through paper. 
The acetic acid dissolves any oxide of zinc that may have been thrown down 
in union with animal matter. The filtered fluid is then to be evaporated to a 
convenient extent, and treated, when cool, with sulphuretted hydrogen gas; 
upon which, a grayish or white milkiness, or precipitate, will be formed. The 
excess of gas must now be expelled by boiling, and the precipitate washed by 
the process of subsidence and effusion, and collected on a filter. It is then to 
be dried, and heated to redness in a tube. When it has cooled, it is to be 
acted on by strong nitric acid, which dissolves the zinc, and leaves the sulphur. 
The nitrous solution should next be diluted and neutralized with carbonate of 
ammonia ;(s) after which, the liquid tests, formerly mentioned, will act cha- 
racteristically. The effect of carbonate of ammonia and that of heat on the 
carbonate of zinc, which is thrown down, ought to be particularly relied on. 

§ 662. Chloride of zinc.—Several-cases of poisoning by a solution of this 
salt, known by the name of “Sir Wm. Burnett’s disinfecting fluid,’ have 
occurred in England and Canada. They prove that it is a highly corrosive 
poison. The symptoms observed have been violent; epigastric distress fol- 
lowed by vomiting, and attended with burning heat in the mouth and throat. 
In a case reported by Mr. Letheby, where a child, fifteen months old, was 


- poisoned by it, prostration was extreme, and the child died comatose in ten 
hours. The body was examined twenty-two hours after death. ‘The lips, 


mucous membrane of the mouth, fauces, and cesophagus, were white and 
opaque. The stomach felt hard and leathery, and contained a liquid like 
curds and whey. Its inner surface was corrugated, opaque, and tinged of a 
dark leaden hue; this appearance ceased abruptly at the pylorus. On digest- 


(r) In the case of alumina, the precipitate is soluble by caustic potash ; and in that 
of zinc by an excess of ammonia. 
(s) Carbonate of soda is more suitable. 


36 561 


§ 663] CHLORIDE OF TIN. [BOOK V. 


| 


ing the stomach in an ounce of distilled water, the liquid obtained gave white 
- precipitates with prussiate of potash, carbonate of soda, and sulphuretted hy- 
drogen and acid nitrate of silver, no precipitate being obtained on the addition 
of a soluble salt of baryta. The presence of chloride of zine was thus demon- 
strated. The author concludes, from some experiments, that the chloride of 
zinc is distinguished from the other salts of the metal by its quick and firm 
coagulating action on liquid albumen and on the delicate tissues of the body, 
and that its toxicological action is twofold, first as an irritant and caustic, and 
second, by a specific constitutional impression upon the nerves.(¢) In the 
eases reported by Dr. Stratton, although death appeared imminent, the pa- 
tients were saved by timely medical aid. (u) 

Since the first edition of this work several fatal cases have occurred, some 
of which are referred to by Dr. Webb, in the account published by him of a 
ease in which recovery took place after an ounce of the liquid had been swal- 
lowed.(v) A like quantity in another case, and in still another a pint of the 
solution were fatal. The symptoms observed in nearly all of the cases were 
intense burning pain in the epigastrium, extending afterwards to the rest of 
the abdomen ; persistent vomiting first of the contents of the stomach and 
then of blood, with urgent thirst; acold and pale surface, a failing and gradu- 
ally extinct pulse, dilated pupils, cramps in the extremities, a husky and whis- 
pering voice, and death without a struggle or previous loss of consciousness. 
After death the body has been found unusually livid; the stomach extremely 
vascular and purplish, lined with tenacious mucus, and its mucous membrane 
more or less softened, corroded, and disintegrated in the cardiac half of the 
organ. The pyloric orifice is constricted, and corrugated, and its lining mem- 
brane may be dense and tough, and in color and consistence resemble wash 
leather. The duodenum partakes of the discoloration and softening observed 
in the stomach, and the same changes exist in some degree in the jejunum. 
The cesophagus is lined with tenacious mucus, or with patches of false mem- 
brane. It is remarkable that the mouth is seldom acted upon by the poison. (ww) 

Death may result after a considerable period from alterations produced in 
the stomach by the poison. A woman who had taken an ounce of Burnett’s 
fluid, recovered from its immediate effects, but died in ten weeks from the 
inability of the stomach to retain food. On examination, the stomach near 
the pylorus was found so contracted as scarcely to admit a probe of the size of 
a crow’s quill. (a) 


XVID Ze: 


§ 663. Ist. Chloride of tin.—This preparation needs little notice: it is an 
irritant poison, but has seldom given rise to accidents. An old man dried 
some wet cooking salt in a tin dish upon a stove, and then ate some meat and 
bread with which he had wiped the dish. He was seized with chilliness, vio- - 
lent pain in the stomach, and the abdomen became swelled, and tender upon 


(t) Lancet, July 6, 1850. (u) Med. Exam. Feb. 1849. 
(v) Times and Gaz. July, 1856, p. 59. 
(w) For cases, see Lancet, Sept. 1857, p. 271; Beale’s Archives, 1858, No. iii. p. 194. 
(x) Markham, Times and Gaz. June, 1858, p. 595. 

562 


BOOK V.] | SILVER.—GOLD.—PLATINUM.—IRON, [S$ 665 


pressure. A febrile condition was soon set up; but the most striking symp- 
tom was salivation, with extreme fetor of the breath, and a grayish discolora- 
tion of the gums. They, as well. as the tongue and inside of the cheeks, 
became covered with ulcers. By an antiphlogistic treatment, and gargles of 
chloride of lime, he was restored in a few days.(m) 


XIX. Silver. Gold. Platinum. 


§ 664. Nitrate of silver. (Lunar caustic.)—The appearance of this caustic 
is well known. Poisoning by it is not, however, of frequent occurrence. A 
patient at the Hopital St. Louis, in Paris, recovered, after having swallowed 
an ounce in solution. The nitrate of silver was neutralized by the adminis- 
tration of common salt.(n) In a case reported by Krahmer a like quantity 
produced insensibility to: tactile impressions, loss of consciousness, and con- 
vulsions. By the sixth day the patient had recovered.(nn) The nature of 
the poison can be readily detected by the black color which it communicates to 
organic matter. 

The terchloride of gold is also a highly irritant poison, acting very much 
like corrosive sublimate. Cullerier, the nephew, has seen one-fifteenth of a 
grain excite, at the second dose, gastric irritation, dryness of the tongue, red- 
ness of the throat, colic, and diarrhea. (0) 

The bichloride of platinum is a powerful caustic poison. It is sometimes 
used, in medical practice, for the treatment of secondary syphilis. 


XX. Iron. 


§ 665. Ist. Sulphate of tron. (Copperas; Green vitriol.) (1.) Symp- 
ioms.—A case of supposed criminal poisoning with this substance is related 
by Dr. Christison. <A girl, four years of age, and previously in good health, 
was attacked with violent vomiting and purging immediately after breakfasting 
on porridge, and died in the course of the afternoon of the same day. The 
porridge had a blue color, and it was proved that a woman in the house had 
purchased both this salt and the sulphate of copper. ‘The body being disin- 
terred, four months after death, the stomach was found soft, gelatinous, and 
of a uniform intense black color through the whole thickness of its parietes, 
and the whole alimentary canal lined with a thick layer of jet black mucus 
“from the pharynx down to the very anus.’’ There was no evidence found of 
the presence of copper, but abundant proof was obtained of the presence of 
iron both in the textures of the stomach and the black mucus which lined 
it.(p) More recently, a case somewhat similar, has been observed by Orfila. 
It was that of a child, aged fifteen months, who died, after purging and 
vomiting a black fluid. On opening the body, ten days after burial, the 
stomach was filled with a greenish fluid, and the vessels of the lungs and 
brain were gorged with black blood. M. Orfila detected sulphate of iron, 


(m) Memel. Deutsche. Klinik. No. xli. 1851. 
(n) Am. Journ. 1840, p. 239. (nn) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht, 1846, p. 247. 
(o) Pereira, Mat. Med. (p) Ibid. p. 393. 


963 


§ 667] CHLORIDE OF IRON.—TESTS. | [BOOK V. 


in notable quantities, in the portions of the abdominal contents forwarded to 
~ him. 

(2.) Chemical analysis.—It should not be forgotten, in making a chemical 
examination of the viscera, in cases of supposed poisoning with the salts of 
iron, that iron is a normal constituent of the body. Orfila says, that when 
these, or the salts of copper or lead, exist in the alimentary canal, as a con- 
sequence of poisoning, we have only to treat the canal by means of very dilute 
muriatic or acetic acid, at a moderate heat; these acids dissolving the metallic 
substances sought for, without attacking any portion of those metals that 
form part of the organization. To obtain these last, we must treat the viscera 
by more energetic agents, or by incineration.(q) The crystals of sulphate of 
iron are of a bluish green color, have a styptic taste, and are readily soluble 
in water. The base may be detected by the ferrocyanide of potassium (pro- 
ducing a greenish-blue precipitate), and the acid by the chloride of barium. 

§ 666. 2d. Chloride (Muriate) of tron.—The medicinal tincture of this 
salt of iron has frequently given rise to serious and fatal accidents. The 
symptoms produced by it are very much like those of the corrosive acids, 
viz., heat, dryness, and swelling of the throat, with a burning pain in the 
stomach and in the course of the cesophagus, vomiting of blood, and inky 
evacuations. Its corrosive properties seem to be due to the presence in it of 
free hydrochloric acid. Dr. Christison relates a case, in which death occurred 
in about six weeks after an ounce anda half of the tincture had been swallowed. 
A case of recovery, after three ounces of the concentrated tincture had been 
swallowed, is reported by Sir William Murray. (7) | 

A gentleman, aged seventy-two, swallowed three ounces of it by mistake. 
He was found “tossing about in the utmost consternation and agony; his 
tongue was swelled, and protruded from the mouth ; its skin was parched and 
peeling off it, while ropy mucus flowed from the mouth and nose; the eyes 
seemed starting from their sockets; the respiration was noisy and laborious, 
and suffocation seemed to be impending. During this time his hand was 
riveted to the region of the stomach, as the principal seat of pain; the palate 
and the interior of the mouth were burned, and presented a parboiled appear- 
ance.”? The acid was first neutralized by an alkaline mixture, and this treat- 
ment was followed by demulcents and laxatives. The gentleman rapidly 
recovered.(s) Several other cases of recovery from large doses are recorded, 
which it is not necessary to particularize. 

Tests.—The iron may be detected by the blue precipitate with ferrocyanide 
of potassium, and the hydrochloric acid by the nitrate of silver. 

§ 667. 3d. Subnitrate of bismuth. A man subject to water-brash took 
two drachms of this preparation by mistake. He was immediately attacked 
with burning in the throat, vomiting, purging, cramps, and coldness of the 
limbs, his pulse became intermittent, and he had a constant metallic and nauseous 
taste. On the third day he had hiccough, laborious breathing, and swelling 
of the hands and face, and suppression of urine was then discovered to have 


(7) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1853, p. 259. 

(r) Ibid. July, 1849. 

(s) Sir Wm. Murray, Dub. Med. Press, Feb. 1849. 
564 


BOOK V.] BICHROMATE OF POTASH. L$ 663 


existed from the first. On the fourth day, swelling and tension of the abdomen 
were added to the pre-existing symptoms; on the fifth day, salivation ; on 
the sixth, delirium; on the seventh, swelling of the tongue and enormous 
enlargement of the abdomen; and, on the ninth, he expired. The tonsils, 
uvula, pharynx, and epiglottis were gangrenous, and inflammatory redness, 
with spots of gangrene, existed throughout the whole intestinal canal.(¢) 
Sobernheim explains the poisonous effects in the above case and in one observed 
by himself, by supposing that the patients’ stomachs contained bitartrate of 
potassa enough to convert the subnitrate into an acid nitrate of bismuth, 
which is stated to be an active irritant.(¢¢) Certain it is that pure subnitrate 
of bismuth is constantly given in unmeasured doses without any toxical effect 
whatever. It has been found that this preparation of bismuth is often so 
carelessly made, that the arsenic which is commonly found in bismuth has often 
not been previously excluded by the operation of roasting. M. Cornut recom- 
mends that it should be tested before being dispensed for medicinal purposes. 
Moisten half a drachm of the trisnitrate of bismuth with a sufficient quantity 
of pure sulphuric acid, evaporate to dryness in a small porcelain capsule, 
wash the residue with a little distilled water, filter, and put into a Marsh’s 
apparatus. (2). 

§ 668. 4th. Bichromate of potash.—This salt being extensively used in 
dyeing, has given rise, in several instances, to accidental poisoning. Locally 
applied, its action is irritant, causing, in the workmen who make use of it, 
troublesome sores and ulcerations upon the hands. Taken in poisonous doses 
internally, its action is highly irritant also, and death has taken place from it, 
with the symptoms usually attending the action of irritant poisons. Mr. 
Wilson, however, relates a case in which death was caused by it, without 
any vomiting or purging having occurred.(v) Several fatal cases have 
occurred in Baltimore. The following was communicated by Dr. Baer, to 
Professor Ducatel: A laborer, aged 35, on attempting to draw off from a 
refiner a solution, in the effort to exhaust the siphon by suction, received a 
small quantity of the solution into his mouth. His first impression was, that 
he had spit it out; but only a few minutes elapsed before he was seized with 
great heat in the throat and stomach, and violent vomiting of blood and 
mucus. The vomiting continued until just before his death, which occurred in 
five hours. On dissection, the mucous tissue of the stomach, duodenum, and 
about one-fifth of the jejunum, was found destroyed in patches. The remain- 
ing parts of it could be easily removed by the handle of the scalpel.(w) A 
boy, who swallowed about two ounces of bichromate of potash, was seized in 
half an hour with vomiting, and became almost totally insensible. He was pale 


~ and collapsed, the pupils were dilated and fixed, the pulse feeble, and there were 


cramps in the legs. An emetic of sulphate of zinc was given, and the sto- 
mach-pump used, until the pinkish color of the washings obtained by it had 
ceased. He had an attack of gastro-intestinal inflammation, from which he 
did not recover for four months.(x) 

(t) Christison, quoted from Wibmer. (tt) Arzneimittellehre, 6te Aufl. p. 268. 

(u) Association Med. Journ. June 17, 1853. 

(v) Med. Gaz. vol. xxxiii. p. 734. (w) Beck, vol. ii. p. 666. 


(x) Guy’s Hosp. Rep. 1850, p. 214. 
565 


§ 669] IRRITANT POISONS.—VEGETABLE. [BOOK V. 


CHAPTER VI. 
IRRITANT POISONS—VEGETABLE. 


I. Colchicum Autumnale. (Colchicum ; Meadow Saffron.) 


§ 669. 1st. Symptoms.—The seed and cormus of this plant, and it is said 
the leaves(y) and flowers(z) also, are capable of producing violent poison- 
ous effects. The symptoms are, an acute, gnawing pain in the stomach, 
vomiting and purging, tenesmus, reduced pulse, and great debility. They are 
said to resemble occasionally those observed in Asiatic cholera, from being 
sometimes attended with cramps in the/various parts of the body, ice-cold sur- 
face, purging of rice-water stools, suppression of urine, and general collapse. 
The dose of the medicinal tincture, or the quantity of the crude seeds or bulb 
that is requisite to produce the effect described, is not precisely known. ‘The 
officinal dose of the dried bulb or of the seeds is six or eight grains, and of 
the wine of either from ten drops to a fluidrachm. <A case has been reported 
in which a person swallowed a wineglassful of the tincture by mistake; he was 
soon seized with violent pain in the stomach, and vomiting, and died on the 
next day of exhaustion.(a) In another case, reported by Mr. Feraday, the 
same quantity was taken. The symptoms did not appear for an hour and a 
half; there was then urgent pain and vomiting, followed by great exhaustion, 
purging, and tenesmus. In this case the intellect was unaffected. The patient 
died in forty-eight hours. (The uniformity with which, in the reported cases 
of poisoning by colchicum, either no mention is made of any cerebral disturb- 
ance, or, on the other hand, an express statement is given that the intellect 
was not at all impaired, justifies the position which we have given to this 
substance, viz., among the irritants, instead of its customary place among the 
narcotico-acrid poisons.) Ollivier met with two cases of death within twenty- 
four hours, in consequence of a tincture being taken which contained the active 
part of forty-eight grains of the dry bulb, and the period mentioned is the 
shortest in which death is recorded as the direct effect of colechicum. Dr. 
Christison states that he has known very violent effects produced by half an 
ounce taken by mistake, although most of it was brought away by emetics in 
an hour; and that, in medical practice, he has seldom seen the dose of a sound 
preparation gradually raised to a drachm thrice a day, without such severe 
purging and sickness ensuing as rendered it prudent to diminish or discontinue 
the remedy.(b) 

2d. The post-mortem appearances in fatal cases may be those of inflam-. 


(y) Bleifus, Repertor fiir die Pharmacie, lxix. 

(z) Magazin fiir Pharmacie, xxx. (a) Med. Times and Gaz. 1853, 1. 

(>) On Poisons, p. 667. For a collection of curious cases, vid. Ed. Month. Journ. 
of Med. Sci. 1852, by J. McGrigor Maclagan. 


566 


BOOK V.] IRRITANT POISONS.—CHEMICAL EXAMINATION. [$ 670 


mation, but the evidence of this is extremely equivocal. In a case in which a 
decoction made with a tablespoonful of the seeds had been taken, and the 
inspection was made twenty-three hours after death, a remarkable rigidity, 
especially of the abdomen, was noted. The muscles were of a deep-blue color, 
as if they had been dried in the air. The heart was covered with spots of a 
black, violet, and brown color; the stomach was of a light-violet color, and 
the veins of it and of the intestines much engorged with blood. The other 
organs had a healthy appearance. (c) 

The following is an analysis of the lesions found in seven cases of fatal poi- 
soning by colchicum. The skin upon the back and sides was usually purple, 
livid, violet, or greenish, and decomposition was unusually rapid. The lungs 
and brain were gorged with dark, imperfectly coagulated, and pitchy blood, 
and so were the veins of the trunk. In several cases the gastro-intestinal 
mucous membrane was intensely congested, and in some places softened; in 
about one-fourth of the number its color was normal. Sometimes ecchymoses 
were found under the micous coat, and sometimes also the discoloration ex- 
tended to the peritoneal membrane. 

Of colchicin Casper remarks that it is one of the most deadly poisons, and, 
in its power, hardly surpassed by phosphorus. He relates four cases of fatal 
poisoning in males between the ages of fifteen and forty. In each of these 
the dose was between two-fifths and the half of a grain of colchicin; but it 
occasioned death rapidly, with violent vomiting, purging, and collapse.(cc) 

§ 670. 3d. Chemical examination.—The possibility of demonstrating the 
fact of poisoning by colchicum, by means of the extraction of its active prin- 
ciple, colchicin, from the contents of the stomach, &c., has been shown by 
Schacht and Wittstock, of Berlin.(d@) Four persons were poisoned by drink- 
ing tincture of colchicum in mistake for ‘“schnapps;’? but the fact being 
somewhat uncertain, a chemical examination of the contents of the stomach 
was instituted with the view of detecting, if possible, the presence of colchicin. 
Previous to the experiment upon the viscera, however, what remained of the 
suspected liquid was examined, and also a tincture known to be the officinal 
preparation of colchicum. In both cases colchicin was obtained, and it was 
found that half an ounce of the officinal tincture of the drug yielded about four 
and a half per cent. of pure colchicin. 

The contents of the stomach were mixed with a large quantity of alcohol, 
to which a few drops of hydrochloric acid had been added, then shaken, the 
liquid portion filtered off and evaporated to the consistence of a thin syrup. 
This residue was dissolved in distilled water, by which much fat was separated, 
then filtered, carefully evaporated, alcohol added again as long as any foreign 
material appeared, and then filtered and evaporated as before. To the mass 
now obtained, after having been reduced by evaporation to about eight ounces, 
half a drachm of calcined magnesia was used to free the colchicin, and, after 
a time, three ounces of ether added. ‘This was allowed to evaporate sponta- 
neously after being filtered. The residue was taken up again by water, and 


(c) Neubrandt, in Ed. Med. and Surg. Journ. July, 1840. 
(ce) Gericht. Med. i. 402. (d) Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, Jan. 1855. 


567 


§ 672] DRASTIC PURGATIVES.—CASTOR BEANS. [BOOK V. 


evaporated in a watch-glass. The residue gave, with tincture of galls, chloride 
of platinum, and tincture of iodine, all the reactions of colchicin. 


Il. Drastic Purgatives. 


§ 671. The chief articles enumerated under this name are jalap, scammony, 
gamboge, colocynth, croton oil, and elateritum. With the exception of the 
last two, they are seldom given singly in medical practice, but generally com- 
bined with each other and with milder purgatives, or with mercurials, and 
always in small doses. That they may give rise to fatal consequences from 
over-purging is not only possible, but is demonstrated by cases upon record. 
Being the most usual ingredients of quack cathartic medicines, especially in 
the pilular form, they have often been taken in large doses, and have thus 
caused death by the exhaustion arising from over-purging. One element in 
the consideration of cases in which death is attributed to the use of any of 
these drugs should not be forgotten, viz., that the very young, or, on the other 
hand, the aged, cannot bear the operation of violent purgative medicine with 
the same impunity as those in other periods of life; and also that those who 
are already enfeebled by disease may readily perish from the effects of a com- 
paratively small dose. In general, where the quantity of a drastic purga- 
tive taken has been very large, there will be found evidence of inflammatory 
action in the intestines. | 

White and black hellebore, besides being violent irritants of the stomach 
and bowels, produce nervous symptoms, such as cramps, convulsions, and 
delirium. American or green hellebore has occasioned similar phenomena in 
a slight degree, but its poisonous action upon the nervous system is rather 
shown by vertigo, somnolency or coma, dimness of sight, dilatation of the 
pupil, and impaired muscular action. 


III. Castor Seeds or Beans. 


§ 672. It is stated (Wood and Bache) that two or three of these seeds are 
sufficient to purge, and that seven or eight act with great violence. This pro- 
perty depends upon an acrid principle which exists, as is now satisfactorily 
ascertained, in the embryo. Dr. Hartshorne states that he has known them 
to be eaten freely with impunity at times, and in other cases to produce the 
most violent and even fatal emeto-catharsis. Dr. Taylor gives an instance of 
poisoning by them. A young lady ate about twenty of them. About five 
hours after they were eaten, she felt faint and sick; vomiting and purging 
came on, and continued through the night. On the following morning she 
appeared like one affected with malignant cholera. The skin was cold and 
dark-colored, the features contracted, and the breath cold; the pulse was small 
and wiry; there was restlessness, thirst, pain in the abdomen, and she lay in. 
a sort of drowsy, half-conscious state. Whatever liquid was taken was imme- 
diately rejected, and the matters passed by stool consisted chiefly of a serous 
fluid, with blood. She died in five days. On inspection, a very large portion 
of the mucous membrane of the stomach was found abraded, and softened in 

568 


BOOK V.]| FUNGI. . [$ 674 


the course of the greater curvature. There was general vascularity of the 
organ, and the abraded portion presented the appearance of a granulating 
surface of a pale rose color; it was covered with slimy mucus. The small 
intestines were inflamed and the inner coat abraded.(e) 


IV. Fungi. (Mushrooms.) 


§ 673. 1st. There is a vast number of cryptogamous plants thus denomi- 
nated, some of which are generally wholesome as food, while others are exceed- 
ingly poisonous. The rules laid down by M. Richard, in the Dict. des Drogues, 
to guide persons who eat mushrooms in their selection, are that those should be 
rejected which have a narcotic or fetid odor, or an acrid, bitter, or very acid 
taste ; which occasion a sense of constriction in the throat when swallowed ; 
which are very soft, liquefying, changing color, and assuming a bluish tint 
when bruised; which exude a milky, acrid, and styptic juice; which grow in 
very moist places and upon putrefying substances; in fine, all such as have a 
coriaceous, ligneous or corky consistence. The last, however, are injurious in 
consequence rather of their indigestible than of their poisonous nature. Even 
mushrooms which are usually edible may prove poisonous if collected too late, 
or in places which are too moist. It is said, moreover, that the poisonous 
species become innocent when they grow under favorable circumstances ; and 
that the most noxious may be rendered edible by boiling them in water acidu- 
lated with vinegar.(/) In many portions of Europe, but especially in Poland 
and Russia, they form the most important part of the food of the common 
people; and in the latter country whole tribes are mainly supported by them, 
scarcely any species, except the dung and the fly agarics, being rejected. Hven 
those kinds which are elsewhere refused, by common consent, as poisonous, on 
account of their extreme acridity, are taken with impunity, being extensively 
dried, or pickled in salt and vinegar, for winter’s use. (q) 

§ 674. 2d. It appears very certain that the poisonous properties of mush- 
rooms may be removed by boiling, and especially with acidulated water, or 
with vinegar. 

Dr. Pouchet, of Rouen, gave a quart of the water in which five poisonous 
mushrooms (Amanita muscaria and Avenenata) had been boiled, to a dog, 
who died in eight hours; but the boiled fungi themselves had no effect upon 
other dogs. Another, who was fed for two months on little less than boiled 
amanitas, not only sustained no harm, but actually got fat on his fare.(h) M. 
Gérard exhibited, before a committee of the Paris Council of Health, the com- 
plete innocuousness of these two most poisonous varieties, after having been 
macerated in water. He directs that some two or three spoonfuls of vinegar 
or some coarse salt should be added to the water, and the fungi macerated for 
two hours, after which they should be washed, and then put into cold water 
and boiled for half an hour. They may then be taken out, washed, dried, and 


(e) Med. Jur. p. 155. 

(f) On the Medicinal and Toxicological properties of the cryptogamic plants of the 
United States, by F. Peyre Porcher, M. D., of Charleston, 8. C., in the Trans. of the Am. 
Med. Assoc. vol. vii. 

(g) Berkeley, ibid. (h) Vid. Christison on Poisons. 


569 


§ 676] POISONING BY MUSHROOMS. [BOOK V. 


used as food.(7) Ina later number of the same journal, Dr. Gondot relates 
the cases of seven persons poisoned by eating mushrooms, three of whom died. 
The mushrooms had been fried in butter. One person ate, the next day, at 
least half in quantity, of those that had served the family the day previous. 
These, however, had lain in water for an hour, and were then drained and 
pressed. In this condition they were fried in butter and eaten. Diarrhea 
followed for several hours, but without any other dangerous effect. For a full 
account of the facts so far ascertained, regarding the distinction between the 
poisonous and edible mushrooms, we beg leave to refer the reader to Dr. Por- 
cher’s admirable essay above quoted, and to Christison and Orfila’s treatises on - 
poisons. 

§ 675. 38d. The symptoms of poisoning by mushrooms or other fungi, are 
both of an irritant and narcotic character. In Dr. Gondot’s cases, the symptoms 
did not come on until several hours after the meal; in the fatal cases, not until 
twenty hours, the patients dying in sixteen hours afterwards. They were all 
affected with vomiting, purging, and cramps. In three cases related by Dr. 
Peddie, the symptoms began in half an hour, with giddiness and stupor ; there 
were no abdominal symptoms, and the patients recovered. The principal 
symptoms in sixty-eight cases referred to by Ballardini, were nausea, uneasiness 
in the abdomen, vertigo, a state resembling intoxication, vomiting and diar- 
rheea, loss of power of locomotion, with convulsions. The following case ex- 
hibits a singular form of the narcotic effects. A boy of fourteen, who had 
eaten the Agaricus panterimus, near Bologna, was, in the course of two 
hours, seized with delirium, a maniacal disposition to rove, and some convul- 
sive movements. ‘Ere long, these symptoms were succeeded by a state re- 
sembling coma in every way, except that he looked as if he understood what 
was going on, and, in point of fact, did so.”(j) The same peculiarity was 
witnessed by Dr. Harlow in a girl seven years old, one of a family poisoned 
by A. campestris. “In the wildness of her delirium she rose from her bed 
and walked into the garden.’’(%) Both the lethargy and the symptoms of irri- 
tation may continue for a considerable length of time, and both may occur 
simultaneously. 

§ 676. 4th. The post-mortem appearances in the few cases recorded, have 
been the following: An unusual fluidity of the blood, turgescence of the vessels 
of the brain, inflammation and even gangrene of the stomach. In one of Dr. 
Gondot’s cases (the only one examined) there was a decomposition of the tis- 
sues, the abdominal viscera were softened, and the odor from them was ex- 
tremely fetid. Dr. Maschka, of Prague, has reported seven fatal cases of 
poisoning by mushrooms, in which, after death, there was an entire absence of 
cadaveric rigidity, dilated pupils, blood of a dark-brown color mixed with dirty 
yellow and soft fibrinous clots, numerous ecchymoses and sanguineous effusions 
in the serous membranes and the parenchymatous organs, and remarkable 
distension of the bladder with urine. (/) 


(7) Union Méd. 1851, No. 148. (j ) Christison on Poisons. 
(k) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. Aug. 1858, p. 78. ’ 
(1) Prager Vierteljahrs., 1855, ii. 137. 


570 


BOOK Y.] ANIMAL IRRITANTS.—CANTHARIDES, [$ 678 


The evidence in cases demanding a legal investigation will most probably 
be derived from circumstances and the symptoms. The only case which can 
present difficulty is where an irritant poison has been designedly introduced 
into the preparation of mushrooms. An instance of this kind occurred: a 
woman died from the effects of arsenic mixed by her servant with mushrooms. 
The girl afterwards confessed the fact.(m) Of course, the only means of dis- 
tinction in such cases is a chemical examination for the suspected poison. 


CHAPTER VII. 


LEAR. UW AN-T .P: Od. 8.0 NS—ANIMAL (a) 
I. Cantharides. 


§ 677. Ist. Properties.—The cantharis, or Spanish fly, much used in medi- 
cine as a counter-irritant, and also occasionally given internally, is capable of 
producing fatal results. From the irritation in the genital organs, which is 
a secondary effect of its use, it has frequently, in ignorance of its dangerous 
properties, been employed for the purpose of exciting the sexual propensities, 
and it is occasionally taken also with the hope of procuring abortion. It may 
produce serious results even by external use. Its vesicating and its irritant pro- 
perty result from the presence of the same principle, viz., cantharidin, which 
has been believed to exist chiefly, if not entirely, in the wing-cases of the insect. 
From some experiments of Dr. Leidy, the vesicating principle of Lytta vittata 
appears to belong to the blood, the peculiar fatty substance of certain acces- 
sory glands of the generative apparatus, and to the eggs.(b). Cantharidin, 
however, is too active for internal use, and is only employed for the purpose 
of vesication. Cantharides are usually taken in powder or in tincture. Ina 
case reported by Dr. Homans, the powder was taken in mistake for hiera 
ptera.(c) 1 

§ 678. 2d. The symptoms occasioned by an overdose of either of these pre- 
parations commence with nausea, vertigo, and a burning sensation in the mouth 
and throat. This sensation presently extends to the cesophagus and stomach, 
is succeeded by violent pain and extreme tenderness in the abdomen, thirst, 
difficulty of swallowing, and vomiting of blood, mucus and shreds of membrane. 
There is also violent pain in the loins, strangury, and priapism, and occasion- 
ally there is satyriasis with seminal emissions. In the female, swelling and 
heat of the organs of generation have been observed, and during pregnancy 
abortion is apt to be produced. It has repeatedly happened that the genital 
organs were attacked with gangrene, even in cases in which no sexual excite- 


(m) Christison on Poisons. 

(a) Poisons of this class Casper denominates septic, because the greater number of 
them, resulting from animal decomposition, corrupt the blood when taken into the 
system. [ 

(b) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci., Jan. 1860, p. 60. 

(c) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ., March, 1855, p. 80. 


571 


§ 680] CANTHARIDES.— POISONOUS DOSES. [BOOK V. 


ment was manifested. The secretion of urine is, in some cases, suspended ; 
for in a case in which the catheter was introduced, no urine could be obtained. 
Occasionally profuse salivation occurs, and, in fatal cases, violent cerebral 
symptoms are observed. A young girl at Windsor was killed by the external 
application of blistering ointment, which was rubbed over her whole body in 
mistake for sulphur ointment which had been prescribed for the cure of the 
itch. Although the ointment was washed off, the cuticle came with it, and 
the girl died in five days, with the symptoms above described.(d) Guibourt 
has reported the case of a young man, suffering from acute pleurisy, who 
having had a large blister applied to his side, became affected with symptoms 
of irritation in the urinary passages, and died after falling into a state of 
complete collapse. (e) 

§ 679. 3d. The quantity required to destroy life is not accurately ascer- 
tained. Drs. Wood and Bache state the medicinal dose as from one to two 
grains of the powder, and from twenty drops to a fluidrachm of the tincture. 
It is evident, however, from the frequently deteriorated condition of the powder, 
that the active principle may, in any given quantity, be found in less than the 
. average amount, and that the strength of the tincture may be often thus im- 
paired. This fact will serve to explain the large quantities which have been 
sometimes taken without dangerous symptoms. The smallest quantity of the 
powder which has been known to destroy life, was in the case of a young female, 
mentioned by Orfila, who took twenty-four grains in two doses. She took it to 
procure abortion, and as this followed, it is uncertain whether it may not have 
hastened the fatal result. Much larger doses of the powder have been taken, 
followed by the most dangerous symptoms, but early vomiting, no doubt, 
removed a great deal of the poison. 

In a case observed by Dr. Ives, of New Haven, a boy of seventeen died from 
the effects of an ownce of the tincture. Death occurred seventeen days after 
he had taken it. A curious case occurred in France, in 1846, where the oint- 
ment of cantharides, consisting of a fourth part of the powder, and three parts 
of resin, wax, and lard, was administered to a man in his soup, with the inten- © 
tion of poisoning him. ‘The criminal was condemned to death, although his 
intended victim recovered from the dangerous symptoms which he suffered. 
The exact dose in this case is not mentioned. 
 § 680. 4th. The post-mortem appearances are those of inflammation. If 
a quantity sufficient alone to destroy life has been taken, the cesophagus, 
stomach, and small intestine will most probably be found highly inflamed, and 
if the person have lived for several days, the kidneys, ureter, and neck of the 
bladder also. Such has been the case in the few fatal cases of poisoning by 
this substance which have been examined. Sometimes the lining membrane of 
the mouth and throat is destroyed, and in Dr. Ives’ case that of the stomach 
was pulpy and easily detached. In Guibourt’s case the kidneys were softened 
and filled with bloody points; the same appearance was presented by the 
ureters and bladder, the mucous membrane of which was partially disorganized. 
A child nearly three years old is said to have rejected by vomiting the entire 


(d) Taylor on Poisons. (e) Abeille Méd. xy. 153. 
572 


BOOK V.] SAUSAGE POISON, — [§ 681 


mucous membrane of the cesophagus, after taking about a drachm of tincture 
of cantharides.(/) 

The presence of the greenish, gold, or copper colored scales, derived from 
the wing-cases of the insect, is, however, the best evidence of the nature of the 
poison. They adhere very closely to the mucous membrane of the intestines, 
and may be easily recognized by a common lens. Although there are many 
other insects which have wings of the same color and are not poisonous, it is 
hardly possible that these should find their way into the stomach, and much 
less that they should have been given with any evil intent. M. Poumet 
recommends also that the suspected liquids which have been vomited should 
be mixed with alcohol and allowed to evaporate on sheets of glass, by which 
means the brilliant colored particles of the fly will be visible after evaporation. 
Or, the stomach and intestine may be inflated and dried, after which, upon 
cutting them open and examining them upon a flat surface, the particles above 
mentioned, if present, will be seen sticking closely to the mucous membrane. 
They are not affected by putrefaction, and, according to Orfila, may be recog- 
nized as long as nine months after interment. If, however, the tincture has 
been taken, this method will not, of course, be available. An effort may be 
made to detect the cantharidin in the suspected liquid, by digesting in ether 
what remains after evaporation, and then testing the vesicating properties of 
the product, but it is evident that the evidence derivable from such a method is, 
very imperfect, if the experiment should not succeed, it being very possible that 
cantharides may have been used and yet not be detected by these means. 

There are several species of fly having similar properties with the Spanish, 
and which are found in the United States and elsewhere. They are seldom 
used, however, but could probably be detected as readily as the. genuine 
cantharides. 


II. Sausages. 


§ 681. Ist. Nature of the poison.—These and analogous articles of food 
have so frequently given rise to poisoning in Germany, that we cannot pass 
them over entirely unnoticed. According to the statistics of Prof. Schloss- 
berger, there have occurred in the kingdom of Wurtemberg alone since 1800, 
no less than 400 cases of poisoning by sausages. Blood and liver-pudding 
(blut and leber-wiirste) constitutes one of the most ordinary articles of the 
diet of the Germans, and other smoked and fatty preparations, obtained chiefly 
from pork, are much used. The nature of the sausage poison is not yet clearly 
ascertained. lLiebig considers it a kind of ferment, Buchner believes it to be 
due to a peculiar acid which he terms botulinic acid, while Schlossberger con- 
siders it to be an organic base. He supports this theory by referring to the 
now numerous sources of the ammoniacal bases, the transformation of protein 
combinations by putrefaction, and the very poisonous nature of many of these 
alkaloids, among which conicine and nicotine are already well known.(g) 
This writer, in a more recent essay, states that the uncertainty regarding the 


(f) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci., Oct. 1857, p. 560. 
(g) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht fiir 1850. V. Band, p. 136. 


573 


§ 684] SAUSAGE POISONING.—SYMPTOMS, ETC. | BOOK Y. 


source of the poison continues. He also adds an important fact, that poisonous 
sausages are eaten by dogs and cats with impunity. (m) 

Whatever may be the chemical nature of the poison, it appears to depend 
upon putrefactive decomposition of the fatty matters. The cases of poisoning 
occur chiefly in the winter and spring months. The unwholesome sausages 
are described by the last mentioned author as showing, especially in the inte- 
rior, little masses of soft consistence like curd; they have a repulsive odor, and 
a sour, bitter, and rancid taste. 

§ 682. 2d. The symptoms are well seen in the following narration. The 
family of Ehrmann at Limmetshausen, with a number of guests, partook of a 
supper of pork sausages, in consequence of which all were more or less affected 
with symptoms of poisoning, eight with severe symptoms, and three died. The 
sausages were made of the liver of a healthy pig prepared eight days pre- 
viously, slightly boiled, then smoked and hung up. There must have been 
something peculiar in the taste of the sausages, as one of the guests remarked 
that they were not wholesome, and did not partake of them, in consequence 
of which he escaped. ‘The symptoms were similar in all, differing merely in 
degree. Shortly after partaking of the sausages, pains in the bowels, vomit- 
ing, giddiness, dryness of the mouth and throat, and difficulty of swallowing 
came on. The pupils soon became dilated and fixed, the headache and vertigo 
increased, and the power of vision was lost. Great prostration of strength 
followed, the power of speech was destroyed, the abdomen was painful to the 
touch, the pulse small, weak, and frequent, and at last intermittent. The 
respiration became difficult, and deglutition impossible, lividity of the counte- 
nance came on, spasms of the muscles of the extremities ensued, and rapid 
death. Death occurred within thirty-six hours after eating the sausages. (7) 

These cases show that the symptoms are not always so slow in appearing 
as is generally stated. Many other cases might be referred to in which the 
effects were precisely similar to those described.(o) 

§ 683. In some cases suspicion is wrongly thrown upon the food. Thus in 
the narrative (communicated by Prof. Rose to Casper’s Journal, 1852), of the 
poisoning of a family by the smoked breasts of geese (spickgans), it was found 
upon chemical examination that a considerable quantity of sulphate of zine 
was contained in the food. It had been used instead of saltpetre in its prepa- 
ration. The symptoms were of a choleraic nature, and nothing like the nar- 
cotism produced by sausage poison was observed. 

§ 684. The post-mortem appearances in the cases seen by Roeser were the 
following. 'The brain and spinal marrow were healthy. The palate and ton- 
sils were red, the last much larger than natural, the lining membrane of the 
larynx was of a deep blue color, and that of the trachea and bronchia of a 
blackish-red color. The lungs were highly congested and condensed. The 
cesophagus was of a remarkably white color, and covered with a white false 
membrane. The stomach and intestines internally were mottled with red 


(m) Virchow’s Archiv. xi. 569. 

(n) Roeser. Am. Journ. Med. Sci. April, 1843. 

(o) Vid. Kussmaul. Ver. deutsch. Zeitsch. v. ii. 1849. Two children out of a family 
of seven died. 


574 


a — ————- 


BOOK V.| POISONOUS CHEESE. [$ 686 


spots, and the duodenum had a black appearance. The other organs were 
nearly natural in their aspect. Similar appearances have been observed in 
other cases. 

§ 685. In December, 1841, over forty cases of cholera morbus occurred in 
New York, which, according to Dr. Lee, were traced to some smoked beef, 
sold from a particular grocery, and of which the individuals attacked had freely 
eaten. The symptoms did not generally make their appearance until several 
hours after the beef had been eaten. They commenced with pain and uneasi- 
ness in the precordial region, which extended to the back and loins, and were 
only temporarily relieved by the dejections which followed. Vomiting soon 
came on, attended with great thirst.and a burning sensation at the pit of the 
stomach, and the irritability of this organ became so great, that no substance, 
either as food or medicine, could be retained for an instant. Extreme pros- 
tration followed; the functions of the nervous, muscular, and the digestive 
systems were much impaired, and convalescence was very slow and protracted. 
In one case, that of a girl six years of age, the disease proved fatal on the 
fifteenth day; and on dissection the blood was found fluid, the mucous coat of 
the ileum deeply injected, and inflamed ; the other organs were healthy.( ) 


III. Poisonous Cheese. 


§ 686. The nature of the poisonous quality occasionally acquired by cheese, 
is not more precisely known than that of sausages; it is supposed by Hiinefeld 
and Sertiirner to depend upon two animal acids, analogous to, if not identical 
with the caseic and sebacic acids. According to the researches of Proust, the 
sharp, peculiar taste of old cheese is owing to the gradual conversion of the 
curd of caseine into the caseate of ammonia, which in sound cheese is always 
united with an excess of alkali. But if the fermentation has been too much 
hastened, or allowed to go too far, a considerable excess of caseic acid is 
formed, as well as some sebacic acid. According to Hiinefeld, the deleterious 
cheeses are yellowish-red, soft and tough, with harder and darker lumps inter- 
spersed ; they have a disagreeable taste, redden litmus, and become flesh-red 
instead of lemon-yellow under the action of nitric acid.(q) Instances of poi- 
soning by cheese have been hitherto observed chiefly in Germany, some few in 
England, and within a few years in this country also. 

Dr. Parrish has given an account of several cases which fell under his obser- 
vation in Philadelphia.(7) A poor family, consisting of a laboring man and 
his six children, after a meal composed of tea, bread and cheese, were seized 
with severe vomiting and purging, with dizziness of the head and great prostra- 
tion of strength; the liquids discharged from the stomach and bowels were thin 
and watery, and not very dissimilar to the rice-water discharges of cholera. 
The attacks were frequent and distressing, and the cases exhibited, at first view, 
very much the appearance of poisoning from some metallic irritant. These 
symptoms occurred within an hour after partaking of the meal, and the mother 
of the family, who was alone unaffected, had been absent from dinner on that 


(p) Copland’s Dict. Am. Ed. art. Cholera. 
(q) Christison on Poisons, p. 495. (r) Trans. Col. Phys. Jan. 1851. 


D795 


§ 687] POISONOUS SHELL FISH. [BOOK V. 


day.. On the following day all Dr. P’s patients had recovered. Similar symp- 
toms having occurred in numerous instances in the same neighborhood, after 
eating cheese obtained from the same grocer, inquiry was made of him, and it 
was found that the cheese from which the deleterious slices had been cut, was 
one of a large lot from a celebrated dairy in New York, all of which up to 
that time had produced no unpleasant results, but on the contrary had been 
considered remarkably good. There was nothing in the taste or external ap- 
pearance of the remnant to indicate any poisonous properties. It was more- 
over tested by a competent chemist, and no mineral poison was detected in it. 
Dr. P. was unable to explain the sudden development of poisonous properties 
in any other way than by reference to the peculiar state of the atmosphere 
existing at the time. ‘It was in the month of January, during a spell of 
remarkably damp, foggy, and mild weather, succeeding to a cold atmosphere. 
In the two days during which these cases occurred, the air was loaded with 
moisture, and the fog on the Delaware was so heavy that the boats were very 
much impeded in crossing. Might not the softening of a mass of cheese, after 
being hardened by freezing, develop deleterious properties??? He also con- 
siders that the fact of the cheese being mild and newly made, would favor the 
changes referred to. 


IV. Potsonous Fish. 


§ 687. There can be no doubt, as Dr. Christison observes, ‘‘that the subject 
of fish poison is one of the most singular in the whole range of toxicology, 
and none is at present veiled in so great obscurity.”” In many cases it is pos- 
sible that the symptoms of poisoning may be due to the fish having been kept 
too long, in others to its mode of preparation, as by pickling or smoking ; but 
nevertheless some few cases will still remain in which the freshest and usually 
most wholesome fishes have caused symptoms of irritant poisoning. These 
cases are, however, far more common in tropical countries, their occurrence in 
this latitude being so rare, that it is reasonable to suspect either idiosynerasy 
on the part of the persons eating the fish, or some deleterious quality acquired 
by it after its removal from the water.(77) 

Ist. Oysters have not unfrequently proved dangerous. On several occasions 
in France, they appear to have become suddenly unwholesome.(s) In the 
autumn of 1854, numerous deaths in our principal cities were ascribed to their 
use, and it was generally conceded that for a period of a few weeks in the 
month of October, they frequently gave rise to choleraic symptoms. No clue 
to the nature of the poison was in this instance, or in any of the previous 
epidemics in France, obtained by chemical examination. We doubt very 
much whether crabs and lobsters acquire any peculiar poisonous quality apart 
from their general unwholesomeness as articles of food, if not eaten too long 
a time after their capture. 


(rr) Consult Moreau de Jonnés, Recherches sur les poissons toxicophores des Indes 
Occidentales, Annales de Thérapeutique, i. 461; Guillon, Abeille Méd. xiii. 67. 

(s) Mem. sur les Empoissonnements par les Huitres, les Moules, les Crabes et par 
certains Poissons de Mer et de Riviére, par A. Chevallier et E. A. Duchesne. Ann. 
d’Hyg. vol. li. : 


576 


BOOK V.] POISONOUS SHELL FISH.—UNSOUND MEAT. [$ 689 


/ 


§ 688. 2d. Mussels, however, by general consent seem to have a specific 
poisonous property accorded to them. ‘The idea that it is due to an impreg- 
nation from copper is wholly untenable, since not a trace of this metal has 
been discovered in those taken from the stomachs of persons who have been 
killed by them. Unquestionably, in many instances, idiosyncrasy is the cause 
of the mussel proving unwholesome to some individuals. This, also, is the 
conclusion at which M. Lunel arrives after a careful investigation of the sub- 
ject.(ss) But, it need hardly be remarked, that it, after all, amounts to a 
confession of our ignorance.of the efficient cause of poisoning by these shell- 
fish. 

In the cases described by Dr. Combe, of Leith, not only were the mussels 
perfectly fresh, but every person who ate those from a particular spot, was 
more or less severely affected, and even animals were poisoned by them, a 
eat and a dog having been killed by the suspected article. Dr. Christison 
was unable to detect in them any principle which did not exist in the whole- 
some mussel. Many cases descriptive of the symptoms have been reported.. 
The following is a recent one: A boy aged ten years, ate the thick part of’ 
two mussels; forty-five minutes afterwards he complained of uneasiness in his 
stomach ; he had a sensation of heat, giddiness, and a desire to vomit; there 
was an eruption of nettle-rash over the whole body as far as the knee, attended 
with swelling of the face and intolerable itching ; after an emetic, the symptoms 
disappeared completely.(¢) Very much the same symptoms were exhibited by 
the persons seen by Dr, Combe.(u) In the fatal case of an adult of intem- 
perate habits, reported by Dr. Lee, who, with his whole family, seven in num- 
ber, were poisoned by eating mussels, the attack commenced with severe distress 
in the stomach, followed by vomiting and purging, painful muscular spasms, 
with great anxiety and prostration; the pulse was frequent and feeble, the 
skin of a deep crimson or livid color, and covered with a cold, clammy sweat ; 
sleeplessness, subsultus tendinum, and delirious agitation, great heat at the 
epigastrium, the rest of the surface being cold, pupils contracted, face sunken ; 
voice and intellect unaffected until four hours before death, about which time 
vomiting of matters resembling coffee-erounds came on; death occurred about 
forty-eight hours after the time of the attack.(v) Chevallier and Duchesne 
report a number of cases of poisoning by the roes of a fish called the barbel 
(barbillon), and several cases of a similar origin are reported by Dr. Trape- 
nard.(w) The symptoms were such as would be produced by a violent emeto- 
cathartic; copious evacuations, and constant efforts to vomit, headache, 
frequent pulse, great pain, and an insupportable sensation of heat. 


V. Unsound Meat. 


§ 689. The symptoms produced by the use of unsound meat are similar to 
those arising from irritant poisoning, but in addition there are typhoid symp- 


(ss) Abeille Med. Juin, 1857, p. 173. 
(t) Guy’s Hosp. Rep. 1850, 213. (wu) Ed. Med. and Surg. Journ. xxix. 86.. 
(v) Am. ed. of Copland’s Dictionary. Art. Cholera. 
(w) Ann. d’Hyg. 1850, and Journ. de Chimie, 1851, p. 584. For a recent case, see 
Edinb. Med. Journ. April, 1860, p. 958. 
37 S77 


§ 691] | MECHANICAL IRRITANTS. [BOOK V. 


toms which indicate the contamination of the whole body by the products of 
decomposition. In some cases related by Dr. Christison, the patients were 
soporose or delirious, and one died comatose in six hours after eating a portion 
of a putrefied calf. The rest being freely purged and made to vomit, eventually 
got well; but for some time they required the most powerful stimulants to 
counteract the exhaustion and collapse which followed the attack.(~) Game 
which has been long kept may be the source of the symptoms of irritant 
poisoning. In this country the flesh of the pheasant ( Tetrao wmbellus), when 
snow is upon the ground, is apt to prove unwholesome to some, in consequence, 
as is supposed, of the bird feeding upon the leaves and berries of the laurel. 
It is doubtful, however, whether this explanation is correct. Dr. Bigelow 
suggests as probable solutions of the difficulty—1. That the bird is affected 
with some disease at the time of its death. 2. That some slow chemical 
change, not putrefactive, may take place when the flesh is long kept in cold 
weather. 3. That the idiosyncrasy of individuals renders some persons 
intolerant of this species of food.(y) Instances of arsenical poisoning resulting 
from the eating of birds who had fed upon grain steeped in a solution of this 
poison, to preserve it, are not unfrequent in England and France, where this 
process is chiefly in use. 


VI. Mechanical Irritants. 


§ 690. There is a vast number of indigestible substances, which, when 
introduced into the stomach, may give rise to fatal consequences. Pins and 
needles, and powdered glass are those which, in case of death, are most likely 
to give rise to a suspicion of their having been criminally given. Naturally, 
such questions can be reasonably raised only in the cases of children or imbecile 
persons; although, indeed, at one time, glass in powder was considered as 
extremely poisonous, and was occasionally criminally administered. Thus, in 
France, in 1808, a man was tried for poisoning his wife with this substance. 
Jt was found in the stomach, but there were other causes which might have pro- 
duced death. A negro woman, in Jamaica, attempted to poison a whole 
family with pounded glass, put into a dish of curried fish. The fact was dis- 
covered towards the end of the meal, and purgatives were given, which brought 
away large quantities of coarsely powdered bottle-glass. The persons did not 
suffer any inconvenience. Dr. Bowling, of Kentucky, obtained as much as 
eighty grains of powdered glass from the discharges of a child. It had not 
suffered at all.(z) Nevertheless, Dr. Christison reports a case in which a 
child, eleven months old, was evidently killed by it.(@) 

§ 691. Pins and needles, when swallowed, rarely cause death ; they frequently 
emerge from various parts of the body, or are found after death in the viscera. 


(x) Articles on diseased meat as affecting the health may be found in Brit. and 
For. Med.-Chir. Rev. Jan. 1858, p. 87, and in North Amer. Med.-Chir. Rev. May, 1858, 
p. 483. Duchesne has written on the unwholesomeness of poultry fed on diseased 
meat, Ann. d’Hygiéne, 2emé sér. xi. 63, and Roeser on that of over-driven cattle, Pra- 
ger Vierteljahrs. xl. anal. p. 86. 

(y) Nature in Disease, p. 287. 

(z) West. Journ. of Med. and Surg. Nov. 1848. (a) Op. cit. p. 504, 


O78 


BOOK V.] MECHANICAL IRRITANTS, [$ 691 


Thus a case is related in which a needle was found in the kidney, in another 
in the liver, in another in the heart, and in another across the cesophagus ; the 
point of it had, in the last case, penetrated the common carotid artery, and 
produced fatal hemorrhage. Sometimes, no doubt, they are thrust under the 
skin by hysterical patients, animated by a morbid desire of attracting attention 
and curiosity. They may be the accidental cause of death in many ways, but 
the most usual is that of disturbance of the digestive functions. A girl, 
twelve years of age, to avoid work swallowed pins and needles, of which 
nineteen of the former and five of the latter were passed from the bowels. 
She suffered occasional colicky pain, and had much swelling and hardness of 
the abdomen.(aa) A case is related,(b) in which a woman eventually died 
from the continued irritation produced by a quantity of needles she had 
swallowed. The stomach, which was enormously enlarged, contained n7ne 
ounces of pins of a purple-black color, and the duodenum contained a pound 
of the same.’ In the body of a lunatic who died suddenly of peritonitis, in 
the Peekham House Asylum, the following articles were found in the stomach: 
thirty-one entire spoon-handles about five inches long; four half handles, 
nine nails, varying in size from a garden wall nail to a spike nail; half of 
the iron heel of a shoe; a screw, two and a quarter inches long; four pebbles, 
and one metal button, weighing in all two pounds eight ounces. The whole 
of them were stained of a black color, and the angular articles rounded off 
and blunted. In the duodenum an entire spoon-handle was found, and here 
the perforation occurred which caused the peritonitis.(c) 

A case in which a mass of hair and string, weighing from eight to ten 
pounds, was taken from the body of a girl aged eighteen, who had been in the 
habit of swallowing these substances, is related in the same journal.(d) A 
remarkable instance of the passage of a tinned iron fork through the whole 
alimentary canal, was communicated to the French Academy of Medicine by 
Velpeau.(e) Another in which death was caused by eating raw rice.(f) M. 
Gosselin related to the Surgical Society of Paris, the case of a man who 
swallowed a clay pipe three inches and a half in length. It occupied two 
months in passing through the bowels, and, at the end of this time, it was 
discharged unbroken. But the man’s health had suffered severely from the 
irritation it had caused, and he died five days after its discharge.(g) Cases 
such as have been enumerated in this chapter, are evidently rather subjects of 
curiosity, than of any importance in legal medicine. ) 


(aa) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. Oct. 1859, p. 227. 


(6) Lancet, Am. ed. 1852, p. 224. (c) Lancet, 1852, vol. ii. p. 296. 
(d) Vol. i. 1852, p. 224. (e) Ibid. 1849, p. 246. 
(f) Ibid. April, 1847. (y) Ibid. 1851, vol. ii. -p. 462. 


579 


§ 692] NARCOTIC POISONS. | [BOOK V. 


CHAP TER t1 1. 
NARCOTIC POISONS. 


I. Opium and its Preparations. 


§ 692. Ist. The symptoms produced by a poisonous dose of opium, or its 
preparations, differ from those which are occasioned by moderate and remedial 
doses of the drug. While in the latter the purely narcotic effects do not occur 
without a certain degree of previous exhilaration and stimulation, in the former 
- dizziness and stupor are the first symptoms, or the excitement is so temporary 
as to pass unnoticed. ‘The main characteristic of poisoning by opium is the 
profound somnolence which it occasions, and which is not preceded by active 
delirium. When under the full influence of this narcotic, the patient lies in a 
deep lethargy, his eyes are closed, the pupils extremely contracted, the face 
generally pale, the limbs relaxed, and the skin moistened with copious per- 
spiration. Respiration is slow, and sometimes stertorous. If no efforts are 
made to save life, or if medical assistance is fruitless, the stupor deepens, the 
patient can no longer be even momentarily awakened, his pulse becomes feeble 
and imperceptible, and he dies comatose. Copious perspiration is a singular 
and not unfrequent symptom. It is mentioned by Christison, who says that in 
one case “the sheets were completely soaked to a considerable distance around 
the body;’’ and Dr. Morland observed it, in an equal degree, in a case he has 
reported.(A) Delirium is very rare, and, when it occurs, is of a passive cha- 
racter. In the adult, convulsions have been seldom observed, although one 
or two curious cases have been reported in which they were witnessed. In 
children, however, they are not uncommon. Occasionally spontaneous vomit- 
ing takes place, especially after the ingestion of the drug in large quantities, 
and some instances have occurred in which this early rejection of the poison 
from the stomach has saved the life of the individual. A child nine years of 
age, mentioned by Dr. Coale, recovered in this way after having swallowed 
four grains of opium and four of extract of belladonna. The pulse also varies 
in character, being usually feeble and irregular, but sometimes full and slow. 
In a case reported by Dr. J. B. 8. Jackson, it is described as “‘rapid, full, and 
throbbing.’’ Such differences depend often, probably, upon the variable periods 
at which the observation is made; thus, the skin is warm and perspiring, and 
the pulse rapid and feeble, or perhaps even strong, early in the case, while 
later, if the patient get worse, the surface becomes cold and pale, and the pulse 
slow, feeble, and irregular. Much also may depend upon the constitutional 
irritability of the system. | 

The differences between poisoning by opium and by other narcotics are 


e (h) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1854. 
580 


_ BOOK V.] POISONING BY OPIUM.—SYMPTOMS. [$ 695 


briefly these : Aconite, digitalis, and tobacco do not produce stupor, nor does 
conium, except in very large doses, and even then not uniformly. Hyoscyamus, 
stramonium, and belladonna excite violent delirium, and extreme dilatation of 
the pupil. JInebriation by alcohol bears a very close resemblance to opiate 
narcotism in many cases, but the former is preceded by confusion of ideas or 
complete delirium, and the breath is strongly tainted with the alcoholic odor. 

§ 693. The symptoms usually commence, in the adult, within an hour after 
the poison has been taken, but sometimes the confirmed narcotic effects do not 
come on until a later period. In a case quoted by Dr. Taylor, the patient was 
found totally insensible in fifteen minutes. In Dr. Lyman’s case,(7) a female, 
after taking an ounce of laudanum with suicidal intent, began very suddenly, 
in thirty-five minutes, to lose her pulse and muscular power, and. had slight 
spasms; the lips became livid, there was spasmodic dropping of the lower jaw, 
the extremities were cold, and in ten*minutes more she was unmistakably dead. 
Thus, three-quarters of an hour only elapsed from the ingestion of the lauda- 
num to her death. Dr. Coale(j) states that. he met with a case fatal in the 
same time, and Dr. Taylor quotes a similar one. Dr. Beck reports a case 
which proved fatal in two hours. Another is given which terminated in two 
hours and a half.(/) 

§ 694. 2d. The average duration of cases of poisoning by opium is stated 
by Christison to be from seven to twelve hours. The rapidity, or indeed the 
certainty, of death does not always correspond-with or depend upon the 
amount taken, when this is beyond the limits of safety. Among the cases 
above referred to is one by Dr. Jackson, which recovered, although ninety 
grains of opium were taken, and no relief was afforded for three hours after- 
wards. In the case mentioned by Dr. Taylor, of a man who had taken from 
twenty-eight to thirty grains of opium, the symptoms were so little charac- 
‘ teristic of poisoning by this drug, that no suspicion was entertained of its 
having been used, and death took place rather suddenly in ten hours after the 
fatal dose had been swallowed.(a) On the other hand, the most rapidly fatal 
case yet recorded was the one above referred to, in which only an ounce of lau- 
danum was swallowed. The fact should, however, be borne in mind, that 
laudanum, or any solution of opium, is more prompt in its effects, because it 
is more readily absorbed than solid opium. 

§ 695. 8d. Amount.—Owing to the varying susceptibility of individuals to 
the poisonous action of opium, it is not possible to state the amount which 
will be uniformly fatal. A case is referred to by Dr. Taylor, in which four 
grains proved fatal, and another in which,death was supposed to have resulted 
from a dose of two drachms of laudanum, but it was uncertain whether as much 
as half an ounce had not been swallowed. A gentleman affected with acute 
rheumatism died comatose after taking, at intervals of an hour, four pills, each 
of which contained one-third of a grain of morphia.(b) In Dr. Lyman’s case, 
one ounce of laudanum was the cause of speedy death. The smallest dose which 


(i) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1854. (j) Am. Journ. Jan. 1850, p. 73.: 
(k) Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xi. p. 285. 

(a) Med. Jurisp. 6th ed. p. 162. 

(b) Med. Times and Gazette, June, 1860, p. 254. A 


§ 695] POISONING BY OPIUM.—SYMPTOMS. [BOOK V. 


has proved fatal to a child is the one-twentieth of a grain of opium.(c) The 
child was six days old. Dr. J. B. 8. Jackson met with a case, in 1845, in 
which five drops of laudanum, injected into the rectum of a child eighteen 
months old, caused death in six hours. Instances are quoted by all the writers 
on toxicology, of death in children from extremely small doses, such as the 
one-tenth or the one-fifth of a grain, and most practitioners have witnessed 
alarming symptoms from a few drops of laudanum, or fractional doses of 
Dover’s powder, given to children. In many instances these have been dissi- 
pated only by active medical interference, such as cold affusion, galvanism, &c.(d) 

Trousseau states that he has seen narcotic effects in children from a dose of 
the wine of opium equivalent to less than the one-hundredth of a grain of this 
drug. It is well known that a child may be narcotized by the milk of a nurse 
who has taken opium. Bouchardat relates that nine new-born children were 
narcotized by the decoction of a single poppyhead. In London an infant four 
days old was destroyed by one-twentieth of a grain of opium, or about one 
drop of laudanum;(e) and in Edinburgh the same effect was produced by two 
drops of laudanum, in an infant also four days old.(/) 

The following cases prove the possibility of recovery after excessive doses of 
this drug. A gentleman seventy-two years of age recovered from the effects 
of twelve drachms of laudanum ;(g) another, aged thirty-five years, after half 
an ounce of this preparation had been taken ;(h) in a third case above an 
ounce was swallowed, and, although the symptoms were intense, the patient 
recovered, temporarily at least, with paralysis of the right side.(¢) Another 
case is reported, in which ninety grains of opium were taken by a female, who, 
however, recovered.(j) An infant of twelve months has recovered from the 
effects of seventy-two drops of laudanum ;(%) another, six days old, after two 
grains of powdered opium ;(/) and a child, not quite six years old, from a 
dose of seven and a half grains of opium, which were, however, mixed with 
an equal quantity of prepared chalk.(m) 

The tincture of opium is liable to considerable variations in strength; and 
although in adults the difference of effect will hardly, within certain limits, be 
perceivable, it may certainly be so in children, on whom this drug has, more- 
over, always a disproportionately speedy action. The quantity of soluble 
matter taken up by the menstrnum is subject to great variation, since the 
purity of the opium, its comparative strength in morphia, the strength of the 
spirit used as a solvent, and the period of the maceration, will undoubtedly 
affect the result materially. The tincture, properly prepared, should contain 
one grain in 12.8 minims, or about twenty-five drops. Godfrey’s cordial con- 


(c) Dr. E. Smith, Assoc. Med. Journ. April, 1854. 

(d) Nid. I. Young’ S case, and the references given by Dr. Hays, Am. Journ. Med. 
Sci. April, 1852, p. 426; also a very instructive case by Dr. Herapath, where respira- 
tion was artificially maintained by means of the galvanic battery until the narcotism 
passed off and the child was saved, Lancet, Am. ed. 1852, p. 450. 

(e) Times and Gazette, April, 1854, p- 386. (f) Edinb. Med. Journ. ii. 145... 

(g) Lancet, July, 1857, p. 80. 

(A) Boston. Med. and Surg. Journ. Aug. 1855, p. 21. 

(7) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. xxii. 523. . 

(j) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1854, p. 385. (k) Edinb. Med. Journ. iii. 716. 

(/) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. Dec. 1857, p. 357. 

(m) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. April, 1859, p. 367. 


082 


BOOK V.] HABIT OF TAKING OPIUM. [$ 697 


tains a little more than one grain of opium in the fluidounce.(n) Dalby’s 
carminative mixture has five minims or ten drops of laudanum in two ounces. 
The fatal consequences arising from the constant and ignorant use of these 
nostrums in domestic practice are undoubtedly very frequent. 

§ 696. 4th. The influence of ¢diosyncrasy in modifying the usual effects of 
opium are often seen, and may be of importance in legal medicine. Thus 
Grisolle states, that he saw narcotism induced ina lady by half a grain of 
opium. Dr. Christison mentions the case of a gentleman who was always 
narcotized by so little as seven drops of laudanum, and Taylor observed 
alarming symptoms from the injection in a clyster of one grain of opium. 
Some authors contend that the drug is even more active by the rectum than 
when swallowed. Some diseases render the system extremely susceptible to 
its poisonous action, and this is particularly the case in all those affections 
attended with a plethoric condition of the bloodvessels. On the other hand, 
painful diseases enable the person to use very large doses, not only without 
injury, but with positive advantage. 

§ 697. The habit of taking opium diminishes the influence of this drug 
upon the system, and doses, which in other cases would be absolutely poison- 
ous, are taken with entire impunity, by persons who indulge in this habit. 
The influence exerted by the habitual use of opium upon the duration of life, 
does not appear to be so unfavorable, as from the powerful action of the drug 
upon the system might at first be supposed.(o) The picture of the opium 
eaters and smokers of the Hast, as drawn by travellers, is indeed a melancholy 
one, and their general testimony is, that there it undoubtedly has the tendency 
to shorten life. This is the conclusion arrived at by Mr. Little of Singapore, as ;, 
the result of careful and extensive inquiries at that place of the owners of 
opium shops, of the smokers who frequented them, the prisoners in the house 
of correction, and the paupers of a poor house. The following picture of the 
effects of the habitual use of opium is drawn by this gentleman: ‘ As the 
habit grows upon its unhappy victim, the first evils experienced are disturbed 
sleep, watchfulness, giddiness, sometimes headache, capricious appetite, a white 
tongue, frequently costiveness, indescribable oppression in the chest, and hazi- 
ness of the eyes. Afterwards a copious secretion of mucus takes place from 
the eyes and often from the nose also; digestion becomes much impaired and 
micturition difficult ; a mucous discharge begins to flow from the organs of 
generation ; the sexual organs, at first preternaturally excitable, gradually lose 
their tone; the body wastes, the muscles lose their torosity, and the bones are 
affected with dull gnawing pains for some hours in the morning. By and by 
the figure stoops, and a peculiar shuffling gait is acquired, by which alone a 


(n) Wood & Bache’s Dispensatory. 

(o) This subject received particular attention from Dr. Christison in consequence 
of its importance in a remarkable civil trial. The Karl of Mar effected insurances on 
his life to a large amount while addicted to the vice of opium eating, and died two 
years afterwards of dropsy. He had used laudanum for thirty years, at times to the 
amount of two or three ounces daily, and died at the age of fifty-seven. He suffered 
greatly from rheumatism. The insurance company having been unaware of this 
habit, refused payment on the ground of its having a tendency to shorten life. The 
persons holding the policy, therefore, instituted an action against the company, which 
was decided in favor of the former, but. on other grounds. 


085 


§ 698] OPIUM EATING AND SMOKING. [BOOK Vv. 


practised eye may recognize an old opium debauchee. At the same time, the 
eyebrow droops, the lower eyelid becomes dark, the eye itself seems to sink and 
grow dim, and the whole expression is that of premature old age. In both 
sexes the procreative power is greatly lessened, and in those women who, never- 
theless, do bear children, the secretion of milk is defective. The influence of 
the habit on the generative functions is indeed so decided, that were it not for 
fresh arrivals from China and other parts of the East, the population of Singa- 
pore would very soon be seriously diminished.”’(p) Finally, according to this 
author, structural derangement is induced, the digestive and assimilative func- 
tions become very much impaired, strumous affections are readily developed, 
and the opium-smoker succumbs without resistance under any violent disease. 

Some Hastern travellers, however, assert that the habit has no tendency to 
shorten life. Thus Dr. Macpherson says, that although the habit of smoking 
opium is, in China, universal among rich and poor, we find them to be a power- 
ful, muscular, and athletic people; and Dr. Burnes, who resided several years at 
the court of Scinde, says, that “it will be found in general that the natives do 
not suffer much from the use of opium.(q) A celebrated Cutchee chief, who 
had taken opium largely all his life, was alive at the age of 80, paralyzed by 
years but his mind unimpaired.”’ 

Dr. Christison, moreover, found upon an examination of twenty-five cases, 
the particulars of which he obtained from various quarters, that instances of 
longevity among opium eaters in Great Britain were not uncommon. In 
most of these cases it is expressly stated that no injurious effect upon the 
general health was observed; in some instances, indeed, the persons being 

yruddy and robust in appearance. In a few, unpleasant symptoms were expe- 
rienced only upon the intermission of the habit. The only inference that can 
at present be drawn from the testimony of travellers, and from these observa- 
tions reported by Dr. Christison, is adverse to the general belief that opium, 
like intemperance in strong drink, has a tendency to shorten life when habit- 
ually used. . Future observation must decide whether this reasonable belief is 
really the correct one. The possibility of abruptly discontinuing the habit 
without injury to the constitution has been shown by Dr. Christison.(7) 

§ 698. 5th. Post-mortem appearances.—It is quite unnecessary to particu- 
larize the morbid alterations which have been seen in persons dying from 
poisonous doses of opium, since there are none which are sufficiently constant 
or distinctive to be attributed to this cause. As a general rule, the vessels of 
the brain and spinal marrow will be found turgescent and the lungs and other 
vascular organs congested, while the blood remains fluid. Putrefaction is 
rapid, ceteris paribus, after narcotic poisoning The multitude of diseases 
and of accidental modes of death which may occasion these conditions preclude 
us from attaching any importance to them as indicative of death from opium. 

_ Sometimes opium in substance or laudanum may be found in the stomach, or 
the latter recognized in this organ by its smell, but in the vast majority of 
cases the poison is rapidly absorbed or eliminated from the system, so that at 
the post-mortem inspection no trace of it will be found. 


(p) Edinb. Month. Journ. June, 1850. (q) Christison on Poisons. 
(rv) Edinb. Month. Journ. June, 1850. 
584 


BOOK V.] CHEMICAL EXAMINATION FOR OPIUM. [$ 701 


§ 699 6th. Potsoning by morphia or its salts requires no separate consi- 
deration. The symptoms are rather more prompt in their appearance but are 
otherwise entirely similar to those produced by opium or laudanum. The 
medicinal dose of morphia, or of its acetate, muriate, or sulphate, is one-sixth 
of a grain. Death has been caused by one grain of the muriate, taken in 
divided doses over a period of six hours,(s) and by one and one-third of a 
grain within four hours.(ss) The former dose was equal probably to six grains 
of opium. It was for poisoning with the acetate of morphia, that Castaign, 
who had formerly been a pupil of Orfila, was, in the year 1823, tried and 
executed in Paris. He was convicted less upon the medical than the circum- 
stantial evidence offered, since with the most ingenious refinement of cruelty he 
had administered tartar emetic to his victim for the purpose of getting rid of 
any of the poison which might have remained in the stomach. The medical 
testimony could only show that the symptoms and post-mortem appearances 
were not opposed to the supposition that morphia was the cause of death. 

§ 700. 7th. Chemical examination.—Opium is easily recognized by its 
familiar physical properties. As, however, it is seldom presented in a pure 
state for examination, but mingled with some form of organic matter, these 
properties can seldom enable us to distinguish it. It is important to bear in 
mind, as Casper has remarked, that the ultimate chemical constituents of 
opium are identical with those of our food, and hence may be so entirely di- 
gested that no trace of the fatal poison can be detected by chemical means in 
the body of its victim. It is necessary to describe first the properties and tests 
of morphia and meconic acid, since it is to these constituents that opium owes 
principally its poisonous qualities, and the chemical analysis is therefore di- 
rected to their separation from the substances examined. 

§ 701. 8th. Morphia.—The crystals of morphia are fansite they are 
nearly insoluble in water, and have a bitter taste. Boiling water dissolves a little 
more than one four-hundredth part of morphia ; it is nearly insoluble in ether, 
but readily soluble in sulphuric, muriatic, or acetic acid. The following are 
some of the chief characteristics of morphia, as enumerated by Pereira :— 

1. Nitric acid reddens morphia or its salts (the chlorate excepted, accord- 
ing to Dumas) and forms with them an orange-red solution, which is much 
darkened by an excess of ammonia, and which becomes yellow after a little 
time. Lallacties.—Nitric acid produces a red color with several other bodies, 
as brucia, commercial strychnia, several volatile oils (as oil of pimento and oil 
of cloves), some resinous substances, &c. 

2. Iodic acid is deoxidized by morphia, iodine being set free. Hence when 
this alkali is added to a solution of iodic acid, the liquor becomes reddish- 
brown, and forms a blue compound (iodide of starch) with starch. Jalla- 
-cies.—Sulphuretted hydrogen, sulphurous acid, phosphorous acid, sulphocya- 
nide of potassium, sulphosinapisin, and some other agents have a similar effect 
on iodic acid. Of course if the morphia be pure these fallacies have no appli- 
cation. | 
8. Neutral sesquichloride of iron dropped on crystals of morphia, renders 


(s) Ed. Month. Journ. Sept. 1846. (ss) Vid. § 695. 
585 


§ 703] DETECTION OF OPIUM IN ORGANIC MIXTURES. [BOOK V. 


them blue. If water in excess, or acids, or alkalies be added to the blue com- 
pound, the color is destroyed. It is also destroyed by heat. Fallacies.— 
Tannic and gallic acids with a little water, and infusion of cloves or pimento 
also form blue compounds with sesquichloride of iron. Dr. Carson adds to 
the above statements—“‘if toa mixture of morphia and concentrated sulphuric 
acid, a drop of bichromate of potash be added, green oxide of chrome is set 
free.’’(¢) 

§ 702. Meconic actd.—The characteristics of this acid are as follows: 1. 
It reddens the neutral sesqui-salts of iron; the red color is destroyed by alka- 
lies, protochloride of tin, and nitric acid, assisted by heat. This, which is the 
most reliabie test for meconic acid, is still also open to objection. Thus sul- 
phocyanic acid produces a similar red color with the persalts of iron. The 
force of this objection is derived from the fact that sulphocyanic acid is natu- 
rally sometimes present in the saliva. Christison, indeed, states, that ‘it is 
seldom possible to procure a distinct blood-red coloration from the saliva, 
except by evaporating a large quantity to dryness, and redissolving the resi- 
due in a small quantity of water ;’’ but Pereira dissents from this statement, 
and says, that in a large majority of cases, he has found saliva distinctly and 
unequivocally reddened by the persalts of iron. He says, moreover, that he 
has several times obtained from the stomach of subjects in the dissecting room, 
a liquor which reddened the salts of iron. We believe that the opinion of 
chemists now, is, in general, in accordance with the statements of the last 
named author. The means of distinguishing the sulphocyanate from the 
meconate is to be found in the action of chloride of gold or of corrosive subli- 
mate, since if a few drops of a solution of either of these reagents be added to 
the red liquid, the color, if due to sulphocyanic acid, will be immediately de- 
stroyed. Further, the liquid may be diluted and a few drops of a solution of 
the acetate of lead added ; a precipitate falls which is either meconate or sul- 
phocyanate of lead. ‘The former is insoluble, while the latter is quite soluble 
in acetic acid. (2) 

§ 703. 9th. Detection of opium or its constituents in organic mixtures.— 
Various processes have been recommended for this purpose. All of them 
require delicacy and skill in manipulation, but from the comparatively infre- 
quent opportunity of discovering any trace of opium in the body, we shall cite 
only the two most recent and probably the best. 

The following is the process recommended by M. Flandin for the detection 
of the vegetable poisons in organic mixtures: ‘ Mix the matter in question 
in the proportion of 12 to 100 of its weight of anhydrous lime or barytes, and 
rub them down together in a mortar; heat to perfect dryness but not to 
exceed 212° F.; treat the powdered matter, at least three times successively, 
with anhydrous, boiling alcohol, and, on cooling, filter. The liquid thus ob- 
tained is almost without color; it contains the principle or principles sought 
for, and also fatty or resinous matters soluble in alcohol. Distil or evaporate 
slowly by alcohol and treat the dry and cold residuum with ether so as to 


(t) Mat. Med. Am. ed. ii. p. 1061. 
(u) Taylor on Poisons, p. 503. For an elaborate account of the nature of the tests 
for morphia and meconic acid, the reader is referred to Dr. Taylor’s work. 


586 


BOOK V.|. | DETECTION OF OPIUM IN ORGANIC MIXTURES. [$ 704 


remove the fatty matters. If the principle sought for is insoluble in ether (as 
morphia, strychnia, brucia), it remains isolated in the liquid and can be sepa- 
rated by filtration and even simple decantation. If it be soluble in ether, then 
the principle must be obtained by a special solvent of the organic bases, as, for 
example, acetic acid, and precipitate the base finally byammonia. The chemist 
in charge must adapt his tests to the supposed substance. I submit only the 
general method. I have mixed with 100 grains of animal matter a grain, or 
even less, of morphia, strychnia, and brucia; and operating on the mixture, in 
the manner described above, have collected from the mixture ponderable por- 
tions of the above poisonous principles. Again, I have added to the animal 
matters rough opium, laudanum, a decoction of nux vomica, false angustura, 
&c., and have isolated by this method the poisonous principles perfectly pure. 
In order to satisfy myself of the satisfactory application of it to legal medicine, 
I have poisoned animals with the smallest required doses of opium, morphia, 
nux vomica, strychnia, false angustura, and brucia, and it was always possible 
to detect the poison in the contents of the stomach and intestines, and some- 
times, indeed, in the organs to which it had been carried by absorption. Ina 
special experiment I mixed two parts and a half of morphia with one hundred 
of meat, and abandoned the compound to putrefaction for two months. At 
the end of that time, using the method above described, I discovered a notable 
proportion of morphia.’’(v) 

§ 704. A still more elaborate, and perhaps more perfect process, is detailed 
by Professor Stas, of Brussels, justly distinguished for his admirable reports 
in the Bocarmé case: ‘‘ The method I now propose for detecting the alkaloids 
in suspected matters, is nearly the same as that employed for extracting those 
bodies from the vegetables which contain them. ‘The only difference consists 
in the manner of setting them free, and of presenting them to the action of | 
solvents. We know that the alkaloids form acid salts, which are equally solu- 
ble in water and alcohol; we know also that a solution of these acid salts can 
be decomposed, so that the base set at liberty remains either momentarily or 
permanently in solution in the liquid. I have observed that all the solid and 
fixed alkaloids above enumerated, when maintained in a free state and in solu- 
tion, in a liquid, can be taken up by ether when this solvent is in sufficient 
quantity. Thus, to extract an alkaloid from a suspected substance, the only 
problem to resolve consists in separating, by the aid of simple means, the 
foreign matters, and then to find a base, which, in rendering the alkaloid free, 
retains it in solution, in order that the ether may extract it from the liquid. 
Successive treatment by water and alcohol of different degrees of concentra- 
tion, suffices for separating the foreign matters, and obtaining in a small bulk 
a solution in which the alkaloid can be found. The bicarbonates of potash or 
soda, or these alkalies in a caustic state, are convenient bases for setting the 
alkaloids at liberty, at the same time keeping them wholly in solution, espe- 
cially if the alkaloids have been combined with an excess of tartaric or of 
oxalic acid.’”? To put in practice the principles thus explained, the following 
method is proposed. ‘I suppose that we wish to look for an alkaloid in the 


(v) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci. Oct. 1853, p. 542, from the Comptes Rendus. 
587 


§ 704] STAS.—-DETECTION OF ALKALOIDS. [BOOK V. 


contents of ‘the stomach or intestines; we commence by adding to these mat- 
ters twice their weight of pure and very strong alcohol; we add afterwards, 
according to the quantity and nature of the suspected matter from ten to thirty 
grains of tartaric or oxalic acid—im preference, tartaric; we introduce the mix- 
ture into a flask, and heat it to 160° or 170° Fahrenheit. After it has com- 
pletely cooled it is to be filtered, the insoluble residue washed with strong 
alcohol, and the filtered liquid evaporated in vacuo, or it may be exposed to a 
strong current of air at a temperature of not more than 90° Fahrenheit. If, 
after the volatilization of the alcohol, the residue contains fatty or other in- 
soluble matters, the liquid is to be filtered a second time, and then the filtrate 
and washings of the filter evaporated in the air-pump till nearly dry. If we 
have no air-pump, it is to be placed under a bell-jar, over a vessel containing 
concentrated sulphuric acid. We are then to treat the residue with cold anhy- 
drous alcohol, taking care to exhaust the substance thoroughly; we evaporate 
the alcohol in the open air at the ordinary temperature, or still better, in 
vacuo; we now dissolve the acid residue in the smallest possible quantity of 
water, and introduce the solution into a small test-tube, and add little by little 
pure powdered bicarbonate of soda or potash, till a fresh quantity produces no 
further effervescence of carbonic acid. We then agitate the whole with four or 
five times its bulk of pure ether, and leave it to settle. When the ether swim- 
ming on the top is perfectly clear, then decant some of it into a capsule, and 
leave it in a very dry place to spontaneous evaporation.” If the suspected 
alkaloid is solid and fixed, there may be or nota residue containing it. If 
there is, a solution of caustic potash or soda should be added to the liquid, 
and agitated briskly with ether. “This dissolves the vegetable alkaloid, 
now free, and remaining in the solution of potash or soda. In either case, we 
exhaust the matter with ether. Whatever be the agent which has set the 
alkaloid free—whether it be the bircarbonate of soda or potash, or caustic soda 
or potash—it remains, by the evaporation of the ether on the side of the cap- 
sule, as a solid body, but more commonly a colorless milky liquid, holding solid 
‘matters in suspension. The odor of the substance is animal, disagreeable, but 
not pungent. It turns litmus paper permanently blue.” 

In order now to obtain the solid alkaloid in a crystalline state, the foreign 
matters, with which it is generally solid, must be first removed. Prof. Stas, 
to accomplish this purpose, adds a few drops of water feebly acidulated with 
sulphuric acid, to the contents of the capsule, and thus forms an acid sulphate, 
which should be carefully decanted, evaporated in vacuo or over sulphuric 
acid, the residue treated with pure carbonate of potash, and the alkaloid dis- 
solved out by absolute alcohol. The evaporation of the alcohol gives the 
alkaloid in crystals. By this process, Prof. Stas has isolated all the impor- 
tant fixed alkaloids previously mixed with foreign matters.(w) For the 
mode of obtaining the volatile alkaloids, the reader is referred to the article 
NIcOTINA. 


(w) Am. Journ. of Pharmacy, Jan. 1853. 
588 


BOOK V.] HYDROCYANIC OR PRUSSIC ACID. [$ 707 


II. Hydrocyanic, or Prussic Acid. 


§ 705. Ist. Qualities.—The extreme energy of this poison in small doses 
is well known. ‘The medicinal acid directed by the United States Pharmaco- 
peeia contains two per cent. of pure anhydrous acid. Very nearly the same 
proportion exists in the formulas of the British pharmacopceias. Scheele’s 
acid, for medicinal use, should contain five per cent. of real hydrocyanic acid, 
but as sold, it is said usually not to exceed the strength of two per cent. The 
dilute hydrocyanic acid is a transparent, colorless, volatile liquid. 

Its taste is described by Dr. Christison as acrid and pungent, and by others 
as hot or bitter; but it is probable, as remarked by Dr. Taylor, that the taste 
may be unperceived, when the dilute acid is taken in a fatal dose, concealed in 
porter or medicine. 

Its odor is popularly supposed to resemble that of bitter almonds, but this 
notion is incorrect. It may have something of this odor, sufficient perhaps 
to recall it, and this peculiar smell may be recognized by some persons and not 
by others, but the impression usually made by it is indistinct, with the excep- 
tion of a peculiar involuntary constriction of the fauces. The character of 
the odor is an important consideration in cases of supposed poisoning by 
prussie acid. If distinctly recognized by more than one person about the 
mouth of the deceased, or upon opening the body, it may afford strong reason 
for supposing that death was caused by this agent. But, as will be presently 
seen, this evidence is not obtained in every case. 

§ 706. 2d. Symptoms.—The rapidity with which this poison acts upon the 
system hardly allows of the observation of successive symptoms. Where in- 
sensibility is not immediately produced, it is preceded by faintness, giddiness, 
loss of muscular power, and sometimes by convulsions. In other cases, the 
patient being found insensible, it is impossible to know the previous symp- 
toms. When seen at this time, the eyes are fixed and glistening, the pupils 
dilated and unaffected by light, the limbs flaccid, the skin cold, and covered 
with a clammy perspiration ; there is convulsive respiration at long intervals, 
between which the patient appears lifeless; the pulse is imperceptible, and in- 
voluntary evacuations occasionally take place. The respiration is slow, deep, 
gasping, and sometimes heaving or sobbing. This description, which is ap- 
plicable to the greater number of cases, we have borrowed from Dr. Taylor. 
It should be added, that there is usually rigidity of the jaws, which has some- 
times effectually prevented the administration of antidotes. 

§ 707. 3d. The period at which death takes place is usually within an 
~ hour, seldom indeed exceeding three quarters of an hour. A man drank from 
a phial containing prussic acid, while embracing his wife; he died in fifteen 
minutes.(~) Seven epileptic patients, who were accidentally poisoned with this 
acid, died in convulsions within three-quarters of an hour.(y) In most cases, 
however, death occurs in a few minutes; and if life be prolonged for a period 
of three-quarters of an hour, recovery may take place. The rapidly fatal 
character of this poison is, indeed, one of its most striking features. From 


(x) Pharm. Journ., Aug. 1851. (y) Orfila, vol. ii. 286. 
589 


S 708] PRUSSIC ACID.—SYMPTOMS. [BOOK VY. 


experiments upon animals, it was supposed at one time that prussic acid was, 
necessarily, almost immediately fatal. Animals, poisoned by it, die within 
a few seconds. In man, however, although the symptoms often commence 
in the act of swallowing, they may also not be perceived for one or two 
minutes. 

§ 708. Upon this fact depends often an important question, bearing upon 
the voluntary or homicidal nature of the poisoning, since it may become evi- 
dent, from circumstantial evidence, that the deceased has retained conscious- 
ness and voluntary power for a certain length of time after swallowing the 
poison. In Mr. Burnam’s case, mentioned further on, insensibility did not 
occur for two minutes after the poison was swallowed, and that in the largest 
dose yet recorded. In the case of a girl, aged seventeen, the servant of a 
chemist, who was seen by the reporter when already insensible, the retention 
of consciousness for a short period, was proved by circumstantial evidence. 
In turning up the feather bed, after the body had been removed from it, a 
prussic acid bottle, with the stopper in, was found between it and the mattress, 
near the centre; it contained about eight drops of the acid. The girl’s mis- 
tress stated, that about twenty minutes after the girl had left her, she was 
proceeding up stairs to bed, when, in passing the girl’s room door, she heard 
a moaning noise; she entered the room, and found her lying in bed, with her 
clothes on, and the bedclothes drawn up to her face, apparently ‘“‘ gasping for 
breath.”’? She instantly gave the alarm. ‘The evidence adduced proved, as 
far as could be proved, that she had swallowed an ounce of the acid, re-corked 
the phial, thrust it to full arm’s length between the feather bed and the mat- 
tress, got into bed, and then drew the clothes over her body, and there appeared 
to have been no convulsions.’’(z) Dr. Sewell reports, in the same journal, 
the interesting account of a gentleman who swallowed seven drachms of the 
medicinal acid, equal to twenty-one grains of Scheele’s acid. It was proved 
that after taking the poison he had walked from the table in the middle of the 
room to the door, unlocked it, called for assistance, and then returning to a 
sofa in the room, stretched himself upon it. Here he was found lying as if 
in a profound slumber, his legs crossed, his arms by his side, and his eyelids 
firmly closed. The eyes were more brilliant than during life, and continued 
so until the next day. His face was livid, and the lips very blue; the muscles 
were all relaxed.(a) A young man swallowed, in his bedroom, a dose equi- 
valent to 2.54 grains. He then descended thirty steps, and walked about 
twenty paces, before he became powerless. He was endeavoring to open the 
front door of the house to go out, when he suddenly fell. The only symp- 
toms observed by a person present were, that “he threw his arms about, and 
made a noise in breathing, fetching it hard; he very soon became still.”’(b) 
A case which is characterized by Dr. Taylor as one of the most extraordinary 
on record in this respect, is that related by Mr. Godfrey: “A gentleman, aged 
forty-four, swallowed, it was supposed, half an ounce of prussic acid (strength 
not stated), but certainly a quantity sufficient to destroy life. After taking it 


(z) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xxxii. p. 528. Leithead. 
(a) Ibid. vol. xxxvii. p. 320. 
(0) Lowe, Guy’s Hospital Rep , 1846, p. 490. 

590 


BOOK V.| FATAL DOSE OF PRUSSIC ACID. [$ 710 


from the bottle, he walked ten paces to the top of a flight of stairs, descended 
the stairs, seventeen in number, and went to a druggist’s shop at forty-five 
paces’ distance, where he had previously bought the poison, entered the shop, 
and said, in his usual tone of voice, ‘I want some more of that prussic acid !’ 
He then became insensible, and died in from five to ten minutes after taking 
the poison.”” ‘There were no convulsions. 

Such cases as these (and more might be quoted) fairly prove the untenable 
nature of the notion, that any acts indicative of design, committed after the 
poison had been swallowed, cannot be attributed to the deceased. Many 
simple acts, like those noted, can be easily performed in a very short space of 
time, and scarcely take anything away from the fearfully rapid character of 
this poison. 

Another fallacy, derived from the result of experiments on animals, is 
the supposition that death from prussic acid is always preceded by a shriek! 
There is no case in the human subject which attests any such fact; on the 
contrary, in the vast majority of cases, there are neither general convulsions, 
as is common in animals, nor any unusual cry, but on the contrary, death 
comes on in a placid manner, the patient passing away without a struggle. 
The convulsions which were observed in the seven epileptic patients, already 
referred to, may, with some probability, be referred to their constitutional pre- 
disposition. In a case of suicide by a dose equivalent to eight grains (reported 
by Dr. J. G. Fleming), the appearance of the body was most strikingly 
like life, even the natural color had not left the cheek, the features were 
composed, and the limbs relaxed. There evidently could. have been no con- 
vulsions.(¢c) — 

§ 709. 4th. The smallest quantity of anhydrous prussic acid capable of 
destroying life has so far, from actual observation, proved to be about nine- 
tenths of a grain. ‘This was the amount which destroyed a woman mentioned 
by Mr. Hicks.(d) Life was extinct in twenty minutes. This quantity is equal 
to fifty drops of acid of the strength of two per cent. Other cases have been 
reported in which most alarming symptoms ensued from smaller doses.(e) In 
any case in which it appears that a death has resulted from a small quantity, 
it is highly important, if we would avoid errors, that the real strength of the 
acid should be ascertained by an analysis of the sample remaining. 

§ 710. 5th. Instances of recovery from very large doses have been recorded. 
Dr. Christison has reported a case in which, with great difficulty, a gentleman 
was restored who had taken between a grain and a half and two grains of 
the anhydrous acid ;(/) and, still more recently, Mr. W. H. Burnam commu- 
nicated to the Lancet a very interesting history of the recovery of his father 
from accidentally taking a drachm of Scheele’s acid, which was found, upon 
analysis, to contain 2.4 grains of anhydrous acid.(g) Mr. Nunneley, also, 
has reported a case of recovery from one grain and a third of anhydrous 
acid.(h) One curious fact, in relation to the size of the dose, should not be 
forgotten, viz., that a comparatively small dose will produce equally fatal 


(c) Ed. Monthly Journ. July, 1846. (d) Lond. Med. Gaz. xxxv. 896. 
(e) Vid. Taylor on Poisons. (f) Med. Gaz. 1850, 917. 
(g) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. April, 1854. (A) Taylor. 


O91 


§ 712] PRUSSIC ACID.—POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK V. 


results with a large one, it being highly probable, from the cases so far 
recorded, that all doses over one grain are capable of destroying life with 
equal certainty and rapidity. The limits of safety, in the use of prussic acid, 
are easily passed, and the formidable symptoms occasioned by it, develop them- 
selves with wonderful rapidity ; hence, too great caution cannot be observed 
in its administration, with remedial views, in medical practice. 

M. Regnauld relates the case of a young man who was poisoned by the 
vapor of prussic acid disengaged from a mixture of the ferrocyanide of potas- 
sium and sulphuric acid. The symptoms were those of asphyxia, rather than 
of the nervous prostration which usually accompanies poisoning from the 
internal use of prussic acid. (hh) 

§ 711. 6th. Post-mortem appearances.—The face is either lived or pale ; 
the lips and nails blue; and the skin of the neck, back, and shoulders, much 
discolored. The jaws are firmly closed; the muscles of the hands and feet 
contracted, and cadaveric rigidity comes on sooner and is more perfect than 
usual. The eyes have a peculiar brilliant and glistening appearance, the 
pupils are widely dilated, and foam is sometimes seen about the mouth. LEyvi- 
dence of involuntary evacuation of the bladder and rectum is not unfrequently 
observed: ‘The veins of the brain are found turgescent, and the lungs are 
congested with a very dark colored blood. Orfila says that the mucous mem- 
brane of the air-passages has generally a dark-red color, which cannot be 
removed by washing, and the bronchial tubes are filled to their extremities 
with a bloody froth. The heart presents nothing abnormal. The mucous 
membrane of the stomach is, in perhaps the majority of cases, highly reddened, 
and this deepening of color may extend for some distance into the intestinal 
tube. In a case reported by Jochner, and in a few others, a chocolate colored 
fluid had been found in the stomach. ‘The blood is generally dark and fluid, 
sometimes also of a purplish color. It will readily be seen how insignificant 
are the pathological alterations found in those who have been killed by prussic 
-acid. There is no one of the appearances here noted which may not be met 
with in death from many other causes, and especially in sudden death by some 
mode of asphyxia. 

§ 712. The only circumstance which is at all deserving of attention, and 
which merits a separate consideration, is the presence or absence of the odor 
of prussicacid. It maybe at once stated that where this odor is unequivocally 
detected, the evidence is satisfactory, since it is of so peculiar a character as 
not to be readily mistaken for anything else. Unfortunately, however, it is 
not always discovered, even in well attested cases of poisoning by this sub- 
stance. ‘The odor is sometimes observed about the mouth and nostrils of the 
deceased, and is not perceived in the stomach. This was the case, in an 
instance reported by Jochner, of a young man who committed suicide by this 
poison. On the other hand, the stomach may exhale the odor of prussic acid 
and none be perceived about the mouth or in the room. This was noted in the 
case reported by Mr. Hicks, in which, moreover, the examination of the body 
was not made until ninety hours after death. On opening the chest, the odor 


(hh) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. Oct. 1852, p. 561. 
592 


BOOK V.| - ODOR OF PRUSSIC ACID. [S$ 7138 


was more plainly perceived than in any other part of the body, and the fluid 
contained in the stomach smelt very strongly of prussic acid.(¢) In none of 
the epileptic patients before mentioned was the odor of prussic acid disco- 
vered in any part of the body. The inspection was made twenty-four hours 
after death. Dr. Christison’s case of recovery from a large dose may be 
referred to here, as corroborative of these facts; the first liquid drawn from 
the stomach by the tube which he introduced, gave indications of the presence 
. of prussic acid, on analysis, but not by any peculiar odor, although there was 
none other by which it might have been concealed. The stomach of Sarah 
Hart, poisoned by Tawell, had no odor of prussic acid, yet one grain of anhy- 
drous acid was obtained, by distillation, from its contents, consisting partly 
of apple pulp: In the greater number of cases, however, there can be no 
doubt that it is readily distinguishable, since in some it has been so strong 
as to seriously affect the bystanders. The circumstances which cause these 
singular variations have not been thoroughly investigated. It is supposed, 
very naturally, that the length of time the person has survived after taking 
the poison, and the interval elapsing between death and the inspection of 
the body, must, as well as the dose, have an influence upon the preservation 
of the odor. But it is evident that these conjectures are not entirely satis- 
factory, since not only has the odor been detected after as long an interval as — 
seven days, but, on the other hand, it has not been detected even where the 
presence of the acid has been demonstrated by chemical analysis. It is pro- 
bable that in these cases it may have been fixed by a base. 

§ 713. Hydrocyanic acid may be obtained from many vegetables, particularly 
those belonging to the sub-orders Amygdalee and Pomex ;(j) as from bitter 
almonds, apple-pips, the kernels of peaches, apricots, cherries, plums, and the 
flowers of the peach, and cherry-laurel, and from the bark of the wild cherry, 
and the root of the mountain-ash. Prussic acid does not exist ready formed in 
these plants, but is the result of the reaction of water upon amygdalin. Hence, 
if any of the above substances are found in the stomach, the question may arise 
whether the. indications of the presence of prussic acid are due to them or to 
the acid swallowed as such. The only manner in which doubt arising from 
this circumstance can be satisfied, is by obtaining, by chemical analysis, a larger 
quantity of the acid from the contents of the stomach, than these substances 
could afford. It is extremely improbable that death should result from the 
ingestion of any of these articles except in such a large quantity as to ob- 
viously preclude the idea of prussic acid in substance having been taken. 

It has been stated that this acid may be produced spontaneously from unsound 
cheese; but Dr. Taylor was unable, by experiment upon numerous samples of 
decayed cheese, to find any evidence of it. The notion, also, that it may be a 
spontaneous product of animal decomposition, is timidly advanced by Orfila, but 
has not as yet received the necessary confirmation. It is also said to be pro- 
duced by the action of nitric acid on alcohol. This fact was clearly ascer- 
tained by M. de Claubry, who observed the serious effects of the vapor upon 


(7) Med. Gaz. xxxvi. 460. (j) Pereira. 
88 593 


§ 717] CHEMICAL TESIS FOR PRUSSIC ACID. [BOOK V. 


_ the health of the workmen engaged in the manufacture of bees hint 
ether. (Z) 

§ 714. While these objections must be allowed their full force in cases where 
their applicability can be shown, it by no means follows that, where no chemical 
process further than mere distillation is employed, and where none of the organic 
matters above mentioned are found in the stomach, that the distinct evidence 
of the presence of prussic acid, by odor and by the simple chemical reactions to 
be presently noticed, ought not to be perfectly satisfactory. .Moreover, if the _ 
mode of death be known, these objections will fall away of themselves. If, 
however, none of the circumstances preceding death can be ascertained, and 
neither the odor of prussic acid nor its reactions with the established tests be 
recognized, it may certainly become a question of serious import, whether the 
traces of it found afterwards may not be due to some other cause than its 
ingestion into the stomach. Thus, if the contents of the stomach be subjected 
to distillation, with an acid, it may possibly happen that the sulphocyanide 
of potassium, which sometimes exists in minute traces in the saliva, may be 
decomposed, and evidence of prussic acid be thus obtained. For the value of 
these objections, we must refer the reader to the more detailed treatises on 
Poisons, especially to those of Drs. Christison and Taylor, and to Orfila’s 
Médicine Légale and Toxicologie. 

§ 115. Bitter almonds.—A lad of fifteen, the son of a wholesale grocer, got 
access to a cask of bitter almonds, and consumed a large quantity of them with 
sugar. After a time, but how long is not known, he felt a pleasing sensation, 
then became suddenly giddy, fell down, and lost his consciousness ‘and recol- 
lection. He was found lying insensible near the cask. Ammonia and car- 
bonate of potash were successively administered and the stomach pump em- 
ployed. By these means he was much relieved. Emetics were then given, and 
he threw off, in the course of half an hour, as much as ezght ounces, Troy, of 
bitter almonds. (/) 

§ 716. 7th. Chemical tests.—The best tests for hydrocyanic acid are three 
in number. They are equally adapted to its detection in its simple state and 
mixed with organic liquids. In the latter case, if the vapor cannot be detected 
by the tests, the liquid must be filtered and reduced by distillation, the acid 
being fixed by caustic potash or nitrate of silver. 

§ 717. (1.) The tron test.—Add sufficient caustic potash to the 2h ae 
acid to saturate it; then a solution of some proto and sesqui salt of iron, 
such as the partially oxidized sulphate of iron; a dirty green or brownish 
precipitate falls, Then add diluted sulphuric or hydrochloric acid, when 
Prussian blue will immediately appear if hydrocyanic acid is present. If 
this be in very small quantity in the liquid, the color will be bluish green, 
but a blue precipitate will gradually fall. By means of this test Dr. 
Christison discovered prussic acid in the liquid first withdrawn from the 
stomach by the stomach pump, although there was no smell of it upon the 
breath or upon the person, and only a very equivocal odor in the liquid 
itself. Two drops of the solution of potash were added to half an ounce of 


(k) Ann. d’Hyg., 1839, ii. p. 350. (1) Ed. Month. Journ. Oct. 1850, p. 379. 
594 


BOOK V.]| SILVER TEST. [§ 718 


the clear fluid, then a few drops of the two sulphates of iron mixed in the 
proportion of one equiv. of sesquioxide sulphate, and two of the protoxide 
sulphate, and, lastly, a single drop of sulphuric acid. A considerable precipi- 
tate of Prussian blue was obtained instantly and characteristically.(m) Dr. 
Carson observes that this test will detect hydrocyanic acid when it is mixed 
with common salt, or other chlorides which interfere with the reaction of 
nitrate of silver. It is, on the whole, a delicate test when properly employed ; 
but a frequent cause of failure in its application is the addition of too much 
potash, or of the iron salt. The Prussian blue formed is decomposed by an 
excess of potash, and if the quantity of iron be too large, the liquid, when the 
surplus oxide of iron is dissolved by an acid, will acquire a yellow color, and 
give a greenish tint to the small quantity of Prussian blue formed at the expense 
of the hydrocyanic acid. The vapor of prussic acid may also be detected by 
this test, by means of the following expedient: Put a drop of the solution of 
potash in a small white saucer, and invert it over another containing a portion 
of the suspected liquid. After two or three minutes, or more if the acid be 
much diluted, remove the upper saucer and drop on the potash a drop of the 
solution of the green sulphate of iron; agitate and expose to the air for a 
few seconds; add one or two drops of dilute muriatic acid, to dissolve the 
surplus oxide of iron, and if hydrocyanic acid is present, a trace of Prussian 
blue will appear. This test may be conjoined with the silver test, both in its 
application to the liquid and to the vapor, for if the cyanide of silver formed 
in that test be decomposed by muriatic acid, prussic acid being liberated will 
of course give the reactions just described. 

§ 718. (2.) The silver test.—The nitrate of silver causes, in a liquid con- 
taining prussic acid, a clotted white precipitate of the cyanide of silver, which 
is known by its solubility in boiling nitric acid, by its decomposition by 
muriatic acid, and by its evolving cyanogen gas (known by its inflammability 
and flame of a carmine color) when carefully dried and heated in a small re- 
duction tube drawn to a fine point. The vapor of prussic acid may be detected 
also by this test. A watch-glass may be moistened with nitrate of silver, and 
inverted over a vessel containing this acid; very soon an opaque white film of 
the cyanide of silver forms upon the moistened spot. Dr. Taylor states that 
one drop of the officinal acid (containing less than =5th of a grain of the 
anhydrous acid) produces speedily a visible effect. 

M. O. Henry has also suggested the following method of determining 
whether the precipitate contains the cyanide of silver. From one-third to 
one-half of a grain of the precipitate should be boiled for five or six minutes 
in a small tube with half its weight of chloride of sodium or potassium, and 
six or seven fluidrachms of distilled water. If the precipitate contains a 
cyanide, an insoluble chloride of silver and a soluble cyanide of sodium or po- 
tassium will be formed. The latter being filtered, treated with a small quantity 
of freshly prepared green hydrated oxide of iron, is heated again and filtered. 
It then contains a ferrocyanide of potassium or sodium, and, if treated by a 


(m) Med. Gaz. 1850, p. 917. 
595 


§ 719] LIEBIG’S TEST. [BOOK V. 


salt of the sesquioxide of iron, gives a Prussian blue color, and, if by the 
sulphate of the deutoxide of copper, a chestnut-colored precipitate. 

M. Henry and M. Hubert have also proposed the following very satisfactory 
test. The cyanide of silver having been prepared according to the method 
referred to above, and thoroughly dried, is introduced into a tube closed at 
one end, and from five to seven inches long, and containing at its closed ex- 
tremity about half the weight of the cyanide in iodine. On heating this end 
of the tube very gently, beautiful snow-white crystals of iodide of cyanogen 
are deposited upon the cool portions of the tube. (mm) 

§ 719. (3.) The sulphur, or Liebig’s test.—This test was first proposed 
by Liebig, and is the most delicate one yet discovered, as it will not only in- 
dicate the presence of prussic acid when no odor can be perceived, but when 
the other tests have failed to detect it. Dr. Taylor says that it detected 
clearly so small a quantity as the 0.3930th of a grain, and that in an experi- 
ment in which ten drops of a liquid containing only one 473d part of a grain 
of anhydrous prussic acid, produced the characteristic reaction with hydro- 
sulphuret of ammonia in five minutes. ‘The manner of applying the test is 
as follows: “Ifa small quantity of hydrosulphuret of ammonia (containing a 
little excess of sulphur) be added to a few drops of the solution of prussic 
acid, and the mixture be gently warmed, it becomes colorless, and, on evapo- 
ration, leaves sulphocyanate of ammonia, the sulphocyanic acid being indicated. 
by the intense blood-red color produced on adding to the residue a solution of 
a persalt of iron; this color immediately disappears on adding one or two 
drops of a solution of corrosive sublimate. This test is very delicate, and it 
therefore requires some care in its application; thus, if the boiling and evapo- 
ration be not carried far enough, the persalt of iron will be precipitated black 
by the undecomposed hydrosulphuret of ammonia; and if the heat be carried 
too far, the sulphocyanate of ammonia may itself undergo decomposition and 
be lost.”(n) “The great utility of the sulphur test, however, is in its appli- 
cation to the detection of the minutest portion of prussic acid when in the 
state of vapor. In this respect it surpasses any process yet discovered. In 
order to apply it we place the diluted prussic acid in a watch-glass, and invert 
over it another watch-glass, holding in its centre one drop of the hydrosul- 
phuret of ammonia. No change apparently takes place in the hydrosulphuret; 
but if the watch-glass be removed after the lapse of from half a minute to ten 
minutes, according to the quantity and strength of prussie acid present, 
sulphocyanate of ammonia will be obtained on gently heating the drop of 
hydrosulphuret, and evaporating it to dryness. With an acid of from three 
to five per cent. the action is completed in ten seconds. The addition of one 
drop of persulphate of iron to the dried residue brings out the blood-red color 
instantly, which is intense in proportion to the quantity of sulphocyanate 
present. When the prussic acid is excessively diluted, the warmth of the 


(mm) Bull. de Acad. de Méd. xxii. 350. 

(n) The terms in the text, “hydrosulphuret of ammonia,” and “sulphocyanate of 
ammonia,” should more properly be sulphide of ammonium, and sulphocyanide of 
ammonium, or rhodanide of ammonium. 


596 


BOOK V.] DETECTION OF PRUSSIC ACID AFTER DEATH, ($ 721 


hand may serve to expedite the evolution of the vapor.”(0) The tests for 
the vapor are equally applicable to organic mixtures and to the detection of 
the poison in the blood, secretions, or soft tissues. 

§ 720. (4.) Detection after death.— Notwithstanding the readiness with 
which prussic acid undergoes decomposition, it has been detected in the body 
after death. Rieckher detected it in the contents of the stomach by the sul- 
phur test, twenty-four hours after death. (p) 

Mr. West was able to detect it, on distillation, by the odor and the silver 
and iron tests, twenty-three days after death, although no pains had been taken 
to insure its preservation.(qg) In the following case it will be seen that it was 
detected after about the same period of time. 

A young man of Tours having purposely poisoned himself with medicinal 
hydrocyanic acid of the twelfth degree, of which he appeared to have swal- 
lowed about twenty-five grammes, M. Brame was called upon, after the lapse 
of three weeks, for the purpose of trying whether it was possible to detect 
hydrocyanie acid in the body. He was able to detect and estimate a consider- 
able quantity of this poison which had remained in the stomach. By the 
addition of neutral and pure nitrate of silver, there was formed an abundance 
of a flocculent and yellowish precipitate, which, well washed and dried under 
the air-pump, and then heated for a few seconds on a sand-bath, assumed a 
gray color. This precipitate was soluble in ammonia and cyanide of potas- 
sium. Decomposed hot with potassium, cyanide of potassium was formed, 
with which it was easy to obtain hydrocyanic acid and Prussian blue. Sus- 
pended in water, and subjected to the action of a current of hydrosulphuric 
acid, it gave rise to a clear and limpid solution of hydrocyanic acid when the 
sulphuret formed had been separated by filtration. By means of hydrochloric 
acid, hydrocyanic acid could be obtained from it of a very powerful odor, and 
the vapor of which formed a white precipitate in a solution of nitrate of 
silver; the precipitate was soluble in ammonia. ‘The first precipitate, heated 
in a lamp, in a narrow tube closed at one end, gave hydrocyanic acid and a 
few drops of water, &c. This same precipitate, gently heated with caustic 
potassa, gave rise to no disengagement of ammonia. 

In this case the hydrocyanic acid had remained in the stomach three weeks 
after burial. It did not appear to have entered into any chemical combination. 
There was a very considerable quantity of it, for, says M. Brame, “I was 
able to collect about 0.60 of cyanide of silver, or nearly 0.120 of hydrocyaniec 
acid.”(7) In the “Haglesham’’ poisoning case it was detected in the stomach 
of the body which had been buried fourteen days;(r7) and in a recent German 
ease three weeks after death.(s) 

§ 721. 8th. The essential oz! of bitter almonds is most active as a poison, 
and has repeatedly been the cause of death. It is stated that in one year the 
daily papers of London furnished accounts of ten cases of poisoning by it. 


(o) Taylor on Poisons, p. 548. 

(p) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht fiir 1852, Bd. vii. p. 49. 

(q) Prov. Med. Journ. July 23, 1845. : 

(r) The Chemist, Feb. 1855, from Comptes Rendus, No. 20, Nov. 13, 1854, by M. Brame. 
(rr) Edinb. Med. Journ. iv. 163. ? . 

(s) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. April, 1860, p. 531. ve 


§ 722) OIL OF BITTER ALMONDS. [BOOK V. 


Dr. Maclagan, who has made some valuable observations respecting it,(ss) 
states that the ordinary commercial essential oil of bitter almonds consists 
of a peculiar oil (hydruret of benzule), to which its peculiar aroma and 
pungency are due, associated with anhydrous prussic acid. The hydrocyanic 
acid can be separated from the hydruret of benzule without impairing the 
peculiar flavor of the oil, and yet leaving it comparatively innocuous. Much 
of the difference of opinion which has reigned as to this fact arises from the 
circumstance that by merely agitating the oil with a large excess of lime or 
caustic potash, and distilling it, the prussic acid is not sufficiently separated. 
A salt of iron should be employed, which fixes it more effectually. Dr. Macla- 
gan made experiments upon dogs with the oil thus rectified, and found that 
when no trace of prussic acid could be detected by the iron test, it was not 
poisonous. The following are the most prominent of his conclusions: 1. That 
the poisonous action of the unrectified oil is essentially due to the hydrocyanic 
acid which it contains. 2. That the oil really free from prussic acid, in doses 
of a few drops, does not act as a poison on animals generally. 3. That 
although the rectified oil, in doses of a drachm and upwards, does prove 
fatal to rabbits, yet that on dogs, whose organization renders them much 
better subjects for testing the probable effects of the substance on man, doses 
even so large as three drachms of the oil, entirely or nearly free from prussic 
acid, produce no other effect than a little vomiting, and do not cause death, or 
even dangerous symptoms. 

The same results have in the main been obtained by other chemists, particu- 
larly Wohler and Frerichs. 

Why the deadly ingredient should be allowed to remain in it, if it can be 
so readily removed, it is not easy to understand. The placing of restrictions 
upon the sale of this and other articles of a pernicious character, for the pur- 
pose of flavoring or ornamenting articles of food, appears to us to be of still 
more urgent importance than any restraint upon the sale of arsenic and similar 
poisons, which cannot be employed except for destructive purposes. In the 
latter case means are readily found to obtain the required poison; while in 
the former, experience has shown that equal brilliancy of color and delicacy of 
flavor can be obtained from harmless substances as from the deadly poisons 
in universal and daily use in this country and England. Prussiec acid is 
too potent a poison to be distributed to cooks and confectioners, disguised 
with the pleasant odor of bitter almonds; the most ordinary prudence and 
humanity would seem to demand that it should not be used thus freely and 
incautiously. 

§ 722. The following are a few of the instances in which the oil of bitter 
almonds has produced fatal results :— 

A child, eight and a half years old, took a teaspoonful of rata/fia, containing 
seven drops of the oil of bitter almonds. She became immediately insensible, 
but had no spasms; the limbs were relaxed, the jaw, however, firmly closed ;. 
the eyelids closed, but the eyes brilliant and glassy, although without ex- 
pression. Cold affusion, emetics, and stimulants restored her, and in twenty 


(ss) Edinb. Month. Journ. Jan. 1854, 
598 


POS 


BOOK V.| SYMPTOMS. [§ 723 


minutes her consciousness returned.(#) The general symptoms of poisoning 
with the oil of bitter almonds resemble very closely those by pure prussic acid, 
the principal difference being that in the former they are perhaps less instanta- 
neous or immediate in their accession, and that the duration of life is somewhat 
longer. Nevertheless, cases of very rapid death from this oil are recorded. 

Dr. Taylor mentions the particulars of a case referred to him, in which it 
was probable that the whole duration of the case did not exceed seven minutes, 
and the man was not seized by the peculiar symptoms of poisoning until jive 
minutes after he had taken the dose. During this time he was conscious and 
self-possessed, and replied rationally to questions put to him. 

In a case related by Mertzdorff, in which two drachms of the ethereal oil of 
bitter almonds were swallowed, death occurred in half an hour. Another one, 
related by Dr. Taylor, is remarkable not only for its termination in a similar 
short space of time, but from the fact of the smallness of the dose, which was 
only seventeen drops. <A druggist swallowed half an ounce of ‘almond 
flavor,’’ equivalent, it is said, to thirty drops of the oil. He fell insensible in 
less than half a minute. This case presents, moreover, this peculiarity, that 
there was a temporary remission of the symptoms. He was sensible for a few 
minutes, and spoke on the nature of his attack, but gradually again relapsed 
into a delirious and apparently very happy state. His eyes were extremely 
brilliant, but the pulse was quick and intermittent, and the whole body cold. 
He gradually recovered from the effects of the poison.(uw) This case is a very 
extraordinary one; the peculiar effects cannot well be attributed to the small- 
ness of the dose, since, as we have already seen, little more than half the 
quantity has proved fatal, and in this case it was strong enongh to produce 
almost immediate insensibility. Mr. Iliff has reported a case in which death 
must have been very rapid. It is that of a young woman who poisoned her- 
self in the Zoological Gardens, London. A small phial containing a drop or 
two of the oil of almonds was found in the pocket of her dress, with the cork 
pushed in.(v) In addition to the similarity in symptoms, the post-mortem 
appearances of this substance resemble those of prussic acid. The same placid 
and natural expression of countenance, and the same purplish color and fluid 
condition of the blood, are here found. But the odor is uniformly present, 
generally more or less about the mouth, but, in all the cases yet reported, very 
characteristic and penetrating in the stomach and cavities of the body gene- 
rally. It is very persistent, and may be discovered several days after death. 

§ 723. The oil of bitter almonds is about four times as strong as the medi- 
cinal hydrocyanic acid of the United States Pharmacopeia. It is of a yellow 
color, has a bitter, acrid, burning taste, and is slightly soluble in water. The 
almond flavors and essences so much used in cooking are solutions of the oil 
in spirit, and may prove highly dangerous in the hands of ignorant people. 
Enough prussic acid is contained in less than an ounce of most of these flavors 
to produce fatal effects, and it is evident that smaller quantities might have 
the same result in the case of children. 


(t) Lancet, June 8, 1844. 
(u) Lancet, Sept. 1839, p. 930, Mr. Chavasse. (v) Lancet, April, 1850. 


599 


§ 726] POISONING BY APRICOT AND PEACH KERNELS. [BOOK VY. 


There is a case related by De Keyser, which appears to show that the appli- 
- cation of this oil to the skin may be dangerous. A lady used about half an 
ounce of it in mistake for an oil intended to make the hair grow. That the 
vapors of the oil did not occasion the symptoms is probable, because the wait- 
ing-maid, who assisted her, was unaffected. She was seized with a coldness 
extending from the head and spine to every part of the body, followed by 
ringing in the ears and unsteadiness, deafness, swimming of objects before the 
eyes, and impaired power of moving the limbs. She fell insensible, and in a 
state of collapse resembling syncope. She gradually regained her conscious- 
ness, but the sense of coldness continued for several hours.(vv) 

§ 724. 9th. Apricot kernels.—At Arles, a child ate two or three apricots ; 
but, not content with this, also took the kernels inclosed in the fruit. Very soon 
after he was seized with convulsions, and died in spite of every attention.(w) 

§ 725. 10th. Peach kernels.—Dr. Keating, of Philadelphia, has reported 
a very interesting case, in which he succeeded, by affusion of cold water, in 
restoring a child three years of age, who had eaten a quantity of peach ker- 
nels. he child was seized suddenly, and when seen was found insensible, with 
slow, deep, sobbing respiration, no convulsion of the limbs, but slight twitching 
of the mouth, icy-cold extremities, finger-nails livid, hands slightly clinched, 
eyes prominent, and pupils dilated. A strong odor of prussic acid was per- 
ceived about the mouth. An emetic brought up a large quantity of peach 
kernels, emitting the characteristic fragrance.(~) Another case is reported, 
in which the kernels of the cherry proved fatal to a child of five years, after 
forty hours’ illness. (y) | 

§ 726. llth. Cherry-laurel water.—The following case of poisoning by 
this liquid is remarkable for the slowness with which the symptoms super- 
vened, and the unusually long duration of life. A hypochondriac of advanced 
age drank one morning an ounce and a half of cherry-laurel water. The 
symptoms of poisoning did not come on for three hours. Then the hands and 
feet became paralyzed, and the head fell forward upon the chest. Involuntary 
discharges from the rectum and bladder took place. The extremities, though 
cold and immovable, were not insensible. The pulse was small, the voice 
hoarse but distinct, and the intellect perfect. The patient observed with plea- 
sure the incessant progress of the weakness; he died in the evening, without 
pain or convulsions. On dissection, the blood was found gluey, and of a pecu- 
liar dark color; but no odor of bitter almonds was detected. The celebrated 
trial of Capt. Donellan, in 1781, on a charge of poisoning Sir Theodosius 
Boughton with this liquid, is no doubt familiar to the reader.(z) Cherry- 
laurel water is of uncertain strength, since the leaves gathered in the spring 
contain more prussic acid than when collected and distilled in the middle of 
summer. It also becomes weaker by being kept. ‘The medical dose is from 
forty minims to a fluidrachm. | 


(vv) Journ. f. Pharmakodyn. 1857, p. 588. 
(w) Quoted in Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1853. 
(x) Trans. of Phil. Coll. of Physicians, vol. iii. No. 3. 
(y) Philad. Med. Exam. July, 1845. 
(z) Vid. Beck’s Medical Jurisprudence, vol. ii. 
600 


BOOK V.] CYANIDE OF POTASSIUM. [$ 727 


§ 727. 12th. Cyanide of potassium.—This substance is equally destructive 
and rapid in its effects with the free hydrocyanic acid. The symptoms are 
exactly similar to those produced by this poison, as are also the post-mortem 
appearances. Dr. Finnell, however, reports having met with intense redness 
of the gastric mucous membrane in three cases of fatal poisoning by this salt. (1) 
But Dr. Schauenstein found a dark red color of the membrane with bloody 
points, in only two out of five cases,(m) and attributes this peculiarity to the 
caustic operation of the alkaline solution in a concentrated state, and when 
the stomach contains but little food. The odor of prussic acid is less striking, 
and less frequently perceived in poisoning with this salt. In a case of sudden 
death from it reported by Casper, there was no unusual odor, although the 
nature of the poison was detected by chemical analysis.(n) The reaction of 
the contents of the stomach is always alkaline, and, according to Schauenstein, 
prussic acid can always be detected in them by the addition of formic acid. 
The writer states it as probable that the former is in every case converted into 
the latter. The quantity capable of proving fatal may be stated at from two 
and a half to five grains, since the former quantity is equal to one grain of 
anhydrous prussic acid. The fatal dose must necessarily vary with the strength 
of the preparation, and this is very different for different specimens. The 
strongest is made by saturating a solution of potassa with prussic acid. <A 
man aged thirty, died in a quarter of an hour after taking fifteen grains, pre- 
scribed for him by his medical attendant, in mistake for the ferrocyanide.(o) 
Dr. Perry related the following case to the Boston Society for Medical Im- 
provement. A nurse administered this poison by mistake, to a child who had 
a slight cough, instead of a cough mixture, which stood near the bottle of 
solution of the cyanide. The immediate effects of the dose were vomiting and 
convulsions ; then insensibility, locked jaw, coldness of extremities, which were 
pendulous and without muscular power; diminished frequency of respiration 
(twelve to sixteen per minute), the pulse small but distinct, sixty per minute; 
the circulation languid, pupils dilated, sphincters paralyzed ; the teeth closed 
so firmly and continuously, that only once or twice could anything be poured 
into the mouth. Dr. P. saw the child in fifteen minutes after the accident, 
and found it in a warm bath and insensible. It was treated by stimulants 
and the inhalation of ammonia. Death was sudden, and no post-mortem 
examination was made. The child lived one hour and a half. 

A case is reported by Dr. ©. E. Ware, of a woman who died in less than 
an hour from taking seven grains of this salt in a teaspoonful of liquid. 
Death occurred by gradual syncope.(p) In Vienna, Dr. Schauenstein met 
with five cases of fatal poisoning by this substance, in the course of eighteen 


months. In all of them the death seems to have been sudden. In one case, 


in a young girl, strong tetanic spasms came on directly after the poison had 
been taken.(qg) The same symptom, with severe abdominal pains, occurred in 


(7) Am. Med. Times, i. 33. 
(m) Prager Vierteljahr. Ixv. anal. 14. 
(n) Vierteljahrschrift, July, 1854. 
(o) Henke’s Zeitsch. Bd. 45, H. 1, p. 6. 
(p) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. Dec. 1856, p. 387. 
(q) Br. and For. Med. Chir. Rev. Oct. 1859, p. 530. 
601 


§ 729] ' ETHER AND CHLOROFORM. [BOOK V. 


a case reported by Prof. Wagner, of Leipzig.(a) The root and the juice of 
- Cassava (Jatropha Manihot) produce symptoms identical with those of prus- 
sic acid, but, in general, they are less intense. De Keyser relates that three 
children who had eaten of the former, and an adult negro who had drunk 
about six ounces of the latter, recovered. (b) 


III. Chloroform and Kther. 


§ 728. lst. When injurious.—These anesthetic agents, now so much used 
in surgical, dental, and obstetrical practice, in the form of vapor, are, as is well 
known, capable of producing fatal effects. Occasionally death has been due 
to their mal-administration, the patient being either unfitted to respire them, 
or having been required to inhale them unmixed with atmospheric air, or for 
too long a time. Such accidents have been extremely few in the case of ether, 
and since the proper mode of its administration has been understood, that is, 
since care has been taken to admit a sufficient proportion of atmospheric air 
along with the ether into the patient’s lungs, there is not a single authenti- 
cated example of its having destroyed life. Chloroform being more energetic 
and rapid in its action, has so frequently been the evident cause of death, that 
the operator cannot be too careful to ascertain its purity, and the probability 
of his patient being able to bear it, and to see that he does not inhale it to the 
exclusion of the atmospheric air, or for too long a time. 

§ 729. 2d. Symptoms.—Notwithstanding every precaution, however, occa- 
sionally death will suddenly occur in the most unexpected manner from its 
inhalation. This has occurred in the practice, and under the supervision of 
the most eminent surgeons. Many cases have been published, which it would, 
however, be tedious to enumerate.(¢) We append, however, one or two by 
way of illustration. Patrick Coyle, chloroformed for fistula; he inhaled for 
about a minute and almost instantly expired.(d) Abbey Pennock inhaled 
about three drachms in two applications, to relieve the pain of toothache, and 
died almost immediately after the second application.(e) John Griffiths had 
chancres and hemorrhoids; inhaled about three drachms, and died in about ten 
minutes, during the incision of the hemorrhoids.(f/) In the case of Madame 
Labrunne, related by M. de Confevron, the fatal effects were manifested in 
eight seconds, and the operator remarked constant winking of the eyelids. 
The patient repulsed the dentist’s hand, making signs that the effect was not 
complete. She then made four or five fuller inspirations. At that instant, 
M. de Confevron removed the handkerchief, and only took his eyes off her for 
the instant occupied by placing it on the table; but in this brief instant, he 
found the patient’s face turned pale, the lips discolored, the features altered, 
the eyes turned upwards, the pupils horribly dilated, the jaw closed, the head 


(a) Archiv f. Phys. Heil. 1859, p. 417. 

(b) Journ. f. Pharmakodyn. 1857, p. 586. 

(c) Dr. Crisp laid before the Medical Society of London a table which he had eee 
of the recorded deaths from chloroform up to June, 1853. They amounted to forty-two. 
At the end of 1859 they had already exceeded sixty in number. 

(d) Dr. Warren. Effects of Chloroform, &c. Boston, 1849. 

(e) Ibid. | (f) Ibid. 


602 


ae 


BOOK V.| ETHER AND CHLOROFORM. [$ 730 


drawn backwards ; the pulse could not be felt, the limbs were all relaxed, and 
a few inspirations at long intervals were the only indications of life.(g) Such 
cases as these can leave no doubt upon the mind that death was attributable 
solely to the inhalation of chloroform, and that it may occur with a celerity 
unparalleled by any other poisonous agent whatever. In cases of ordinary sur- 
gical practice, when the chloroform is administered by a competent person, and 
with those precautions which experience has shown to be necessary, the surgeon 
is probably not culpable in the eye of the law; but increasing familiarity with 
its soothing effects, and ignorance of its toxical properties, may be the source 
of fatal results in the hands of unqualified persons. A case bearing upon this 
point has been reported.(h) Here the chloroform was procured and adminis- 
tered by a nurse, to a woman in labor, contrary to the injunction, and without 
the knowledge of the physician. The woman’s death could be attributed to 
no other cause than the inhalation of chloroform. 

§ 730. The external phenomena of etherization, whether produced by chlo- 
roform or ether, are very nearly alike. There is usually at first a little cough, 
with expectoration of mucus and a flow of saliva, and some laboring of the 
respiration ; then the inspirations become strong and deep and take place 
without difficulty ; the pulse becomes quickened, and the eyes injected. With 
these early symptoms, there are often irregular movements of the limbs, and 
expressions of various kinds are uttered; sometimes a patient will try to put 
away the sponge or instrument used, but more generally he is anxious to 
retain it. If the inhalation goes on, the face generally becomes flushed, the eyes 
are brilliant, and turn in different directions, often upwards; soon the eyelids 
droop; very often now there are laughter and incoherent expressions; the 
pulse begins to be slower, and a general insensibility with muscular relaxation 
follows. This is the true surgical period of anesthesia. If this period be 
surpassed and etherization be pushed to its utmost limits, the respiration be- 
comes stertorous, the face livid, the pulse slow and weak, and death may take 
place. To sum up, temporary excitement, then stupefaction or disorder of the 
intellectual powers, insensibility and death, are the three great and observable 
stages of etherization pushed to its utmost limits.(7) We have already de- 
scribed the psychical effects of the inhalation of the vapors of ether and chlo- 
roform. (Vid. Rape.) 

Serious and alarming symptoms like those produced by inhaling the vapor 
of chloroform may arise from taking it internally. A lady, weakened by 
miscarriage, was affected within five minutes after taking half an ounce of 
chloroform, with convulsions, insensibility, dilated pupils, trismus, flushed face, 
a full and oppressed pulse, and foaming at the mouth.(j) Another person, 
also a female, took two ounces of chloroform; there was a deep stupor with- 
out congestion of the face, and the pupils were contracted.(<) In neither case 
was the pulse reduced. In a third case the symptoms were the same as in the 
second, and were also produced by two ounces of the liquid.(/) When death 


(g) Med. Gaz. vol. ix. 1849, p 295. (h) Med. Times and Gaz. April, 1855. 

(7) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. Jan. 1852. 

(j) Med. Times and Gaz. Dec. 1857, p. 615. (k) Annuaire de Thérap. xviii. 55. 
(/) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci. Oct. 1857, p. 367. 


603 


. 


§ 732] CHLOROFORM. [BOOK V. 


has been produced by the internal use of chloroform, its local irritant action 
has evidently been the chief cause of the fatal result. Three cases, at least, 
of this description are recorded.(m) In all of them the quantity taken was 
from one to two ounces, and the local symptoms were those of an active 
irritant of the stomach. In one case the air-passages shared in the irritation, 
and their congestion was the immediate cause of death. In all, examination 
of the bodies showed softening of the mucous membrane of the stomach, and 
in one case ulceration also. 

In regard to the mode in which the inhalation of chloroform occasions death, 
a review of the fatal cases furnishes a very uniform result, and in general shows 
but very few symptoms as precursors or concomitants of death. In a very 
small number more or less twitching of the muscles of the face and extremi- 
ties, and in two or three instances spasmodic contractions of the muscles of 
the posterior part of the trunk, have been noticed ; but, in general, the breath- 
ing grows feeble and infrequent, the pulse small and faint, and the face pale 
and cold. Ina smaller proportion of cases the features are congested instead 
of pallid, and in these the respiration is more or less stertorous, and there is 
sometimes foam upon the lips. In the former group the mode of death 
indicates exclusively a direct poisonous action of the chloroform, producing 
an arrest of the heart’s action, or syncope, while in the latter are swper- 
added the effects of an exclusion of atmospheric air, in other words, the signs 
of asphyxia. 

Casper treats of a chronic poisoning by chloroform,(n) maintaining that 
the vapor may prove fatal after the lapse of hours, days, or even weeks, the 
patient meanwhile suffering more or less from its effects. 

§ 731. 3d. The post-mortem appearances found in those who have perished 
by chloroform are remarkably uniform ; they are, great congestion of the lungs 
and bronchial tubes, and the blood is dark and fluid. Exceptions have, in- 
deed, been observed to this rule, but in a very large majority these appearances 
are constant. This condition is not, however, significant of any peculiar 
action of chloroform upon the blood. As Dr. Snow has remarked, it generally 
remains fluid after death by chloroform, only because it remains fluid in every 
kind of sudden death.(o) It is found equally so in death from any asphyxiating 
cause and in cases of narcotic poisoning. It may also be due to disease. 
Dr. Faure is of opinion that the congestion of the lungs met with in death 
from chloroform, is, to some extent at least, an hepatization produced by the 
combination of the vapor with the blood in the vessels. ( p) 

§ 732. Chloroform may, it is said, be detected in the blood or the tissues 
by the following means: ‘‘ Place the blood in a sand-bath, pass the resulting 
vapor through a tube heated in the centre to a red heat, and lined at its 
extremity with a paste of iodide of potassium and starch; its open end being 
also covered with paper moistened with the same mixture. If chloroform be 


(m) Month. Journ. of Med. Sci. v. 77; Philada. Med. Exam. Nov. 1856, p. 659; 
London Lancet, Apr. 1859, p. 400. 

(n) Gericht. Med. i. 621. (o) On Anesthetics, p. 248. 

(p) Arch. Gén. Jan. 1860, p. 56. 


604 


BOOK V.] CHLOROFORM. [$ 732 


present, the paper will be tinged blue. This process depends on the decom- 
position of the chloroform at a red heat. The simple distillation of the 
chloroform would often be better.” M. Rigout has detected chloroform in 
blood by passing a current of air through the blood heated to from 100° to 
120° F., and then conveying it into a limpid solution of nitrate of silver. If 
chloroform is present the liquid will become turbid, and regain its clearness 
on the addition of ammonia. 

The reader will find in the note some important considerations relative to 
the mode of death by chloroform, and the means of obviating the frequent 
accidents which attend its employment.(,/) 


(j) Report on an Experimental Inquiry Concerning Accidents by the Inhalation of 
Chloroform.—The Société d’Emulation of Paris appointed a committee for the above 
purpose, which met forty times to conduct a series of 150 experiments upon different 
classes of animals. The results of their labors are detailed by M. L. Lallemand in the’ 
present report; but we must confine ourselves to recording his conclusions. 

1. The action of chloroform upon the economy takes place with a rapidity directly 
proportionate to the amount of concentration of the inhaled vapor—the phenomena 
being, however, always manifested in the same order, and with the same characteristics. 
2. The excito-motor properties of the nervous centres, the sensibility and motricity of 
the cerebro-spinal nerves are suspended by chloroform; but the excitability of the 
medulla, and the motricity of the nerves continue to be manifested under the electric 
current. 3. Chloroform possesses an especial elective affinity for the nervous centres, 
in the substance of which it becomes accumulated during inhalation, and is there found 
after death in a much larger proportion than in other organs. 4. The respiratory 
movements cease before the action of the heart. 5. After the respiratory movements 
are suspended, the animal, if left to itself, dies. 6. Chloroform is rapidly eliminated 
from the economy, the pulmonary surface being the principal agent in elimination. 
7. Inthe majority of cases, the suspended vital functions can be re-established by 
means of the insufflation of air, or oxygen gas, even after all apparent circulatory 
movements are abolished. 8. In order to succeed, it must be resorted to immediately 
after the suspension occurs, aud be steadily persevered in until the normal actions are 
completely re-established. 9. Artificial respiration, produced by the faradization of 
the phrenic nerves, may likewise re-establish the suspended vital functions. 10, 
Electricity, employed as a general stimulus of the nervous system, is powerless, and 
it rapidly exhausts the nervous excitability of animals in the last stage of chloroform 
intoxication. 11. Insufflation acts by stimulating the excitability of the nervous sys- 
tem, and inducing elimination of the chloroform by the pulmonary surface. 12. Death 
ensuing on the inhalation of chloroform takes place from the abolition of the action 
of the nervous system, and not from asphyxia or paralysis of the motions of the heart. 
13. The dilution of the vapor of chloroform with a considerable and constant propor- 
tion of air, will, if not entirely prevent, very much retard, the danger of intoxication. 

Applying these results to the human subject, the reporter feels convinced that insuf- 
flation of air, effected my means of a tube passed through the mouth into the trachea, 
and connected with a bellows, if commenced at once on the development of accidents, 
and continued with perseverance, will, in the majority of cases, prove perfectly suc- 
cessful. Local faradization of the phrenic nerves is only of secondary importance, 
compared with insufflation. By the latter, as much air as is desired can be intro- 
duced, the energies of the circulation becoming aroused and the elimination of the 
poison favored; while, under the employment of electricity, the excitability of the 
nervous system is apt to become exhausted. 

In a preventive point of view, it is to be observed, that in all the experiments the 
respiratory movements first ceased ; so that such suspension becomes the signal of the 
intense poisonous influence exerted on the economy, and the imminence of death. 
These movements, therefore, require especially to be watched during the administra- 
tion. The chloroform, too, should be employed only when diluted with air, and care 
be taken not to administer large additional doses when the effect is commencing to 
take place. Owing to their density, the atmosphere near the patient remains charged 
with the vapors, which may easily thus become inspired in greater concentration than 
is supposed. 

The reporter furnishes a drawing of a new apparatus, contrived by M. Duroy, for 
the purpose of administering a diluted chloroform, which he terms an Anzxsthesimeter. 
—Med. Times and Gaz., March 10, 1855, from L’ Union Médicale, No. 13, 1855. 


605 


§ 733] CRIMINAL EMPLOYMENT OF CHLOROFORM. [BOOK V. 


§.733. 4th. A medico-legal question of no little importance is that respect- 
ing the possibility of chloroform being used for the purpose of facilitating 
rape, robbery, &c., by the production of insensibility. The question is not 
one merely of the possibility of its forcible administration but of its adminis- 
tration also to persons already asleep. Dr. Snow, it is well known, has 
denied the possibility, but we are disposed to think that his opinion can be no 
longer sustained. We, however, present his reasons, as well as the very 
sensible remarks made thereon by Lord Campbell, that the reader may judge 
for himself. 

Dr. Snow says: ‘The sensation of pungency in the nostrils and throat 
that is caused by this agent when its vapor is in sufficient quantity to produce 
any effect on the sensorium, is so strong and peculiar, that no person can take 
a single respiration without being aware that he is inhaling something very 
unusual. Chloroform, in fact, can never be administered without the consent 
of the party taking it, unless by main force, which has to be used in the case 
of children who are not old enough to be reasoned into taking it. If a child 
be asleep when the process of inhalation is commenced, it nearly always awakes 
before being made insensible, however gently the vapor may be insinuated. 
As breathing is perfectly under the control of the will, a person would, on 
finding such a strange attempt being made upon him, in the public street, 
instantly hold his breath and use all his powers of resistance to repel the 
assault,” &¢.(&) Lord Campbell, in his speech in the House of Lords advo- 
cating the adoption of the bill making unlawful administration or application 
of chloroform and other stupefying agents felonious, made the following 
remarks: “ A most respectable physician had done him (Lord Campbell) the 
honor to write him a letter, which he had printed, and there he stated the fear 
arising from the use of chloroform in this way was altogether imaginary, that 
no strong man who made resistance could possibly be chloroformed. He 
believed that was true; but in the case of those who were not strong, and 
unable to resist, it might happen to many of that class, that the chloroform 
would be employed most effectively for facilitating robbery. The gentleman 
to whose letter he had referred, stated that a person thus attacked might refuse 
to breathe, and that he might turn away his head. But, suppose a wet hand- 
kerchief was put to his nostrils, and held there, the man must breathe and 
thus inhale the particular gas that came from the chloroform. It stood, 
indeed, on record, that since the discovery of chloroform, persons had been 
convicted before the competent courts of using that article for the purpose of 
robbery. He hoped, therefore, their lordships would be of opinion that those 
who made such an attempt, should not be guilty of a misdemeanor only, as 
was at present the case; but that any person who tried to commit a robbery 
by means of chloroform or such like substances, though he did not succeed, 
should, if convicted, be held guilty of felony, and be liable to be Rae gS 
beyond the seas.” 

We have not seen the evidence brought forward in the cases thus Lente 
to, but we do not doubt that it was fully sufficient to establish the fact of 


(k) Lond. Med. Gaz. 1850. 
606 


BOOK V.] POISONING BY ALCOHOL. [§ 734 


chloroform having been used for the purpose alleged; the only recorded instance 
which we have met with is the following ; its employment was, however, as 
will be seen, unsuccessful. A gentleman named Mackintosh had retired to bed 
at an hotel in Kendal. He was awoke about twelve by a man attempting to 
suffocate him by means of a rag steeped in chloroform. Mr. Mackintosh, who 
is an elderly man, struggled desperately with his assailant ; but whether from 
the fumes of the chloroform, or the disadvantage at which he was taken by 
his midnight assailant, he felt himself fast fainting, when his cries of ‘‘ Help! 
murder !”’ roused the house. When the landlord made his way into the room, 
Mr. Mackintosh was almost powerless, and his assassin or robber was lying 
upon the bedding, which had fallen upon the floor in the scuffle, apparently 
sound asleep. On being roughly shaken, the latter professed that he had long 
been a sleep-walker, and appeared to be astonished to find himself where he 
was. A policeman was sent for and the man taken into custody. A strong 
smell of chloroform was perceived by the parties who entered the room upon 
the alarm being given, and a bottle containing chloroform was found under 
Mr. Mackintosh’s bed, and a similar bottle in the carpet bag of the prisoner, 
who had been at the hotel several days. The probability was that the ruffian 


_ was secreted under the bed when Mr. M. retired to sleep, as the latter had 


placed a chair previously against the door to prevent intrusion, there being no 
lock upon the door.(7) This criminal escaped with eighteen months’ imprison- 
ment; the offence not being a felony.at that time, since there was no intent to 
commit murder shown. 

Several remarkable instances of robbery of persons designedly rendered in- 
sensible by chloroform have lately been reported in the newspapers of this 
country ; although they may be authentic, we do not feel warranted in further 
alluding to them while unable to attribute them to responsible sources. It is 
obvious that a person may allege that he has been robbed or maltreated after 
being rendered insensible by chloroform, but also that the allegation may be 
false, and be put forward so as to divert suspicion or awaken sympathy. 


IV. Alcohol. 


§ 734. Ist. The pernicious effects upon the system, of the abuse of alcoholic 
liquors, are too well known to need any mention here. We propose, there- 
fore, to refer only to their immediate poisonous action when taken in large 
quantity into the stomach. 

Death, from this rapid saturation of the system with alcohol, is by no means 
rare. Orfila mentions an instance in which a man died immediately from the 
effects of a large dose of brandy.(m) Dr. Résch relates three cases in which 
adults died from the immediate effects of excessive drinking in a few hours. (7) 
Taylor says that a man died in half an hour after swallowing a bottle of gin 
fora wager. Résch also relates the cases of two children in which quite a 
small quantity proved fatal. The one was a boy aged two years, who drank 


(1) Med. Gaz., Nov. 1850. (m) Op. cit. ii. 528. 
(n) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1850, 4 H. 


607 


§ 737] POISONING BY ALCOHOL. [BOOK V. 


some brandy and soon after became comatose, had convulsions, and died in a 
‘few hours. The other was a little girl of four years, to whom her uncle had 
given about two tablespoonfuls of spirits. The child soon sank down insensi- 
ble, was seized with convulsions, and, in spite of all remedies that were used, 
died within twenty-four hours. In another case, the same quantity of brandy 
was given to a child six months old, to keep it quiet during the night. In 
less than a minute it was attacked with convulsions; its face was purple, the 
eyes staring, the pupils dilated and insensible, the mouth open, the head ex- 
tremely hot, while the rest of the body was cool, the breathing stertorous, and 
the pulse hardly perceptible. It had: also bloody evacuations. It died, in a 
state of coma, in nine hours. (0) 

§ 735. In general, the state of stupor is preceded by a short period of great 
excitement, but in some cases this preliminary stage is either very short or 
entirely absent. The difference probably depends upon the strength and quan- 
tity of the spirit and the age of the person. 

§ 736. 2d. Symptoms.—Fhe general characteristics of the comatose stage 
in the adult are the following: The face may be either pallid or flushed; the 
pupil at first contracted, and afterwards dilated and insensible to light: respi- 
ration slow and sometimes stertorous; the pulse quick and jerking, and the 
limbs cool and relaxed. In general, the appearance is very much the same as 
in poisoning by opium, or as in the apoplectic condition. In the absence of 
any knowledge of the mode of accession of the symptoms, the diagnosis of 
the case will often be incomplete. The odor of alcohol upon the breath is of 
course an uncertain sign, since ardent spirits may have been swallowed with- 
out being the cause of the symptoms. The ability to arouse the patient 
temporarily is also no means of distinction, as this may be possible in the 
stupor from intoxication. 

In fact, should the individual die, the shepetstich will often be left in doubt 
of the origin of the symptoms until some evident cause for them is found in 
the post-mortem examination. Even then nothing may be found to throw 
light upon the case, since a person presenting the above symptoms may have 
died of concussion of the brain, which leaves no ascertainable morbid change. 
If the symptoms have been due to opium or other narcotics, these may not be 
discovered, and, as will presently be seen, the evidences of death from alcohol 
may also be deceptive. It will only be from a careful analysis of the history 
of the case, and comparison of it with the post-mortem signs, that the physi- 
cian can hope to come to a probable conclusion. 

§ 737. 3d. The post-mortem appearances in acute poisoning 6 alcohol are 
generally the following: The odor of alcohol is perceived in the stomach and 
chest, if too long a time has not elapsed since death ; the vessels of the brain 
are congested, and numerous bloody points are seen on cutting: into its sub- 
stance; there is also not unfrequently an effusion of bloody serum under the 
membranes. ‘The stomach is reddened in patches, and there is acute edema 
of the lungs. But the only appearance which can afford tolerable certainty 
as to the mode of death, is the highly injected state of the brain and the effu- 


(0) Deutsch. Canstatt’s Jahresbericht fiir 1851, Bd. 10, p. 286. 
608 


BOOK V.] CAMPHOR. [§ 738 


sion of serum. This, however, gives only an indication of the mode of death, 
but not necessarily that it has been caused by alcohol.(p) 


V. Camphor. 


§ 738. Ist. Symptoms.—Although camphor cannot be regarded as a very 
active poison, no well authenticated case of death resulting directly from its 
use having, as far as we are aware, been yet reported; it is, nevertheless, 
capable of producing very dangerous symptoms. These, in the cases which 
are known, have varied somewhat, but in all there has been more or less evi- 
dence of its action upon the brain; vertigo, confusion of intellect, delirium, 
and somnolence being the most prominent effects. Indeed, the primary action 
of large doses of camphor is a powerful but not a permanent sedation of the 
nervous and vascular systems, followed by ataxic phenomena, and remotely by 
slight and very transient febrile excitement. Dr. Florain has reported the fol- 
lowing curious case: A man 56 years of age and of good constitution, took 
for the relief of priapism, and under a misapprehension of the directions of his 
physician, an enema containing ¢en drachms of camphor. Immediately after- 
wards he had sensations of cold alternating with heat in the lower bowels, 
and these sensations extended along the spine to the neck and spread over 
the whole body. He was then seized with vertigo, had grotesque hallucina- 
tions, an excessive frequency of the pulse, embarrassed respiration, vomiting, 
and strangury, and was greatly prostrated within two minutes after taking 
the injection. The delirium increased, the features became pale and decom- 
posed, the eyes fixed, and the pupils dilated. The skin became covered with 
clammy perspiration, and was ice-cold, the pulse frequent and thready, and the 
impulse of the heart very feeble. When violently aroused the patient regained 
his consciousness for a moment, complained of distressing nausea, extreme 
chilliness, and great desire to sleep. Vomiting of a yellow watery fluid, 
smelling of camphor, followed, and was succeeded by great prostration. By 
the assiduous employment of stimulation, both externally and internally, as 
well as purgatives, the patient was rescued from this very precarious situation. 
He recovered entirely, and the only durable effect of the camphor was seen in 
the complete anaphrodisia which lasted for several weeks.(qg) Two other 
cases are reported where the camphor was also given in injection (of about a 
drachm), and which were followed by analogous symptoms. In one of these the 
symptoms were very similar to those of an epileptic convulsion.(r) Dr. O. E. 
Brown, of Kentucky, mentions the case of a young man who chewed and swal- 
lowed about 100 grains of camphor. No symptoms came on for a short time, 
but he was, perhaps an hour afterwards, suddenly seized with convulsions, and 
remained unconscious for several hours. He was relieved by bleeding and a 
warm bath. He gradually recovered his speech, but remained stupid, languid, 


(p) For some valuable remarks upon the form in which alcohol enters into the 
system, we beg leave to refer the reader to Dr. Duchek’s paper in the Prague Journal, 
translated in the Phil. Med. Examiner for Sept. 1854. 

(q) Gaz. des Hépitaux, No, 41, 1851. 

(r) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht fiir 1851, Bd iv. p. 277. 


3” 609 


§ 741] HYOSCYAMUS. . [BOOK V. 


_and wandering all the next day.(s) A few cases are quoted by Drs. Taylor 
and Christison, in which camphor was taken by the mouth, but they do not 
differ essentially from the preceding. 

§ 739. 2d. Power.—The smallest dose which appears to have been attended 
with serious symptoms, is twenty grains.(t) In a case related by Wibmer, as 
much as eight scruples of camphor were swallowed by a drunkard, dissolved 
in spirit. It was followed by vertigo, dimness of sight, delirium, and burning 
pain in the stomach; there was no vomiting, and yet the man recovered. The 
nature of the poisonous agent cannot fail, in cases where camphor has been 
taken, to be discovered, since the odor is so powerful'and so well known as 
to betray itself at once. 


VI. Hyoscyamus Niger. (Henbane.) 


§ 740. All parts of this plant are poisonous. The root is long, tapering, 
whitish and fleshy, and bears considerable resemblance to parsley and parsnip 
roots, and has been eaten in mistake for them. Dr. Houlton states that, 
in a monastery where the roots had been eaten for supper by mistake, the 
monks who partook of them were seized in the night with the most extraordi- 
nary hallucinations, so that the place became like a lunatic asylum. One 
monk rang the bell for matins at twelve o’clock at night; of those of the fra- 
ternity who attended to the summons, some could not read, some read what 
was not in the book, and some saw the letters running about the page like so 
many ants.(u) Orfila relates two cases in which paralysis, delirium and in- 
sensibility, together with tetanic symptoms were caused in two soldiers who 
ate of the young shoots of this plant.(v) The seeds are still more active. 
Two young children having eaten some of them, became actively delirious, 
and even maniacal, striking and biting all who came in their way. Their 
faces were red, hot and swollen, and the pupils dilated. 'They were gradually 
restored by the use of emetics, local depletion, and sinapisms to the extremi- 
ties.(w) Another similar case is related in the same journal, but the seeds 
being unripe, the symptoms were still more alarming. 

§ 741. The medicinal preparations usually given are the tincture and ex- 
tract. Both of these vary greatly in strength. The dose of the former is a 
fluidrachm, of the latter five grains, on an average. Dr. Cabot, of Boston, 
gave three teaspoonful doses of the tincture, at intervals of an hour. Ten 
minutes after the last dose, the face began to swell, and become red and 
polished, the eyes were closed, and the patient was able to speak only with the 
greatest difficulty, on account of the tongue and lips. The red discoloration of 
the skin extended as far as the navel, and was attended with intolerable itch- 
ing and burning.(x) Delirium and hallucinations, after fourteen grains, in 
divided doses, were met with by Reinbold, of Hanover. (y) 

The only two cases of death alleged to have been caused by hyoscyamus 


(s) Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xxxvi. p. 368. 

(t) Vid. Taylor on Poisons. 

(u) Lancet, July 6, 1844. (v) Toxicol. gener, ii. 264. 

(w) Henke’s Zeitsch. 1848, 4 H. p. 516. (x) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci. Oct. 1851. 
(y) Casper’s Wochenschrift, 1840, No. 8. 


610 


BOOK V.]| HASCHISCH.—LACTUCARIUM. [$ 744 


were reported, the one in 1715, by Walther,(yy) and the other by Lindern, 
who is quoted at second hand by Orfila.(z) This result may therefore be 
regarded as extremely rare. 

Hyoscyamia, in the dose of 535 gr. has reduced the pulse from 79 to 18. 
In medicinal doses it occasions dryness of the mouth and throat, lowers the 
pulse, dilates the pupils, and induces sleep. 

§ 742. VII. Haschisch, or hatchy ratchy, a narcotic much used by the 
Turks and Arabs in place of opium, for the purpose of producing intoxicating 
effects after their meals, is composed of a mixture of hyoscyamus, bitter 
almonds, and the juice of hemp-root (cannabis indica). A single teaspoon- 
ful of this preparation is said to be sufficient to deprive the strongest man, for 
a short period, of the right use of his senses, and render him oblivious of the 
external world. (zz) 

§ 743. VIII. Lactuca. Lactucarium.——The inspissated juice of two spe-. 
cies of lettuce, the L. Sativa and the L. Virosa, has decided narcotic proper- 
ties, and in some experiments made by Orfila, the extract of the latter variety 
was fatal to dogs. No observations of its poisonous effects upon man have 
been recorded. Lactucarium is also known under the name of lettuce opium. 

§ 744. IX. Solanum.—The bitiersweet, or woody nightshade (8S. Dulca- 
mara), is said to possess feeble narcotic properties. There is but little testi- 
mony to support this view. A case is recorded in Casper’s Wochenschrift, in 
which a mati took, in one forenoon, from three to four quarts of a decoction, 
made from a peck of the stalks, and was attacked with pain in the joints, 
numbness of the limbs, dryness of the mouth and palsy of the tongue, the con- 
sciousness was unimpaired, the pulse quiet but small and rather hard, and the 
skin cool. The symptoms disappeared under the use of stimulants.(a@) Orfila 
relates an instance in which three children were poisoned by the berries of the 
S. Nigrum, the common garden or deadly nightshade. One of them died, and 
all of them exhibited symptoms analogous to those produced by belladonna. 
The supposed active principle of these plants is called solania, or solanin, and 
is found also in the young shoots of the common potato, 8. Tuberosum, but 
not in the tuber itself. In some experiments by Dr. Fraas, the effect of this 
alkaloid upon animals was very variable, when administered by the mouth or 
rectum. Those in which it was injected into the veins we do not consider as 
conclusive. Two grains of acetate of solanin injected into the rectum of a 
rabbit, produced heaviness, apathy, dilatation of the pupils, convulsions, and. 
death in six hours; but twenty grains of pure solanin given to a pig, and five 
grains to a dog, produced little or no effect.(b) Schrofi, however, distinctly 
states that this alkaloid has no influence upon the size of the pupil.(c). 


(yy) Wibmer, Wirking, &c. iii. 149. (z) Toxicologie, 5éme éd. ii. 304. 

(zz) Schneider, in Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1848, 4 H. p. 520; see also Bayard Taylor’s 
Travels in Palestine, &c., for an amusing account of its. effects. 

(a) Lond. Med. Gaz. Sept. 1850, p. 548. 

(b) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. July, 1854. 

(c) Lehrbuch d. Pharmakologie, 8. 553. 


611 


§ 745] NARCOTICO-ACRID POISONS. [BOOK V. 


CHAPTER IX. 


NARCOTICO-ACRID POISONS. 
‘ I. Datura Stramonium. (Jamestown Weed.) 


§ 745. 1st. Nature and effects.—All parts of this plant are poisonous, but 
the seeds and the leaves are most frequently employed. In some countries it 
has been and is still now used for the purpose of producing intoxication, with 
unconsciousness, in order to facilitate the perpetration of criminal designs. It 
has been thus given infused in wine or mixed in food. Poisoning by other 
species of datura is very common in India. During the year 1848 there 
were treated for it at the Native Hospital, in Bombay, forty-nine males 
and two females. The powdered seeds are there employed, concealed in 
rice or other grain. In many cases three stages of symptoms are observed— 
delirium, sopor, and coma; in others delirium only is observed. The primary 
delirium may be vociferous or merely garrulous, the patient usually manifesting 
excessive timidity. In both this and the soporific stage he is constantly en- 
gaged in picking at real or imaginary objects, and sometimes in performing 
such antics as to render laughter on the part even of friends unavoidable. 
Dr. J. G. Johnson reports the case of a boy in whom the movements were 
like those observed in chorea.(d) Several of the movements seem to depend 
upon perverted vision, which destroys the power of judging of the distance of 
objects, and which may be due to the widely dilated pupil, a persistent symp- 
tom. Husemann observed a case of poisoning by this plant, in which all black 
objects appeared to the patient green.(e) In other cases there is complete 
blindness. The pulse and temperature, although usually natural, undergo in 
some cases extremes of exaltation and depression. On recovery, the person 
usually recollects nothing since the meal at which he was poisoned, so rapid 
are its effects.(f) Dr. Duffin, of London, reported the case of his own child, 
two years old, who died in twenty-four hours after swallowing one hundred 
seeds, without chewing them. She became fretful, and like a person intoxi- 
cated; in the course of an hour efforts to vomit ensued, together with flushed 
face, dilated pupils, incoherent talking, and afterwards wild spectral illusions 
and furious delirium. In two hours and a half she lost her voice and the 
power of swallowing, evidently owing to spasms of the throat. Then croupy 
breathing and complete coma set in, with violent spasmodic agitation of the 
limbs, occasional tetanic convulsions, warm perspiration, and a scarcely per- 
ceptible though not frequent pulse. In other cases the pulse was full and slow, 
and the general symptoms those of ordinary intoxication, with this remarkable 
exception of the slowness of the pulse. In a case related by Boerhaave, and 


(7d) Am. Med. Times, i. 22. (e) Journ. f. Pharm. ii. 191. 
(/) Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rey. Jan. 1851. 


612 


BOOK V.] NICOTIANA TABACUM. [§ 747 


in others reported in this country, a scarlet eruption appeared on the face. 
In females it has produced nymphomania. Kurzak observed priapism of an 
hour’s duration in a case of poisoning with stramonium-seeds.(a) Dr. Bo- 
bierre, professor of chemistry at Nantes, drank by mistake a small quantity of 
an infusion of the leaves and seeds. In a quarter of an hour he began to feel 
heavy, and he had an uncomfortable feeling of constriction in the neighborhood 
of the larynx. His pupils were dilated, and the secretion of saliva, perspira- 
tion, and urine was entirely suppressed.(b) The external application of the 
bruised leaves may give rise to the symptoms of poisoning. An overdose of 
the officinal extract has produced fatal effects. The active poisonous principle 
resides in the alkaloid, daturia; this, when placed on the eye, dilates the pupil, 
and the eighth of a grain has killed a sparrow in three hours. 

§ 746. 2d. The post-mortem appearances after poisoning with stramonium- 
leaves or berries present nothing which can be fairly attributed to the poison. 
In the cases which have been examined there has been but a very slight devia- 
tion from the natural condition. 


II. Nicotiana Tabacum. (Tobacco.) 


§ 747. 1st. Symptoms.—The symptoms produced by a poisonous dose of 
tobacco are nausea, vomiting, a burning heat in the throat and stomach, colic, 
diarrhoea, urination, extreme giddiness, great anxiety, with a disposition to 
faintness, pallor, coldness of the extremities, spasmodic trembling; the pulse is 
small, weak, tremulous, and intermittent; the breathing labored and stertorons ; 
there is a paralytic relaxation of the voluntary muscles, and clonic spasms of 
the limbs. The pupils are but slightly affected, and the eyes seem to be sensi- 
ble to light. This state is succeeded by a general torpor, or utter prostration, 
which is not coma, but which may terminate in death. Tobacco has produced 
death by having been criminally mixed with liquor. Not being used in medi- 
cine by the mouth, the dose capable of destroying life, when thus introduced, 
is not known. 

Two cases are related by Dr. Deutsch, in which life was in extreme danger 
from the swallowing of tobacco. In one, a soldier suffering with the tape- 
worm took, by the advice of a friend, some of the extract of tobacco, such as is 
deposited in smoking-pipes. The quantity swallowed was estimated at an 
ounce. He was at once seized with the most horrible pains in the sto- 
mach, and fell into a state of extreme collapse. ‘The efforts to vomit were 
ineffectual until an emetic was given to him. After extreme suffering, he 
slowly recovered. In the other case, a young lady accidentally swallowed 
the still lighted stump of a cigar which she had been smoking, and suffered 
greatly from the ordinary symptoms of poisoning by tobacco, together with 
pain in the stomach, until she was relieved of it by vomiting. A fatal case 
is reported by Mr. Skae, of a man who swallowed a large mouthful of crude 
tobacco. In addition to the usual symptoms, he had convulsions.(c) <A fur- 


(a) Schroff, Pharmacol. p. 532. 
(b) Journ. de Chim. Méd. 1851, p. 539; vid. also Charleston Med. Journ. and Rev. 
Nov. 1854. 
(c) Edinb. Med. Journ. i. 643. 
6138 


§ 749] POISONOUS EFFECTS OF TOBACCO. [BOOK V. 


ther variation from the ordinary course of symptoms was shown in the case 
of two females, about eighteen years of age, both of whom drank an equal 
quantity of a decoction of tobacco. The one was affected in the usual manner, 
the other became insensible and was attacked with convulsions; her arteries 
and veins were distended, and the former throbbed forcibly, and the conjunctiva 
was injected.(d) 

Dr. Weaks, of Vermont, mentions the case of a child a few days old, to 
whom two tablespoonfuls of water impregnated with the smoke of tobacco 
were given, for the purpose of keeping it. quiet. It died comatose in eight 
hours, notwithstanding the most active efforts to resuscitate it.(e) 

Pereira quotes from Dr. Copland an instance in which half a drachm admin- 
istered by enema proved fatal. Other cases are given in which one and two 
drachms had the same effect. In one of these referred to by Dr. Christison, 
death occurred in thirty-five minutes. Dr. Tavignot witnessed a fatal result 
in the case of a robust man, fifty-five years of age, who took an enema pre- 
pared from fifteen grains of tobacco.(a) Dr. Eberle knew the life of a boy 
destroyed in less than twenty minutes by a tobacco enema.(b) Several in- 
stances also are recorded in which the external application of moistened 
tobacco leaves produced alarming symptoms or death. Two also are said by 
Gmelin to have resulted from excessive smoking, in one case seventeen, in the 
other eighteen pipes having been smoked at a sitting. . 

§ 748. 2d. The post-mortem appearances are by no means characteristic. 
Tn a case minutely described by Dr. Grahl, of Hamburg, the only appearances at 
all unusual were a diffuse redness of the omentum, and of the outer and inner 
coats of the intestine, and patches of extravasation in some portion of the 
mucous membrane, together with an empty condition of the vessels of the 
abdomen and of the heart. . 

Where a large quantity of snuff has been taken into the stomach, portions 
of it may remain entangled in the mucus, and thus be recognized either by its 
physical characters or on chemical analysis, by the active poisonous principle 

called nicotine, or nicotia. In Dr. Weaks’ case, no odor of tobacco was bins 
ceived on opening the body. 

§ 749. 3d. Nicotina, or nicotia.—This aielote has much interest attached 
to it from its having been the poison used by the Count of Bocarmé in the 
murder of his brother-in-law, Gustave Fougnies.(f/) The nicotina was ob- 


(d) Dierbach, Neueste Entdeck. ii. 884. 

(e) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. vol. xlvii. p. 461. 

(a) Rev. Med. Nov. 1840. (b) Therapeutics, p. 389. 

(f) On account of the great interest which this trial excited, we have subjoined 
the following succinct history of the case, as presented by the Attorney-general of the 
Court of Appeals of Brussels. 


ACT OF ACCUSATION. 


The Attorney-general of the Court of Appeals of Brussels represents that the court, 
by a decree of the 16th April, 1851, transmitted to the Court of Assizes of the province 
of Hainaut the names, first of Alfred Julien-Gabriel-Gérard-Hyppolite Visart, Count of 
Bocarmé, aged thirty-two years, landholder, born at the Camp of Weltevreden in 
Java, &c.; second, of Lydia Victoire-Joseph-Fougnies, aged thirty-two years, wife of 
Count Bocarmé, born at Péruwelz, and both living at Bury, accused of the crimes enu- 
merated in the articles 301, 302, 59 and 60 of the penal code. 


614 


BOOK V.] |. ,NICOTINA, [$ 749 


tained by Professor Stas from the mouth and stomach of the deceased, and 
from articles of clothing and furniture. It had been prepared by the hands 


In consequence, the Attorney-general has drawn up the present act of accusation, 
in which the following facts and details are set forth :— 

The Count Hyppolite Visart de Bocarmé, belonging by birth to one of the first families 
of Hainaut, married, in 1843, at Péruwelz, the daughter of an ex-grocer who had two 
children, and whose son, having lost his right leg by amputation, had not a very 
strong constitution. The, accused, therefore, even before the contract of marriage, 
foresaw that the end of Gustave Fougnies, his brother-in-law, was more or less near; 
and after having secured to himself the property of his wife by will, he did not hesitate 
to consult Dr. Semet regarding the chances of life or death which Gustavus might have. 

But Gustavus also began to think of marriage. He had already entertained the 
idea in 1846, and he was on the point of carrying it into execution, in the month of 
November last, when he died suddenly at the mansion of Bitremont, where the pri- 
soners resided, and in the very apartment where he had been dining with them. 
They communicated the intelligence the next day to Madame Dudzeele and her 
daughter, to whom Gustavus was about to be married ; and the Countess herself charged 
a servant to “go and tell the two hussies that her brother had died of apoplexy.” 
But the state of the body indicated a very different kind of death, since the autopsy 
disclosed upon the anterior part of the nose a deep contusion, upon the left cheek a 
number of scratches, which appeared to have been made by the finger nails; over the 
left maxillary region there was a corrosion involving the cuticle, and which seemed 
to have been caused by some caustic fluid; in fine, upon the tongue, in the mouth, 
throat, and stomach, there were numerous traces of the passage of a similar substance. 

The physicians (experts) concluded from these observations that a corrosive liquid 
had been poured during life into the mouth of Gustavus Fougnies, and had produced 
a cauterization of the whole of that cavity and part of the pharynx ; that a portion of 
this liquid, either spilt or rejected, had burned the left side of his neck; and that the 
marks of violence on the face proved that efforts had been made to force down the 
liquid, and to stifle the cries of the victim. 

Moreover, the Count presented upon the second phalanx of the middle finger of 
the left hand, two wounds, which involved the skin, and which were evidently the 
result of a bite, for the marks of two teeth were visible in the lower wound, which 
was deeper than the other. 

At the time the investigation took place, on the 22d November, at the chateau of 
Bitremont, there was also apparent upon his fingers and under his nails a red dis- 
coloration, which was only too evidently connected with the scratches of which the 
face of Fougnies offered numerous traces. All this required an explanation, which 
was far from being satisfactory; and chemical analysis speedily demonstrated that 
Gustavus Fougnies had been poisoned by nicotine, a narcotic alkali, extracted from 
tobacco, and which is one of the most deadly poisons. The prosecution was prepared 
to show that the accused had for ten months previously made this poison a particular 
study ; that he had, some days before the death of Gustavus, procured by his labors 
two small phials of it, which, since that event, have not been found. Moreover, the 
Countess herself formally accused her husband of having poisoned her brother; and 
although the Count himself now acknowledges that he extracted the nicotine which 
destroyed Gustavus, without, however, explaining by whose means it had been admin- 
istered, we think it may be useful to present a summary of the facts which instigated, 
preceded, accompanied and followed the crime on the 20th of November. 

In marrying Lydia Fougnies, whose patrimony he had over-estimated, Count 
Bocarmé was far from gaining an opulent position, since he only received from his 
father-in-law a yearly allowance of 2,000 francs, and he brought on his own side 
2,400. 

Such feeble resources did not well accord with so grand a domestic establishment, 
with numerous servants, and especially with the irregularities of the accused, who in 
a short time had a second household in the environs of Brussels. He therefore found 
himself obliged to resort to daily loans from his notary, to whom he owes nearly 
43,000 frances ; and although M. Fougnies, the father, died in 1845, leaving his daughter 
a revenue of 5,000 francs well secured, this increase of fortune was far from assuring 
the future of the accused, since their expenses were every day increasing, and they had 
even drawn since 1846, without repayment, to the amount of 95,000 francs. 

All this did not prevent them from owing dribbling debts to the amount of 7,000 
francs, some of which dated back to the same epoch, and in which we see domestics 
or mere journeymen figure for sums of thirty, twelve, ten, and three francs. In fine, 
they had so completely lost their credit, that the Count was reduced to pledge for 400 


615 


§ 749] NICOTINA. [BOOK V. 


of the murderer himself, who had devoted several months to the study of the 
‘process of eliminating it from tobacco. The symptoms produced by it in the 


francs, at a pawnbroker’s in Brussels, ornaments belonging to the Countess, and which 
are still there. The ruin of the accused was thus imminent, unless the death of 
Gustavus, on which they had so long counted, should occur, to re-establish their 
dilapidated fortune. 

But Gustavus did not die; he had even formed new projects of marriage, which 
seriously vexed the accused, and which they sought to break, by means of the no- 
tary, Cherquefosse. The Countess herself had written to her brother two letters, which 
were found after his death, and which contained some slanders against Miss Dudzeele, 
which she had used in an anonymous letter of the month of August. These attempts, 
however, had resulted in nothing, and there only remained to the Count the last resort, 
and the most efficient means for attaining his end. 

After having cultivated poisonous plants in 1849, he presented himself, in the month 
of February, 1850, under the assumed name of Bérant, before Léppens, Professor of 
Chemistry at the Industrial School of Ghent, and begged to be informed of the proper 
apparatus for extracting the essential oils of plants, remarking that he had seen 
the American savages poison their arrows with the juice of certain plants, and that 
he wished to make some experiments for the benefit of his parents, who lived in the 
United States. He consulted Léppens particularly with regard to the mode of dis- 
tilling the essential oil of tobacco, that is to say, nicotine; and he ordered from 
the brazier, Vandenberghe, according to the instructions of the professor of che- 
mistry, an apparatus of brass, which he wished to be ready by the 11th of March. 

On his return to Ghent, in the month of May, the accused showed Léppens the first 
sample of nicotine, which had not proved efficient. He then recommenced the opera- 
tion under his supervision, and after having labored two days in his laboratory, he suc- 
ceeded in obtaining two drops of pure nicotine. 

He returned again, after some time, with another sample, which had not succeeded 
any better than the first. Loéppens then gave him new instructions; and the accused 
announced to him at last, on his third visit, in the beginning of October, that he had 
obtained the most deadly effects on animals. 

Nothing now remained but to procure the necessary substances and instruments to 
operate on a larger scale, and to follow the procedure of Schlesing, which Léppens 
had pointed out as the best, and which Pelouze and Frémy describe in their course of 
General Chemistry. 

But these purchases made new journeys to Brussels necessary, which the accused 
visited on the 16th and 28th of October, and after laboring without interruption two 
days and two nights, he at length succeeded, on the 10th of November, in obtaining two 
phials of nicotine, which he was to employ on the 20th, and which could not be found 
after the death of Gustavus. With regard to the chemical instruments which had 
served for its preparation, the Count had taken care that they should immediately 
disappear. The servants of the establishment could give no information with regard 
to them, and it was not till six weeks after that they were discovered in a sevret 
place, where the Count had mysteriously concealed them. 

This precaution, all will agree, does not well accord with scientific labors, or with 
researches made for the benefit of another continent. 

There is, moreover, the false name of Bérant, which the Count always assumed in 
his interviews with Léppens and Vandenberghe, although he did not conceal his true 
name at the pawnbroker’s shop in Brussels. We may then safely conclude that he 
had already, in the month of February, meditated the crime which he committed in 
the month of November, and of which his own mother would seem to have had a 
presentiment, since she said one day to her daughter-in-law, that Hippolyte was 
capable of anything, that he might do some mischief by his chemistry, and that she 
expected nothing else but to see him some day brought before the Court of Assizes. 
The diligence with which he labored night and day, moreover, clearly indicated the 
object he had in view, especially at the period when the idea of marriage had taken 
possession of Gustavus, and the Countess herself had avowed the object, since she 
said in so many words, at one of her examinations, “My husband speculated on 
the death of Gustavus ; it was his fortune that he coveted—it was that which made 
him decide upon his death; he had lived too long, in his estimation. During the. 
first days of November, I knew that the poison was prepared for Gustavus; I knew, 
moreover, that the poison was nicotine. My husband himself told me this in the 
rear wash-house, the day I saw the large matrass in the vessel of oil, and where he 
told me he made cologne water. I used many entreaties to know what he was really 
making, and he at last admitted that it was nicotine. Some days after, he told 
me, that the first time an opportunity presented, he would not miss Gustavus; and 


616 


BOOK V.] BOCARME CASE. [$ 749 


human system are not well known. Besides the one already referred to, there 
is but a single case upon record, and in that, also, the symptoms were not 


on the 20th of November, on learning that he was coming to Bitremont, he declared 
to me,” added the Countess, “‘ that he would do the business for him that day.”’ 

Gustavus, in fact, arrived at ten o’clock; it only required a single word to save 
him, and yet the Countess passed the whole day with him without informing him of 
the dangers which impended. She even gave orders which would insure the execution 
of the crime, by removing those whose habitual presence would have hindered it. 
Thus, she made the oldest of the children, and his governess, dine in the room of the 
latter, instead of admitting them to her own table where they dined every day, and 
she had caused supper to be prepared for the two smaller children in the apartment of 
the nurses, instead of in the kitchen, as was their custom. It is true that one can 
hear from the kitchen, what passes in the dining-room. She also sent her coach- 
man, Vandenberghe, to Grandmetz, with a letter to the ladies of Dudzeele, although 
he had, by the arrival of Gustavus, an additional horse to take care of, and although 
the letter had no other object than to inquire of the ladies what price they would ask for 
their agricultural implements. There was no urgency in the message, but the distance 
to travel over required the absence of the coachman for four or five hours ; and when 
afterwards the Countess ordered her chambermaid, Emérance Bricourt, to serve at table 
instead of Vandenberghe—she was careful to order her to withdraw after the second 
service. Emérance did not again appear.in the dining-room until the time when she 
supposed they would need a light, and the accused, to whom she came to offer it, 
answered both at the same time, “ No, no, not yet.’’ 

On withdrawing, Emérance was going to the kitchen, where the coachman was din- 
ing, who had returned from his trip to Grandmetz. The Countess followed her and 
saw her go up to the nursery, where she found the two nurses, Justine Thibaut and 
Virginia Chevalier. She had also ordered Vandenberghe to accompany, as far as the 
road to Leuze, a distance of about one kilometre (nearly equal to three-quarters of 
an English mile) the cook, Louisa Maes, who was returning home. Vanden- 
berghe had set out on the road with Louisa, but he was not long in perceiving that 
it would be too late for the girl to travel alone, and as she had no money to pay 
for lodging on the way, he had returned with her to the house, and informed his 
master and mistress, who were still in the dining-room with Fougnies. Gustavus 
had already manifested an inclination to leave. The Count had even ordered Francis 
Deblicquy, the gardener, to get the carriage ready, but the stable was locked, and 
Vandenberghe had the key. He had scarcely returned to the house, when the Count 
went to the kitchen to give the same orders which he had given to Deblicquy. The 
coachman then took the lantern and went to the stable, and the Count returned to 
the dining-room. 

Justine Thibaut was coming down stairs at this moment to get some supper for the 
children, although the Countess had ordered them away from the kitchen on this oc- 
casion, as already stated. Arriving upon the last steps of the stairs, she heard a fall 
in the dining-room, and the voice of Gustavus, who cried for help, exclaiming, “‘ OA, 
oh, forgive me, Hippolyte !” 

She then ran to the kitchen, crossing the office which separated it from the vestibule 
and dining-room, when she saw the Countess go out of the dining-room and enter the 
office, closing the doors of the two apartments, so as to prevent the cries of Gustavus 
from reaching the kitchen. The girl being still more frightened at this sight, hastened 
to reach the court by a circuitous way; she then passed opposite the windows of the 
dining-room, from whence issued stifled cries, and went up to the children’s apart- 
ment by the old back stairway. Emérance, whom she found there, then went down to 
offer her services; but she heard no more noise, and the Countess made her go up 
again on seeing her at the bottom of the stairs. 

The marks of violence observed upon the body exclude the idea of accident or 
of suicide. They prove, on the contrary, a violent struggle ; and when we reflect, that 
to make the victim swallow the poison, it was necessary at the same time to open his 
mouth and restrain the movements of his head to the right and left, which he would 
otherwise make, it is nearly impossible to admit that the crime was the act of one 
person only. 

How, indeed, can we conceive that the Count Bocarmé, whose left hand, imprinted 
with a double bite, was held in the mouth of Gustavus, and whose right hand was 
fully employed in steadying the head and arms, could of himself, and without foreign 
aid, pour into his mouth a phial of nicotine? 

Another person was, therefore, necessarily a participator in the act, and there were 
only the Count and the Countess in the dining-room at the moment when Justine 
heard the fall and the cries of Gustavus. The accused wrote as follows, on the 12th 


617 


§ 749] POISONING BY NICOTINA. . - [BOOK Y.- 


witnessed. From the circumstances, it was inferred that the person became 
suddenly insensible and powerless, and died in from three to five minutes.( 7’) 


(#7) Times and Gaz. June, 1858, p. 659; Guy’s Hosp. Rep. 3d ser. iv. 345. 


of last March, to a correspondent in Paris: “My wife has requested you to engage 
M. Berryer; do not doit; and if the engagement is made, suspend it until a new 
order is received from me, but let her continue in the belief that he is engaged. 
On this recommendation, both her life and mine depend. Only imagine that this 
wretched woman, after having poisoned her brother, can find no better defence now, 
when we are both in prison for the deed, than to charge the whole upon me, and 
to accuse me of the most atrocious crimes. Do not answer this note, which I se- 
cretly slip in the accompanying letter. Remember, that all the letters we receive are 
opened. If Berryer shall have engaged to come, explain to him what I have stated 
to youin this note; show him that the hostile attitude assumed towards me by my 
wife, is only the result of a moral constraint, occasioned by the position in which she 
finds herself placed, and that his aim should be to defend us both equally against the 
accusation, and not to take up for my wife in the hostile position she has assumed 
in regard to me; this would give great plausibility to the charge, and lead us inevi- 
tably to the scaffold.” 

This note, which the accused had fraudulently slipped into a letter, intended to be 
shown, was not for the Judge of Instruction. It expressed then the secret thoughts of 
Count Bocarmé better than they were éver explained in his interrogations, and those 
thoughts entirely agree with the nature of the crime of which he is accused ; it also well 
agrees with the disclosure the prisoner had made to the keeper of the prison, since he 
told him, on returning from his first examination, that it was the Countess who had 
turned the poison into the mouth of Gustavus; that she had made two different 
attempts in doing it, and had even spilt it on the clothes of her brother. 

This explains why she went, a few minutes afterwards, to wash her hands with soap 
in the kitchen; why she immediately placed the clothes of Gustavus, and those of her 
husband, in a wash-tub full of water; why she caused them to be wrung and 
washed in lye at midnight, in her presence, by the cook, L. Maes. This also will ex- 
plain why she caused the crutches of her brother to be washed with hot water; why 
she even caused them to be burned, saying she could not bear the sight of anything 
that had belonged to him; why she had burned his waistcoat and cravat, at the very 
moment the officers of justice arrived at Bitremont. This will also serve to explain 
why she caused the floor of the dining-room to be washed the same night, and in 
her presence; why, the next day, she herself poured oil upon the spots, that they 
might not be recognized ; and why she said, with evident satisfaction, to Emérance, at 
the time they were making the autopsy, that everything went on well, and that they 
had discovered nothing, and would bury Gustavus on the morrow. 

These facts are too numerous and too direct for any one to doubt of her being an 
accomplice, especially when placed in connection with the extraordinary declarations 
of her husband, with the special character of the crime, and with the measures the 
Countess had taken to insure its execution. This complicity dated as far back even 
as the time when she had written, and signed with the false name of Bérant, all the 
letters addressed to Léppens, and the brazier, Vandenberghe ; and she had even coun- 
terfeited his handwriting in several of these letters. 

The Countess alleges, it is true, that if she passed the night in effacing the traces 
of the crime, it was only to save her husband and the father of her children. But it 
is very difficult to admit the excuse in regard to so odious a crime, and one, too, com- 
mitted against her own brother. 

Especially, it is difficult to admit it in connection with the almost daily acts of 
violence which the Countess had to complain of, and to which her husband added the 
grossest immorality, since we have seen that he obliged her to receive the fruit of his 
adultery at the chateau of Bitremont. 

She also maintains, that if she concurred in preparing for or aiding the poisoning, 
she had only done it under the threats of her husband, and under the influence of 
moral constraint. But then, why did she not at least apprise her brother, when a 
single word might have saved him? Why did she profane his dead body, by ordering 
the coachman, Vandenberghe, to deluge it with vinegar? Why apply an opprobrious 
epithet to the ladies Dudzeele, when she directed a servant to inform them of the 
death of Gustavus? All this denotes too clearly a common purpose to attain the same 
object, which might profit both the accused, and which even the uncle of the Countess 
openly proclaimed in his deposition, explaining the reasons why he had not been pre- 
sent at the house the next day, in compliance with the invitation he had received. ‘I 
was,” he said, ‘‘ too indignant against them on account of their infamous conduct, and 


618 


BOOK V.| CHEMICAL TESTS FOR NICOTINA. [$ 752 


In experiments upon dogs, Orfila observed that vertigo was first produced, 


that they then sank down, had tetanic convulsions, with opisthotonos, and 


died in a variable time, according to the strength of the liquid. Anhydrous 
and pure nicotina, he says, may kill a dog in half a minute, but two minutes 
are usually required. If somewhat less pure and more diluted, death will 
follow in about ten minutes, and if still further diluted, the animal may recover. 
The doses given were from one to twelve drops. 

§ 750. Nicotina is an oily, transparent, colorless liquid, becoming brown 
and thick upon exposure to the air, and, when pure, exhaling a slight smell 
of tobacco. Its taste is acrid and burning. The vapors that are given off 
when it is volatilized at 200° have so strong an odor of tobacco, and are so 
irritating, that, according to Orfila, it is difficult to bear them. Nicotina is 
soluble in alcohol, water, ether, and the oils. 

The tests for nicotina are thus stated by Dr. Taylor :(g) It precipitates 
yellow with chloride of platina, white with corrosive sublimate, bright yellow 
with arsenio-nitrate of silver, reddish brown with iodine water, yellowish white 
with tannic acid, and does not affect a solution of gallic acid. 

§ 751. It may be sought for in the viscera of a person poisoned by tobacco, 
in the following way. After the suspected substances have been macerated in 
water acidulated with sulphuric acid for twelve hours, this should be filtered, 
evaporated in closed vessels nearly to dryness, treated with a little distilled 
water to dissolve the sulphate of nicotina, then neutralized with potash and 
distilled over. Or, instead of this latter stage of the process, the solution 
holding the sulphate may be treated with ether, decanted, and allowed to 
evaporate, The residue will be nicotina. It has been detected by Orfila in 
the bodies of animals destroyed by it, two or three months after their death. 
The process employed by Professor Stas has been, in its preliminary steps, 
explained in the chapter on OPIUM. 

§ 752. The subsequent steps applicable to the discovery of any of the liquid 
and volatile alkaloids may be here briefly quoted. ‘By the evaporation of 
the ether, there remain in the inside of the capsule some small liquid striz 
which fall to the bottom of the vessel. In this case, under the influence of 
the heat of the hand, the contents of the capsule exhale an odor more or less 


this indignation has its foundation in my deep conviction that they murdered Gus- 
tavus.” 

In conclusion, Alfred Gabriel Gérard Hippolyte Visart, Count Bocarmé, and Lydia 
Victoire Joseph Fougnies, wife of Bocarmé, are charged with having wittingly made an 
attempt upon the life of Gustavus Fougnies, their brother and brother-in-law, at Bury, 
on the 20th of November, 1850, by means of substances which would cause death more 
or less promptly, or at least with having been accomplices in this act, whether they 
gave instructions to commit it, or procured the substance, or did any other act to 
carry it into execution, knowing the object intended ; whether they knew of, or aided 
or assisted the author or authors in, those acts which prepared for or facilitated the 
deed, or those which consummated it. 

Regarding which, the Court of Assizes of Hainaut will decide. 

‘ For the Procureur Général, 

May 3d, 1851. (Signed) E. D. Corsisier, Substitute. 

The discussions respecting this case occupied the court during twenty-one sittings 
(from May 27 to June 15). M. Bocarmé was found guilty by the jury, and condemned 
to death; and Madame Bocarmé was acquitted.—Procés du Comte et de la Comtesse 
de Bocarmé. Paris, 1851. 

(g) Guy’s Hosp. Rep. 3d. ser. iv. 


619 


§ 754] CONIUM MACULATUM. [BOOK V. 


disagreeable, suffocating, irritant; it presents, in short, a smell like that of a 
volatile alkali masked by an animal odor. If we discover any traces of the’ 
presence of a volatile alkaloid, we add then to the contents of the vessel, from 
which we have decanted a small quantity of ether, one or two fluidrachms of a 
strong solution of caustic potash or soda, and agitate the mixture. After a 
sufficient time we draw off the ether into a test-tube, exhaust the mixture 
by two or three treatments with ether, and unite all the ethereal fluids. We 
afterwards pour into this ether, holding the alkaloid in solution, one or two 
drachms of water acidulated with a fifth part of its weight of pure sulphuric 
acid, agitate it for some time, leave it to settle, pour off the ether swimming 
on the top, and wash the acid liquid at the bottom with a new portion of 
ether.”” The sulphate of nicotina, as well as some others, being entirely 
insoluble in ether, a pure sulphate is contained in the water. The alkaloid 
may be now set free by caustic ammonia, and agitation with ether. The 
ether may be left to spontaneous evaporation, and the last traces of ammonia 
removed by placing the vessel containing the alkaloid in a vacuum over sul- 
phuric acid. The organic alkaloid being thus isolated, it is the duty of the 
chemist to determine, if possible, its real nature. This was the process used 
by Prof. Stas for the separation of nicotina in the Bocarmé trial, and also in 
experimental researches upon animals. (gq) 


OI. Conium Maculatum. (Common or Spotted Hemlock.) 


§ 753. Ist. Its action—The poisonous properties of this plant reside 
chiefly in the leaves, but exist also in other parts. The accounts of its action 
upon the human system are somewhat contradictory. Some authors attribute 
to it positive narcotic properties; Orfila quotes the case of a soldier, who, 
having eaten of some broth into which hemlock had been put, went to sleep 
immediately after his supper. A couple of hours later, he was found still 
lying on the ground in a profound sleep, insensible. His pulse was extremely 
slow, the extremities cold, the face swollen and livid, and the respiration 
labored. He died in three hours. Some cases are related in which delirium 
and fatal convulsions were said to be due to this poison. On the other hand, 
these symptoms are not produced by conia, which is supposed to be the active 
poisonous principle of the plant, nor do they agree with the observations of 
other authors, especially of recent date. Dr. Pliny Harle tried the effect of 
the extract of conium upon himself. The preparation seems to have been a 
feeble one, for although the dose was steadily increased until it reached sixty 
grains three times a day, and seven such doses were taken, the effects were by 
no means striking. No soporific effect, however, resulted; he experienced 
merely the sensations of fulness of the head and eyes, a “‘ tendency to ver- 
tigo,”’ double vision, and a great feebleness in the limbs.(h) 

§ 754. 2d. Symptoms.—Dr. Hosea Fountain, however, who prepared fox 
himself an extract from the fruit or seeds of the plant, and took twelve grains 
of it, began to experience its effects in half an hour. He had a feeling of 


(gg) Am. Journ. of Pharm. Jan. 1853. (h) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. July, 1845. 
620 


BOOK V.| CONICINE, OR CONIA. [$ 755 


lightness in his head, dimness of vision, and muscz volitantes, before his eyes ; 
“very soon,” he says, ‘“‘a numb, pricking sensation was felt in the fingers, 
extending gradually to the elbows, producing a stiffness of the muscles of the 
parts, making it difficult to move the forearm and hand. In a few minutes 
the same sensation was observed in the feet, creeping slowly upward, until it 
reached the upper part of the thigh. The eyes now began to feel uncomfort- 
able, causing me to brush them frequently, to clear apparent obstructions from 
the lids. The pulse was soft and feeble, but not more frequent than usual.” 
Having dismounted from his horse, he found so much difficulty in walking that 
he required assistance, and the lower limbs appeared to be nearly paralyzed. 
This partial paralysis of the limbs continued throughout the whole day, 
although the head symptoms disappeared under the influence of tobacco and 
rest. No soporijfic effect was produced. (2) 

In an undoubted case of death from eating hemlock, the symptoms were 
very much like those just described. The man’s consciousness and intelligence 
were not affected, but he lost his sight completely, and was unable to walk. 
He seemed also to have lost all muscular power in his arms, and the power of 
deglutition and speech; several efforts were made to vomit, but they were 
ineffectual. His pulse and breathing were perfectly natural, as well as the 
heat of skin. Death ensued in three hours after eating the poisonous plants, 
without convulsions, but apparently from paralysis of the heart. 

The post-mortem appearances in this case were not important except the 
presence of numerous extravasations of dark-red blood below the epithelium of 
the mucous membrane of the stomach. The stomach contained a pultaceous 
mass formed of a raw greenish vegetable resembling parsley. Its contents 
weighed eleven ounces and had an acid and slightly spirituous odor. The 
hemlock leaves were identified by their botanical characters, and by the pecu- 
liar musty odor of conta which was strongly evolved, on bruising some of 
the leaves in a mortar, with a solution of potash. (7) 

3d. The hemlock water drop-wort (Ginanthe Crocata) is a still more ener- 
getic poison than the foregoing, but from not being medicinally used does not 
require notice here. Many accidents have happened from the roots of this 
plant having been eaten in mistake. 

§ 755. 4th. Conicine, or conia.—The active principle of common hemlock 
isa most virulent poison and a local irritant. A single drop applied to the 
eye of a rabbit, killed it in nine minutes; and when two grains of the muriate 
of conia were injected into the femoral vein of a young dog, it died before there 
was time to note the interval.(Z) It produces paralysis almost instantaneously, 
but does not appear to interfere at once with the functions of the brain, since, 
according to Christison, the external senses are little, if at all, impaired, until 
the breathing is almost arrested; and volition too is retained. The blood 
undergoes no alteration. The following plan is recommended by Orrfila for its 
detection in food and other organic matters. The parts cut into small pieces 
should be placed in water acidulated with sulphuric acid, filtered, and evapo- 
rated by a gentle heat, after cooling, agitated with twice their volume of strong 


(7) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1846. 
(j) Ed. Med and Surg. Journ. July, 1845. J. H. Bennett. (k) Christison. 


621 


§ 757] NUX VOMICA.—STRYCHNIA. [BOOK V. 


alcohol, then again filtered and evaporated until all the alcohol has been dissi- 
pated. The fluid should, after cooling, be neutralized or rather rendered alka- 
line by soda, when the characteristic, mousy smell of conicine will be perceived. | 
Being now agitated with sulphuric ether, and decanted, the conicine is left 
behind by the spontaneous evaporation of the ether, and may be distilled over 
chloride of calcium. Heated in a capsule it forms white vapors, having a 
strong smell of celery and of the urine of mice. 


IV. Nux Vomica.—Strychnia. 


§ 756. Ist. Qualities.—Nux vomica and its chief poisonous alkaloidal 
principle may be conveniently treated of together. Nua vomica is a round 
flat seed about three-quarters of an inch in diameter, and two lines in thickness. 
It is covered with fine, silky, gray hairs, and is hard and difficult to pulverize. 
The powder is of a yellowish-gray color, and has an intensely bitter taste. 
Strychnia is usually seen as a grayish-white powder, inodorous but excessively 
bitter. This property is so distinct that it is said that it may be perceived 
when only one part of strychnia is present in 30,000, or as others assert, in 
600,000 parts of water. It is very sparingly soluble in water, but is easily 
dissolved by ordinary alcohol when boiling. It is deposited, however, upon 
cooling. 

§ 757. 2d. The symptoms produced by strychnia or by nux vomica in poi- . 
sonous doses are the following: The most prominent are spasmodic muscular 
contractions, which the slightest cause, such as a noise in the room, the con- 
tact of a person, or the attempt to introduce liquids into the mouth is suffi- 
cient to excite. During these convulsions the limbs become perfectly rigid, the 
muscles tremble, the respiration is suspended, and the lips, tongue, and fingers 
become blue. The intellect is not affected, this drug seeming to exercise its 
influence upon the nervous centres, from the medulla oblongata downwards, 
alone. The fits succeed each other at short intervals, and death usually takes 
place during one of them, although it may occur after their cessation, from 
mere exhaustion. A well described case of accidental poisoning with strych- 
nia, by Mr. Bennett,(2) would answer almost equally well for a picture of 
hydrophobia. The quantity taken was about a grain and a half in solution. 
The patient, when first seen, which was about an hour after the poison had 
been taken, was in a rigid and trembling state and the face almost maniacal 
in its expression. ‘This was soon followed by a violent tetanic convulsion. 
Between the fits she did not utter any expression of alarm, but would occa- 
sionally request a little cold water. The muscles of the jaws remained so 
rigid between the spasms that the attempt to introduce the stomach pump was 
unsuccessful, and although some strong emetics were got down, it repeatedly 
happened that the attempt of the patient to take liquids was followed by so 
violent a spasmodic fit as to prevent her swallowing them, and to give that 
apparent dread of water so well marked in cases of hydrophobia. During the 
tetanic fits the whole body was stiffened and straightened; the neck violently 


(/) Lancet, 1850, vol. ii. p. 462. 
622 


BOOK V.]| SYMPTOMS OF POISONING BY STRYCHNIA. [$ 758 


drawn back, the chest fixed, the eyes protruding from their sockets in a horri- 
ble manner, the legs pushed out and widely separated, the muscles of the face 
convulsed, pulse imperceptible, and no breathing could be perceived; the face 
was livid, more particularly the lips, and froth issued from the mouth. The 
pupil was also dilated during the paroxysm. It was impossible to produce 
any relaxation of the body during a fit, and if moved the whole body remained 
in its rigid condition. As soon as death had taken place, which was in an 
hour and a half, the limbs relaxed, the face and lips gradually lost their livid 
hue and became, as well as the body, extremely pallid. 

In this case alarming symptoms did not arise until about an hour after the 
poison had been taken, and numerous cases might be referred to in which an 
interval of an hour or two occurred. The poisonous effects of strychnia are 
more rapidly developed than those of nux vomica. But usually the former 
supervene very speedily, being seldom delayed more than fifteen minutes. 
Death may occur in fifteen minutes, as in the case of Dr. Warner, who was 
supposed to have taken only half a grain,(m) or in half an hour, as ina 
case reported by Dr. Theinhart, where thirty grains of strychnia were swal- 
lowed, and seldom is postponed for more than two hours, if no measures for 
the removal of the poison have been taken.(mm) In a case that occurred near 
London, a prescription was improperly prepared, so that the young man, for 
whom it was directed, took a grain and a half of nux vomica, and the same 
. quantity of strychnia. It is stated that “he soon afterwards complained of 
some extraordinary sensations and almost immediately expired.”’(n) 

§ 158. 3d. Power.—The smallest quantity of nus vomica which is known 
to have caused death, is said to be three grains of the alcoholic extract, but 
it is quite uncertain to how much of the powder this corresponds. Hoffmann 
(quoted by Christison) states, that two doses of the powder, of fifteen grains 
each, proved fatal, and other cases are related in which fifty and sixty grains 
produced death. The smallest quantity of strychnia which has proved fatal 
appears to be one grain.(o) In Mr. Bennett’s case, above quoted, about one 
grain and a half was taken. 

Recovery occasionally is observed, even after very large doses. Dr. Thomas 
Anderson records a case in which seven grains of strychnia were taken without 
producing fatal consequences.(00) The comparative mildness of the symptoms 
and the recovery throw some doubt upon the purity of the strychnia which 
was used. Dr. Dresbach, of Ohio, attended a man who drank, by mistake, 
three ounces of a solution of strychnia, containing one grain to the ounce. 
When seen by Dr. B., about twenty minutes afterwards, he was in the follow- 
ing condition: The whole muscular system rigid, the muscles of the back and 
legs so rigidly contracted, that it was with extreme difficulty the man was able 
to walk, face drawn awry and articulation impeded, a sense of burning about 
the stomach, tightness about the chest, vertigo and dimness of vision, lower 


(m) Phila. Med. Exam. Oct. 1847, p. 309. 

(mm) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1848, p. 303, from Gaz. Médicale. 

(n) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. April, 1854, p. 537, from Pharm. Journ. July, 1852. 
(o) Med. Times and Gaz. April, 1855. 

(oo) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci. Apr. 1848, p. 562. 


625 


§ 759] POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK V. 


extremities cold, and perspiration abundant. Chloroform being the only 
article at hand which seemed likely to be useful, Dr. B. gave the patient at 
once two drachms, and in less than fifteen minutes, the relief, Dr. B. says, 
was complete.(p) A case, in which a man recovered after swallowing a 
grain and a half, is reported by Mr. Foster.(q) In another case, a girl swal- 
lowed two grains of strychnia, upon an empty stomach. The poison re- 
mained in the stomach fifty minutes before it was removed by an emetic and 
the stomach-pump. ‘The disturbance was but slight, and the girl recovered. 
Dr. Taylor suggests, that owing to the symptoms having been very slight in 
this case, the strychnia was probably not pure.(7) But recently, other cases 
have occurred of recovery from still larger doses. In one, four grains were 
taken by mistake. Copious vomiting was produced by emetics in about a 
quarter of an hour, but the system was violently affected, there being not only 
excessive tetanic rigidity of the muscles, but frequently recurring convulsions, 
with other symptoms already detailed. The man recovered entirely in two or 
three days.(s) In another case, by Mr. Chippendale, a man who had been in the 
habit of using small doses for an imaginary spermatorrhcea, took four grains 
of strychnia, and four of morphia, in an ounce of spirit, with the intention 
of destroying himself. Tetanic spasms ensued in about half an hour; but 
in this, as in the preceding cases, the intellect remained unaffected—a fact 
the more remarkable, on account of the large quantity of morphia which had 
been swallowed. The latter produced none of its peculiar effects, except, per- 
haps, an itching of the skin, which occurred in the convalescence, and might 
perhaps be ascribed to it. The man recovered perfectly. The stomach-pump 
_was used one hour after the poison had been taken, and water and animal 
charcoal injected into the stomach.(¢) A case is reported by Dr. Bly, of a 
man who by mistake took four grains of strychnia at a dose. Tartarized 
antimony was immediately administered, but ineffectually, and tetanic convul- 
sions and locked jaw succeeded. 'These symptoms were palliated by chloroform 
inhalations, so that an additional dose of tartar emetic could be administered. 
In thirty-five minutes after the poison had been swallowed the emetic operated 
freely, and the anesthetic inhalations having been continued, the threatening 
symptoms ceased in the course of seven or eight hours.(t) In this case it is 
probable that the tartar emetic taken immediately after the poison hindered 
the absorption of the latter. Mr. Iliff has reported a case in which a female 
recovered after swallowing two drachms of powdered nux vomica.(u) 

§ 759. 4th. The post-mortem appearances are by no means characteristic. 
To some extent the degree of rigidity of the body, and the permanence of this 
condition, are peculiar. In the case of Cook, poisoned by Palmer, Dr. Harland 
testified that the body was very stiff, more than dead bodies generally are. The 
muscles were very highly developed; they were strongly contracted and thrown 


(p) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. April, 1850, p. 546, from Western Lancet. 

(q) Lancet, 1852, vol. ii. p. 198. 

(7) Med. Times and Gaz. Ap. 1854. 

(s) Ibid. Ap. 1855. G. Hinnell. 

(t) Med. Times and Gaz. Ap. 1855. G. Hinnell. | 

(tt) New York Journ. of Med. Nov. 1859, p. 422. (u) Lancet, 1849, Dec. 15. 


624 


So 


<r ER 


BOOK V.] POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES, [$ 760 


out. The hands were firmly closed.(ww) In another case, reported by Mr. 
Wilkins, it is stated that seven hours after death the rigidity of the body was 
so great as to allow it to be lifted by the heels; it is described as being ‘as 
stiff as wood.’’(v) In some cases there have been found signs of inflammation 
in the intestinal canal, and very generally congestion of the brain and its 
membranes, and sometimes softening of its substance and of the spinal mar- 
row. The right cavities of the heart are usually contracted, and the blood 
dark and fluid. In some instances, no doubt, these appearances were due to cada- 
veric changes, and were not the result of any peculiar influence of the poison. 

§ 760. 5th. The usual tests for strychnia are the following. The crystals 
are elongated octohedral prisms. It is slowly dissolved, and acquires a red 
color by the addition of strong nitric acid. The color is immediately destroyed 
by the protochloride of tin. Specimens of the alkaloid entirely free from 
brucia are not turned red by nitric acid. If a drop of a solution of chromate 
of potash be added to a solution of strychnia in sulphuric acid, the mixture 
acquires a beautiful violet color, which becomes darker on standing. If a 
grain of peroxide of lead be added to the solution of strychnia in sulphuric 
acid, brilliant colors are produced, which pass through various shades of blue, 
red, and yellow. 

The following process for the detection of strychnia in mixed fluids was 
devised by Prof. Graham and Dr. Hoffmann, for the purpose of testing the 
presence of this poison in the bitter ales of Burton.(vv) It may be also 
applied to other liquids. Two ounces of animal charcoal are to be shaken in 
about half a gallon of the suspected fluid, and this is to be left at rest for a 
night, and then filtered through paper. The fluid is thus deprived of its bit- 
terness. The charcoal which contains the strychnia is then to be boiled for 
half an hour in eight ounces of rectified spirit, and the spirit, after being 
filtered, is concentrated by distillation. The remaining liquor, which is watery, 
is next decomposed with a few drops of solution of potash, and agitated with 
an ounce of sulphuric ether. The ether contains the strychnia in a state of 
considerable purity, and, on being evaporated, it deposits a white soluble mat- 
ter, of intense bitterness. If a drop of sulphuric acid be placed upon this 
residuum, and then a fragment of bichromate of potash, in the resulting liquid 
a beautiful violet tint appears at the points of contact, and soon spreads over 
the whole fluid. This change of color seems to be characteristic of the alka- 
loid strychnia. The discoverers could detect with it half a grain of strychnia 
in half a gallon of the pale ale (of Allsop & Son), into which it had been 
purposely introduced. These gentlemen attest that, after analyzing a large 
number of samples of pale ale taken indiscriminately from the supplies of 
various manufacturers, not one of the varieties of beer, when tested with the 
greatest scrupulousness, gave the slightest evidence of the presence of strych- 
nia.(w) 

(uu) Times and Gazette, May, 1856. (v) Guy’s Hosp. Reports, 3d ser. iii. 484. 

(vv) This inquiry was instituted at the invitation of the English brewers of ale, who 
were naturally indignant at the assertion made in a lecture by M. Payen, of Paris, that 
strychnine was there prepared in large quantities, for the purpose, as had been ascer- 
tained by the French authorities, of being sent to England, to be there employed in 
the manufacture of the celebrated bitter beer of that country. 


(w) Med. Times and Gazette, May, 1852. 
40 625 


§ 761] ‘PESTS FOR STRYCHNIA, [BOOK V. 


The following is a description of the process used by Mr. Lonsdale in a case 
of supposed poisoning by a grain and a half of strychnia :—(x) 

Experiment _—(a.) Portions of the stomach and contents were oiled in 
water pretty strongly acidulated with sulphuric acid; the mixture was then 
filtered, and to the liquid thus obtained a quantity of carbonate of lime was 
added, sufficient to neutralize the acid. This was evaporated to dryness, and 
digested with rectified spirit; after which it was again filtered, to remove all 
insoluble matter. The result, a clear liquid, was then evaporated to the con- 
sistence of syrup, which had a slightly yellowish color, and, when tasted, was 
distinctly and persistently bitter. 

(b.) To this alcoholic extract a few drops of strong sulphuric acid were 
added, and then a small quantity of powdered bichromate of potash. A pur- 
plish tint was at first observed, but it very speedily changed to a beautiful 
light green, which remained permanent. 

(c.) A very small quantity of the above extract was mixed with sulphuric 
acid and peroxide of lead, but there was no appreciable change of color. 

(d.) A similar quantity was tried with the bichromate of potash test, with 
a very slight change of color, hardly appreciable. With a large quantity, the 
color was unmistakable. (y) 

The most reliable test, and the one most generally adopted for the detection 
of strychnia, is that proposed by the Belgian chemist, M. Stas. A small 
quantity of acetic acid and water is digested with the suspected substance, and 
dissolves the alkaloid if it is present. This solution is separated from organic 
matters, if any there be, by repeated washing with water and alcohol, and by 
filtration, and is then rendered alkaline by potassa, which precipitates the 
strychnia. The latter is redissolved by means of ether, which is poured off 
and allowed to evaporate, leaving strychnia behind it. The alkaloid may be 
recognized by its crystalline form, its intense bitterness, and its reactions with 
the appropriate chemical tests. 

The physiological test, proposed by Dr. Marshall Hall, consists in applying 
the suspected solution to the back of a young frog freshly taken from the 
pond. The skin should be first dried with blotting-paper. So small a quan- 
tity as the five-thousandth part of a grain of strychnia, thus applied, produced 
the characteristic effects of the poison.(yy) 


V. Aconite. (Monkshood; Wolfsbane.) 


§ 761. Ist. Hffects—The leaves and root of Aconitum Napellus con- 
tain one of the most extraordinary and speedy poisons known. ‘The former 
have proved fatal when eaten by mistake for salad; and the latter, from its 
resemblance to horseradish, has given rise to many unfortunate accidents. 
The root is tapering, about the thickness of the finger at its upper part; its 
color externally is brown, internally it is white and fleshy. Its taste is bitter, 
but after a few minutes a remarkable numbness and tingling are perceived on 


Ce emrnunna Torte Feb. 1805) pe Alsy (y) Vide Experiment (6). 
(yy) Lancet, June, 1856, p. 623. ) 


626 


BOOK V.| POISONING BY ACONITE. [$ 762 


the lips, tongue, and fauces. The leaves, when chewed, have the same taste, 
and produce the same feeling of numbness.(z) Dr. Isaacs has reported the 
case of an apothecary’s clerk poisoned by the inhalation of the dust of aconite- 
root, which he was pulverizing. The effects of the drug were first manifested 
by numbness of the tongue and difficulty of swallowing, with dryness and a 
sense of constriction in the fauces. About an hour afterwards there was some 
difficulty of respiration, with diminution of the force and frequency of the 
pulse, greatly dilated pupils, loss of voice, and prostration of strength. Very 
slight convulsions occurred, at repeated intervals, for about five hours, when 
the patient was supposed to be dying. The countenance was hippocratic, the 
pupils very greatly dilated, the pulse 36 and feeble, and the breathing corre- 
spondingly slow. There was also, from the first, great oppression in the 
cardiac region. ‘Two weeks afterwards the aphonia still continued.(zz) The 
pharmaceutical preparations most in use, and which, therefore, are most apt 
to be either accidentally or intentionally employed, are the ordinary and the 
saturated tinctures and the alcoholic extract. There being several formule 
for these preparations, they are variable in strength, owing to the variable 
quantity of aconitina contained in the prescribed dose. Thus, two persons, 
who took twenty-five minims of the tincture, died; while another, who swal- 
lowed an ounce and a half of the tincture prepared according to the Parisian 
Code, survived. The aconitina prepared by Mr. Morson, of London, is so 
powerful that, according to Pereira, one-fiftieth of a grain has endangered 
life; but, on the other hand, a case is reported by Dr. Golding Bird, in which, 
although two grains and a half of this alkaloid were taken, the patient re- 
covered, after having very dangerous symptoms. Pereira states, also, that 
there is a spurious aconitina sold in the shops, which is inert, or nearly so, 
since he took one grain of it without perceiving the least effect upon the 
tongue or otherwise. The effect of a slight increase in the medicinal dose 
is well seen in the following case, communicated to Pereira by Dr. Redfern. 
The patient, who was suffering with acute articular rheumatism, took five 
drops of the tincture three times a day, for two days, without marked relief. 
On the third day the dose was increased to six drops, at the same intervals. 
Two doses of this amount were taken; and an hour after the second he was 
found in a state of extreme restlessness, and complaining of great pain in 
various parts of his body. To use his own expression, he felt as though his 
skin were too tight for his body. He described his sensations as intolerable. 
At this time there was much frothing at the mouth, with violent retching at 
intervals. The surface of the body was cold, and bathed in profuse perspira- 
tion, which ran down his face in streams. The pulse, though at first 150 in 
the minute, fell to between 50 and 60 in a few minutes, and was so small and 
compressible as scarcely to be felt at the wrist. He recovered under the use of 
brandy and water, and external warmth. 

§ 762. 2d. Symptoms.—The first and most usual symptoms are a burning. 
and numbness of the lips, mouth, throat and stomach, followed by tingling in 


(z) Pereira. For several cases, vid. Headland, Lancet, March, 1856, p. 341. 
(zz) New York Journal of Medicine, Sept. 1859, p. 191. 


627 


§ 763] POISONING BY ACONITE.—SYMPTOMS. [BOOK V. 


various parts of the body, loss of sensation, vertigo and dimness of vision, 
‘tremors, cramps, great prostration, sense of fulness in the throat, speechless- 
ness, hurried respiration, and death, in a state of collapse. Vomiting and 
purging are also usual symptoms, but are not observed in every case. General 
convulsions are unusual, as we find that, in fifty-three cases collected by Dr. 
Tucker, of New York,(a) they are mentioned as having occurred only in seven. 
In four out of twelve more recent cases there were convulsions. ‘The mind 
remains perfectly clear, there being in general neither stupor or delirium. The 
latter symptom was seen in three cases of the number collected by Dr. Tucker. 
When applied to the eye, the preparations of aconite are said to have the 
effect of contracting the pupil. In seventeen out of twenty cases, however, in 
which the poison was swallowed, it is stated by Dr. Tucker that the opposite 
effect was observed. Sometimes the sight is temporarily impaired. The 
symptoms of poisoning by aconite usually arise within a few minutes after it 
has been taken; and when death takes place, it is, in the majority of cases, 
within three hours. The quantity of aconite, or any of its preparations, ca- 
pable of producing death, is, for the reasons before given, unknown. The 
case related by Dr. Haston,(b) in which twenty-five minims of the tincture 
were taken, shows probably the smallest dose which has proved fatal. An- 
other case, in which twenty-five drops proved fatal, occurred in January, 1853. 
A gentleman, feeling himself unwell, stepped into a drug store, and was given 
by a medical student, a friend of his, who was attending, this amount of the 
tincture, under the supposition it was the proper dose. He expired about four 
hours after taking it, under the symptoms of poisoning by aconite. Dr. Male, 
of Birmingham, it is stated, died from the effects of not more than ezghty drops, 
taken in ten‘doses, during a period of four days, the largest quantity taken at 
once being ten drops. An excise officer in England died in consequence of 
tasting Fleming’s tincture of aconite. He said he thought he had swallowed 
about a teaspoonful. He did not complain at the time, but in the course of 
a few hours was cold ‘and pulseless. The remedies applied were ineffectual, 
and he soon expired.(c) 

§ 763. 3d. Post-mortem appearances.—The few cases in which post-mortem 
examinations have been made, have revealed nothing peculiar, the most con- 
stant appearance being congestion of the vessels of the head and of the lungs. 
Tt is, of course, evident that no conclusion can be drawn from such imperfect 
data as these.(d) Of the fifty-three cases collected by Dr. Tucker, in which 


(a) For these valuable tables, vid. New York Journal of Medicine for March, 1854. 

(b) Glasgow Med. Journal for July, 1853. 

(c) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. April, 1852, p. 553. 

(d) In the trial of John Hendrickson, Jr., for the murder of his wife by poisoning, 
at Bethlehem, Albany County, New York, Dr. Swinburne, who made the post-mortem 
examination, inferred from the emptiness of the stomach and small intestine, the 
corrugation of their mucous coat, and the presence of a reddish, viscid mucus in the 
stomach, that vomiting had taken place, and that this vomiting was produced by 
aconite! Dr. Salisbury, who had charge of the chemical analysis of the organs of the 
deceased, testified that he tested a small portion of the stomach and a small portion of 
the duodenum for prussic acid, most of the mineral poisons, then for morphine, strych- 
nine, ‘“stramonine,” and other poisons, none of which he discovered. He then inferred 
the presence of aconitine, from the fact that, after digesting a small portion of the 
stomach and duodenum in alcohol, evaporating, filtering and purifying, finally with 


628 


BOOK V.] LOBELIA INFLATA. [S$ 765 


aconite in various forms and in all variety of poisonous doses was taken, 
twenty-seven recovered, and twenty-six died. In all those who recovered, 
emetics and external and internal stimulants were employed. 

§ 164. 4th. Yests.—The remarkable symptoms occasioned by the plant, 
and the discovery of a portion of that which has been taken, will generally 
be sufficient to explain the cause of death. The only case in which it was 
criminally administered, is that which is related by Dr. Geoghegan, where 
the deceased had eaten for his dinner some greens dressed by the prisoner. 
The latter was convicted upon the medical and general evidence, no trace of 
the poison having been discovered in the body. He confessed before his exe- 
cution that the powdered root of aconite had been mixed with pepper, and 
sprinkled over the greens. (e) 

Stas’ method (§ 760) may be employed for separating the alkaloid of 
aconite from organic liquids. The chemical tests of its presence are thus 
stated by Dr. Taylor: It fuses and burns with a bright yellow flame; heated 
in a tube it evolves first an alkaline and then an acid vapor; it is soluble in 
weak acids and alcohol; nitric acid dissolves it without a change of color; 
sulphuric acid gives it a yellowish color, and on adding a crystal of bichromate 
of potash, green oxide of chromium is set free. Iodine water gives a reddish- 
brown precipitate in a solution of the sulphate. Tannic acid precipitates the 
solution ; it is precipitated whitish-yellow by chloride of gold, but not by 
chloride of platina. Gallic acid, corrosive sublimate, iodide and sulphocyanide 
of potassium produce no change in the solution. Dr. Headland has proposed 
the application of the physiological test to the detection of this poison. If 
sth of a grain be obtained it will be enough; 33 th of a grain will poison a 
mouse with characteristic symptoms; ;2,th, a small bird; ;o 5th of a grain 
causes tingling and numbness on the top of the tongue; ;j 5th, dissolved in 
spirit and rubbed into the skin, causes loss of feeling lasting for some time. (ee) 


VI. Lobelia Inflata. (Indian Tobacco.) 


§ 765. This plant, which in the hands of empirics has been productive of 
so much mischief, is very similar in its effects to ordinary tobacco. Itis a 
powerful nauseating emetic. It causes severe and speedy vomiting in most 
cases, attended with continued and distressing nausea, sometimes purging, 
copious sweating, and great general relaxation, extreme prostration, anxiety, 
contracted pupils, insensibility, and occasionally death preceded by convulsions. 
As an emetic, the dose is from ten to twenty grains, as an expectorant, from 
one to five grains. The poisonous principle, called lobelina, a viscous, trans- 
parent oil with a strong alkaline reaction, has been obtained in a pure state 
by M. Bastick.(f) The trial of Samuel Thompson for the murder of Lovett 


animal charcoal, and then testing the filtered solution by boiling in sulphuric acid, 
it was “turned to a deep port-wine red color.” We beg leave to refer the reader for 
well merited strictures upon the medical and chemical evidence given upon this trial, 
to the candid and able review of it by Prof. Charles A. Lee, in the American Journal 
of Medical Sciences, for Oct. 1844. 
(e) Dublin Journal, July, 1841. (ee) Lancet, March, 1856, p. 343. 
(f) Gaz. des Hop. July, 1851. 


629 


§ 765] LOBELIA INFLATA. [BOOK V. 


by this drug, is given in considerable detail in the chapter on “ Malpractice.’’ 
Other cases of death from its administration, both in this country and in 
Hngland, where the peculiar practice of Thompson has been extensively in- 
troduced by a person named Coffin, and is there called ‘‘ Coffinism.”’ Dr. 
Letheby, in his testimony upon an inquest held upon a man who died from 
the effects of a lobelia emetic given him by a green grocer, stated that within 
three or four years there had been, in England, thirteen cases of poisoning 
with it.(g) When any of these cases were brought to trial, however, the 
culprits usually managed to escape. But in 1856 one was convicted and 
sentenced to three months’ imprisonment.(gg) Dr. Beck says, ‘‘ that thou- 
sands of individuals in the United States have been murdered by the combined 
use of capsicum and lobelia, administered by the Thompsonian quacks.” “The 
founder of what has been called ‘ Coffinism,’(h) an individual who styles him- 
self, ‘A. S. Coffin, M. D., Professor of Medical Botany,’ declares in his ‘ Bo- 
tanic Guide to Health, and the Natural Pathology of Disease,’ 17th ed., 1850, 
that lobelia ‘is not a poison,’ ‘that it never operates upon those who are in 
perfect health,’ and he says that the powdered leaves or pods may be given in 
doses of a teaspoonful every half hour, in a cup of vervain tea or pennyroyal, 
and repeated until it operates as an emetic; and he adds, ‘Never mind Hooper, 
but give enough ! !’ ’’(7) 


(g) Med. Times and Gaz. 1853, ii. 568. 

(gg) Taylor on Poisons, 2d Am. ed. p. 732. 

(h) Vid. Pharm. Journ. Sept. 1, 1849, and Feb. 1, 1851. 

(i) Pereira. For cases, vid. Med. Gaz. Aug. 1849 and 1850; Lancet, 1849, June, 1850, 
and Pharm. Journal, Aug. 1851; also Med. Gaz. 1851, p. 384. The following case of 
lobelia poisoning we have selected on account of its brevity. “ The defendant, Riley 
Drake, was charged with having produced the death of Miss Lucina Frost, by ‘the 
grossly ignorant, careless and unskilful administration of lobelia to her.’ Dr. A. H. 
Brownson, sworn, says: ‘ He was called tovisit Miss Lucina Frost on the 11th of Sep- 
tember, 1843. Found her laboring under febrile excitement. Considered her com- 
plaint a case of bilious remittent fever. Continued to attend her as a physician, until 
Thursday, the 28th of September, when she was convalescent, and had been for several 
days. Patient had some appetite. Witness. also testifies that lobelia is a violent 
emetic; which, if taken in large doses and not discharged from the stomach, will act 
as a fatal poison. Thinks an emetic, of any kind, would have been very improper for 
the deceased when he last saw her.’ Dr. Brownson’s testimony was corroborated in 
every point by that of Dr. P. R. Brooks, who was called to see the patient two or 
three times, in consultation with Dr. Brownson. Nancy Sutcliffe, sworn, says: ‘She 
has known the deceased about eight years. Was there about a week before her death, 
and up to the time of her death. Saw Riley Drake there on Sabbath (September 
24th), when the patient asked him if he thought she was getting better, and he said 
not. He, Drake, had something to say to her every time he was there. On Thurs- 
day, she, deceased, said to him that Brownson told her that her fever had turned, and 
that she was better. Drake said that Brownson was mistaken, that her fever had not 
turned, and that she would never get well under Brownson’s treatment. Deceased 
asked Drake if he could help her, and he said he could. Her father would not give 
his consent to have Drake. Friday night, September 27th, Drake came in, and she, 
deceased, told him if he thought he could help her, she wished he would. He gave 
her some medicine, to prepare her stomach for an emetic. The next morning he came 
in and gave her an emetic. He gave her small seeds steeped in water. Witness saw 
the seeds. She vomited twice. After vomiting, appeared to feel better. Probably a 
teaspoonful of seeds was given. Nothing else was given. Drake did not come again 
till afternoon. Patient appeared better till noon, when she became distressed for 
breath. Seemed filled up on her stomach, and continued so until Drake came in the 
afternoon. He ordered ginger-tea, which was made, and three tea-cups full given. He 
then steeped lobelia in a tea-cup, and gave her that, seed and all. Tea-cup was about 
half full. She drank about half of it; and then wanted some physic. He gave her 


630 


BOOK V.] CEDAR OIL. [$ 766 


VIL. Cedar Oil. 


§ 766. The oil of the common juniper (Juniperus Virginiana) has an action 
upon the system similar to that of savin, except that it appears to have a 
more decided narcotic influence. Dr. Wait reports four cases of poisoning 
by this oil, two of which proved fatal. The quantity taken in each case was 
from half an ounce to an ounce, and in three of them it was swallowed with 


some. She then said she thought she ought to take more. She then took the rest of 
the Jobelia. He then gave her some red stuff, and then some nerve-root tea. She died 
in half an hour after the lobelia was first administered.’ The evidence was confirmed 
in every essential particular by that of Olive Fairchild and Charles Gearnsey, with 
the additional fact that the deceased was severely convulsed after taking the emetic, 
on Saturday just previous to her death. Dr. Stephen D. Hand, sworn: ‘ Witness is 
a practising physician, residing in Binghampton, Broome County, New York; says he 
was called to examine the body of Miss Lucina Frost, on Sunday, September 31st, 
1843. Was informed that she died on the Saturday previous, September 30th. Ex- 
ternal appearances of the body natural. Examined the stomach and other internal 
organs. Found a tablespoonful of lobelia seeds in the stomach. Mucous membrane of 
stomach softened and much inflamed. Intestines also considerably inflamed. The 
heart and other organs healthy. Witness has no doubt but the lobelia contained in 
the stomach killed the patient. Thinks there was enough there to destroy the life of 
any person unless thrown off. All parts of the lobelia plant contain the same pro- 
perties. Thinks, from the description given of the patient by Drs. Brownson and 
Brooks, that an emetic of any kind would have been very improper under the circum- 
stances.’ The testimony of Dr. Hand was corroborated by that of Drs. West, Brooks, 
and Cook, who were also present at the post-mortem examination. Drs. Thomas 
Jackson, and N. 8. Davis, both residents of Binghamptom, were also sworn in regard 
to the properties of lobelia, which they stated ‘ to be an active narcotico-acrid poison, 
when taken in large doses.’ 

“ This closed the evidence on the part of the prosecution, when the defendant called 
Charles Gearnsey, Haman Gearnsey, Samuel Martin, Harry Martin, Alvah Parsons, 
Nathaniel Boughton, Charles Elliot, Sherlock Black, Rhodia Gearnsey, George Doolittle, 
Uriah Doolittle, James Russel; all of whom testified that they were personally ac- 
quainted with Riley Drake, and considered him a skilful physician of the Thompsonian 
school. The defendant then called the following Thompsonian and Botanic doctors 
to prove the qualities of the lobelia. Folkert Van Vleck, sworn: ‘ Lives in Hamilton, 
Mad. Co. Is a physician of the Thompsonian order. Twelve years’ practice. Have 
had as many patients as I could attend to. Have used lobelia in almost every case 
of inflammation and fever, and usually with good success. In cases of remittent 
fever, should use lobelia as an emetic, and afterwards in broken doses. My patients 
have always recovered. Lobelia produces an emetic effect on the healthy stomach. 
It will not produce inflammation under any circumstances. Did not hear the testi- 
mony of Dr. Brownson. Heard Dr. Hand’s. Thinks that lobelia would not produce 
the effect described by Hand.’ Cross-examined: “Says he lost only one fever patient. 
Has lost some with consumption. Gives lobelia in consumption. Has been present 
at a post-mortem examination. Thinks that a single dose of lobelia could not be 
taken so as to produce death ; it might be by repeating the dose. Cannot tell whether 
_ tobacco is a poison, or not. Thinks cicuta would produce nausea. Has never studied 
surgery, anatomy, &c., and does not deem it necessary.’ William Rose, sworn: ‘Is 
-a botanic doctor. Has used lobelia for thirty years in all cases were emetics were 
needed. In 1825, had one hundred cases of scarlet fever, in which he used lobelia, 
and did not lose a patient. Has no knowledge of its possessing poisonous qualities. 
Understands by narcotic poisons, that which stops the blood. Don’t know how opium 
produces death. Thinks arsenic would produce death quicker than cicuta.’ Jabez 
Jeffers, also a botanic physician, gave similar testimony to that of Dr. Rose. Thomas 
W. Griffin, sworn, says ‘he is a Thompsonian physician ; has practised eighteen years 
as such. Says he uses three articles, viz: lobelia, Cayenne pepper, and Barbary bark, 
in all cases, and in all stages of disease, and under all circumstances, and always with 
good effect. Thinks that lobelia is not a poison.’ The testimony being closed, the case 
was ably argued by Lieut. Gov. Dickinson, for the defendant, and by the Hon. Joshua 
A. Spencer in behalf of the people, when it was submitted to the jury by Judge Mor- 
refl. The jury, after an absence of a few hours, returned with a verdict of guilty. 
Judgment was, however, suspended until the next term of court.”—New York Journ. 
of Medicine, Nov. 1844. 

631 


§ 767] SAVIN, . [BOOK V. 


the view of bringing on abortion. The patients were seized with convulsions, 
and vomited a fluid having a strong odor of the oil. After the convulsions 
had subsided, they fell into a comatose condition. The post-mortem appear- 
ances in the two fatal cases were not very striking. There were several small 
red patches upon the lining membrane of the stomach, and the duodenum 
showed marked signs of inflammation. The uterus in each case was in a 
healthy, gravid state. The odor of the oil was distinctly perceived on open- 
ing the stomach. (j) 


VIIL Savin. 


§ 767. The leaves of this plant have, in the fresh state, a strong, peculiar, 
and heavy odor, especially when rubbed, and a nauseous, resinous and bitter 
taste. The dried tops are of a yellowish green color, and are less odorous 
than the fresh ones. The oil of savin is a limpid, almost colorless liquid, 
having the unpleasant odor of the plant, and a bitter, acrid taste. The medi- 
cinal dose is from two to six drops. But the use of the oil or of the dried 
leaves of this plant, in medicine, is exceedingly restricted. From the fre- 
quency, however, with which it is resorted to for the purpose of procuring 
abortion it is necessary to notice its effects. The oil of savin, when applied to 
the skin, exercises a powerful rubefacient and even vesicant property. Swal- 
lowed in large doses, it occasions vomiting, purging, and other symptoms of 
gastro-intestinal inflammation. Pereira says, that according to his obser- 
vation, it is the most certain and powerful emmenagogue of the whole materia 
medica. He quotes, from a German author, the case of a woman who swal- 
lowed an infusion of savin to occasion abortion. Violent and incessant 
vomiting was induced, which was followed in a few days by excruciating pain 
in the abdomen, abortion, dreadful hemorrhage from the uterus, and death. 

Two other fatal cases are given by Dr. Christison, in one of which abor- 
tion was produced. In two others, related by Dr. Taylor, the women, who 
were respectively in the seventh and eighth month of pregnancy, violent and 
fatal gastro-intestinal inflammation was induced, and abortion followed. In 
one of these cases, furnished by Mr. Letheby, the symptoms resembled those of 
narcotic poisoning; the woman being found lying on her back, perfectly 
insensible, and breathing stertorously. Although, therefore, the power of pro- 
ducing abortion cannot be denied to this drug, it is the result of general 
observation that this effect ensues only when it is taken in such doses as to 
endanger life by the violent inflammation set up in the stomach and intestines, 
and that it may yet even destroy the life of a pregnant female without bring- 
ing on the premature expulsion of the child. In a case reported by Dr. 
Hinds, a woman, five or six months advanced in pregnancy, brought on pre- 
mature labor by repeated doses of oil of savin. Before and after this event 
she suffered greatly from purging, vomiting, and intense pain, which termin- 
ated in a dangerous attack of peritonitis. She was actively treated, and re- 
covered. (x) 


(7) Bost. Med. & Surg. Journ. 1849. 
(k) Times and Gaz., Nov. 1857, p. 524. 


BOOK V.]| DETECTION OF SAVIN. [$ 770 


§ 768. Ist. Post-mortem appearances.—After death there are found, in 
general, undoubted evidences of inflammation of the stomach and intestines. 
In one of Dr. Christison’s cases, the inside of the stomach was red with 
patches of florid extravasation, and there was extensive peritoneal inflamma- 
tion, with fibrinous effusion. The contents of the stomach had a green color. 
In the case communicated by Dr. Salisbury to Dr. Beck (vid. “ Abortion,”) 
where the examination was made from twelve to fourteen hours after death, 
the stomach was found softened and perforated, its contents emptied into the 
cavity of the abdomen, and extensive peritonitis. The perforation was about 
the size of a fifty cent piece, and was situated in the region of the greater cur- 
vature, near the cardiac orifice. For several inches around the perforation, 
the stomach was very much corroded, thinned, and softened, so that it was 
easily torn. ‘The cesophagus and upper part of the small intestines are <e- 
scribed as inflamed. Evidence of the presence of savin in the intestinal canal 
was obtained, and a vial was discovered in the room, still containing half a 
drachm of the oil of savin and tincture of lavender. In a case occurring to 
Mr. Lord, of Hampstead, the cesophagus presented a dark, arborescent injec- 
tion, with slight patches of ecchymosis, and in the stomach there was a large 
patch of redness about three inches in length; the vessels of the mucous mem- 
brane were considerably injected, forming infiltrated patches, especially about 
the lesser curvature, but there was no ulceration or erosion. Here, also, a 
large quantity of a greenish fluid was found, of the appearance and consistency 
of green pea soup, which was found on examination under the microscope, to 
be due to the presence of finely triturated savin powder. ‘The intestines, also, 
were highly inflamed, the duodenum being of the color of cinnabar, and there 
was also some peritonitis. 

§ 769. 2d. Detection.—According to Pereira, powdered savin may, on ac- 
count of its green color, be mistaken for bile, but when mixed with distilled 
water, it entirely subsides, and provided no bile be intermixed, the supernatant 
liquor will be devoid of a green color. 

If savin have been given in the form of infusion or decoction, it may be 
impossible to detect it, but when the oil has been administered, it may be sepa- 
rated by distillation. Furthermore, as has been already stated, savin, in powder, 
may be recognized by means of the microscope; the circular pores being visi- 
ble, and the acuminated shape of the leaves. The odor, also, may aid in its 
recognition. 


IX. Taxus Baccata. (Yew.) 


§ 770. The leaves and berries of the common yew have been known for ages 
as poisonous. Although Orfila gave them to animals in many cases without 
effect, numerous cases of accidental poisoning by them are known. | It is usu- 
ally classed among the acrid narcotics, although in most cases of poisoning by 
it which have been reported, acrimony has appeared to be the least essential of 
its properties. In the case of a lunatic who died fourteen hours after chewing 
yew leaves, the symptoms were giddiness, sudden prostration of strength, vomit- 

633 


S771] YEW.—OIL OF TANSY. [BOOK V. 


ing, coldness of the surface, spasms, and irregular action of the heart.(/) Simi- 
~ lar effects were seen in a child who died four hours after eating the berries.(m) 
Brandis says, a young woman took, as an abortive, the leaves of the yew, and 
fell into the sleep of death without convulsions. Indeed, one might have 
supposed her to be really sleeping, for her cheeks preserved the hue of life, 
and a quiet smile played over her face.(n) In Henke’s Journal,(o) an inter- 
esting history is given of the poisoning of eleven persons by a decoction 
of yew leaves. They had partaken of it as a prophylactic against hydro- 
phobia, some of their dogs having been bitten by one supposed to be rabid. In 
half an hour all of them were seized with giddiness, confusion of sight, pain in 
the head, nausea and vomiting, and then fell asleep. Two of them, however, 
died within about an hour, without either pain or convulsions, but with a smile 
upon their countenance. The rest recovered without further symptoms. The 
post-mortem appearances, in these and the preceding cases, threw no light 
upon the manner in which the poison affected the system, except from the 
negative evidence of the absence of any well-marked signs of inflammation. 
In Mr. Hurt’s case, however, it is stated that, besides patches of redness upon 
the mucous membrane of the stomach, it was also much softened. 


X. Oil of Tansy. 


§ 771. The few cases that have been reported of poisoning by the oil of 
tansy indicate that its appropriate position is among the narcotico-irritant 
poisons. It has been often taken for the purpose of inducing abortion, but 
does not seem to possess this property, which is popularly attributed to it. A 
fatal case of poisoning with half an ounce of this oil, is recorded in the Am. 
Journ. Med. Sci. for May, 1835. Frequent and violent clonic spasms were 
experienced, with much disturbance of respiration. No signs of inflammation 
in the stomach and bowels were found upon dissection. Death occurred in 
two hours after taking the poison. A young lady took a teaspoonful of the 
oil in mistake for the essence of tansy, for the purpose of promoting the cata- 
menial discharge. She complained of dizziness, and became insensible in ten 
minutes, was seized with convulsions, and her respiration was laborious and 
her pulse irregular. She died in one hour and a quarter after taking the oil. 
Another young lady in the family took of the medicine at the same time, but 
vomited very soon, and suffered no inconvenience.(p) In a case which came 
under the notice of Dr. Dalton, of Lowell, recovery took place in consequence 
of spontaneous vomiting having occurred. Nevertheless, the girl remained 
insensible and convulsed for some time after it. The most interesting and 
detailed case is that related by Dr. Dalton, Jr., of Boston. The quantity 
taken was a little less than an ounce and a half, and death took place in three 
hours and a half. The girl, when first seen, had fallen out of bed, in convul- 
sions, and was entirely unconscious. The cheeks were highly flushed, the eyes 
open and brilliant; the pupils widely dilated and insensible; the skin was 


(J) Dr. Mullan, Dub. Hosp. Gaz. 1845. (m) Hurt, Lancet, Dec. 10, 1836. 
(n) Blumenbach’s Med. Bibliothek, Bd. 3, p. 684. (o) Erg. Heft. 43, p. 127. 
(p) Am. Jour. Med. Sci., July, 1852, p. 279. 


634 


BOOK Y.| POISONING BY OIL OF TANSY. [$ 773 


warm; pulse full, rapid, and strong; respiration hurried and stertorous, and 
obstructed by an abundance of frothy mucus, which filled the air-passages and 
was blown from between the lips in respiration; the breath had a strong odor 
of tansy ; convulsions occurred every five or ten minutes, in which the respira- 
tion was suspended, the arms raised and rigidly extended, and the fingers con- 
tracted. In the intervals between the convulsions there was no return of 
consciousness, and the jaws remained clenched so that it was impossible to 
administer any medicine by the mouth. 

§ 772. The autopsy was made ten hours after death. The countenance 
was natural, the cadaveric rigidity was very strong, and there was only a slight 
discoloration of the dependent parts. The brain was not congested in any 
part, nor was there any effusion. Neither was there any appearance of con- 
gestion in the lungs. The interior of the heart exhaled a distinct odor of 
tansy, as did also the cut surface of the pectoral muscles. There was a strong 
odor of tansy in the peritoneal cavity. ‘‘The stomach contained about twelve 
ounces of a semi-fluid, yellowish-gray substance, consisting of partially digested 
food—potato, cranberries, onions, &c.—mixed with an abundance of small, 
yellowish-brown, glistening oil-globules, exhaling an excessive odor of tansy ; 
mucous membrane generally pale, not vascular in any part, but throughout 
nearly the whole of the great pouch brownish and much thinned and softened, 
so that for a considerable space it was nearly or quite destroyed. There was 
an old, whitish, slightly puckered cicatrix of the mucous membrane on the 
posterior wall of the stomach, near the smaller curvature, but no other morbid 
appearance.”? A four months’ foetus was found in the womb, not in the least 
disturbed. A two-ounce phial, containing still five drachms of the oil of 
tansy, was found in the pocket of the girl’s dress; and a mug was also found, 
smelling very strong of the medicine, from which it had apparently been drunk, 
mixed with water. 

Half an ounce of oil of tansy, taken by a pregnant female to procure abor- 
tion, produced a partial loss of consciousness, and convulsions. It failed, 
however, of its purpose.(~p) No other means have as yet been proposed, or 
are perhaps necessary, for the detection of this oil in cases of poisoning by it, 
than its powerful and peculiar aromatic smell. 


XI. Cocculus Indicus. 


§ 773. Ist. Symptoms.—This is the fruit of Anamirta Cocculus. The 
kernel, which is the only poisonous portion of the berry, has no smell, but an 
intensely bitter taste. It contains an alkaloid, called picrotoxia, which is an 
exceedingly active poison. It appears, from the experiments of Glover, Routh, 
and Falck, that the prominent symptoms produced by it in animals are sali- 
vation and tetanic convulsions, which usually terminate fatally, although the 
dose required to kill is much greater than that of other poisonous alkaloids, 
as much as forty grains of it being required to kill a dog. Cocculus Indicus 
is chiefly used for the purpose of taking fish and of sophisticating malt liquor. 


(pp) Bost. Med. and Surg. Journ. Dec. 1857, p. 383. 
635 


§ 775] COCCULUS INDICUS. [BOOK V. 


It is also used for the destruction of lice. Several fatal accidents have oc- 
--eurred in this country from it. Dr. Thompson reports one case from its 
external application. A child, aged six years, whose head, after the hair had 
been cut close, was washed with an alcoholic tincture of cocculus indicus, was 
seized, in less than half an hour after its application, with tetanic convulsions. 
The pupils during the spasm were exceedingly contracted, and in the interval 
between the attacks were dilated to the fullest extent. By touching the eye- 
lids, the spasm could be produced at pleasure. The case was treated with 
energy, but the child died in a few hours. 

§ 774. 2d. On post-mortem examination, no changes of any note were 
observed. A younger sister of the deceased, who had also been submitted to 
the same cleansing process, was likewise attacked in a similar manner. Under 
the use of counter-irritation by mustard, and injections of the tincture of 
assafcetida, she recovered, the convulsions gradually subsiding about three 
hours after the attack commenced. The next morning a scarlatinous erup- 
tion appeared upon the body and arms, which gradually faded during the 
day.(q) 

The following account of several cases of poisoning by the internal use of 
this substance has been kindly communicated to me by Dr. Fish, formerly 
assistant resident physician at the Philadelphia Hospital, Blockley. A strong 
decoction of this berry (two ounces to a pint of water) is used in that insti- 
tution for the destruction of vermin upon the paupers. The vessel containing 
it was unfortunately placed near some tonic infusions in use by several patients. 
Through the ignorance of the nurse, a wineglassful of this decoction was given 
to each of three persons, and two tablespoonfuls to three others, in mistake 
for their usual medicine. Two of those who took the largest quantity were 
seized with convulsions about twenty minutes-after they had taken the poison, 
and died in about half an hour. This happened in the evening, and their 
muscles were still contracted the next morning. Both of these men were 
much reduced by intemperance and disease. The remaining four, who were 
seized within a few moments of each other, and within half an hour after they 
had taken the poison, presented the following symptoms: faintness, mental 
confusion, giddiness, dimness of vision, nausea, excessive thirst, severe pain in 
the abdomen, and in one case insensibility. The pulse was much weakened, 
and the respiration was slow and labored. EHmetics were given to them, and, 
after their operation, mucilaginous drinks and stimulants. They all recovered, 
but suffered greatly from headache during the rest of the day. 

Another case is mentioned in Traill’s Outlines; and one is referred to by 
Dr. Taylor, in which the post-mortem examination distinctly revealed traces 
of gastro-enteritis, due to the irritant action of the poison. In this case, 
however, the patient lived until the nineteenth day. 

§ 775. The following case presents a curious question in the administration 
of poisons. The prisoner was indicted for administering poison, and it was | 
proved that two cocculus indicus berries had been given to a child nine weeks 


(q) Philad. Med. Examiner, April, 1852, reported by William B. Thompson, Senior 
House Surgeon, Emigrants’ Hospital, Ward’s Island. 


636 


lS a ae 


BOOK V.| COCCULUS INDICUS. [$ 775 


old. The child, after having swallowed them, threw up one by vomiting, and 
the other passed through her body in the course of nature, and was found 
next day in her clothes. 

Two medical witnesses, called on the part of the prosecution, proved that 
the cocculus indicus berry is classed with the narcotic poisons; that the poison 
consists in the presence of an alkaloid, which is extracted from the kernel ; 
that all the noxious properties are in the kernel; that it has a very hard 
exterior or pod, to break which much force is required. 

One of the witnesses added that the berry, if the pod is broken, is calculated 
to produce death in an adult human subject, though he did not know how 
many berries would be required for the purpose; that he thought the poison 
contained in the kernel of two berries, if the pods were burst, and if retained 
on the stomach, might produce death in a child nine weeks old, but that the 
berry could not be digested by the child, and that it would pass through its 
body, without the pod being burst, and so would be innocuous (as had, in fact, 
happened in the present case). 

The counsel for the prisoner objected that the berries were not poison within 
the meaning of the statute, for that though the kernel of the berries contained 
poison, yet the pod rendered the poison innocuous. The judge (Vaughan 
Williams) overruled the objection, and left the whole case to the jury. Ver- 
dict, guilty. 

Judgment of death was recorded, but execution was stayed in order to sub- 
mit the point raised by the prisoner’s counsel to the consideration of the 
judges. The discussion before them in the Exchequer Chamber is given in 
detail by the reporter, and is quite interesting. 

The counsel for the prisoner observed that the indictment was founded on 
the statute 1 Vict. c. 85, sect. 2, which makes it a capital felony to administer 
to, or cause to be taken by, any person, ‘‘any poison or other destructive 
thing,’ with intent to commit murder. The real question is, whether the 
berries in the state in which they were administered were “poison.” The 
prisoner thought he was giving a destructive thing, but did not do so. It 
was inquired of the counsel by the judges what he would say if arsenic was 
given in a globule of glass? Again, if arsenic was put in a paper envelop, 
and that wrapped in oiled paper and administered? He contended that in 
“such states it could not be a destructive thing.” But it was replied, if a 
person gives poison in too small a dose, you would say that it was not within 
the statute, as it could not be destructive. If you are right in so saying, 
persons might give doses of arsenic and speculate on the size of the dose. 
Finally, Chief Justice Wild remarked, ‘‘ The question here is whether the pri- 
soner administered poison with intent to murder. The kernel of the berry 
was a poison, but he administered it in a condition in which it was not capable 
of doing injury. Is that administering poison? If a person administers 
poison with intent to murder, but accompanies it with something which pre- 
vents its acting, we all think it is the offence provided for by this enactment, 
and that the conviction must be affirmed.”? Justice Alderson said, ‘‘'This is 
very different from the case of a person administering an innocent thing and 

637 


§ 776] BELLADONNA. [BOOK V. 


thinking it poison ; there he does not administer poison at all; here he does.” 
The other judges concurred in affirming the conviction. (7) 


XII. Atropa Belladonna. (Deadly Nightshade.) 


§ 776. The root, leaves, and fruit of this plant are all poisonous. The 
berries are black, and have often been eaten by children in ignorance of their 
poisonous properties. Dr. Taylor states that they were on one occasion 
openly sold in the streets of London as an edible fruit. Two persons, who 
had eaten of them, died; and the man who sold them was tried and convicted 
of manslaughter. A case graphically described by this author, will suffice 
as an illustration of the symptoms produced. ‘A boy, aged 14, ate, soon 
after breakfast, about thirty of the berries, which he had bought in the 
street. In about three hours it appeared to him as if his face was swollen, 
his throat became hot and dry, vision impaired—objects appeared double, and 
they seemed to revolve and run backwards. His hands and face were flushed, 
and his eyelids tumid; there were occasional flashes of light before his eyes. 
He tried to eat, but could not swallow on account of the state of his throat. 
In endeavoring to walk home he stumbled and staggered; and he felt giddy 
whenever he attempted to raise his head. His parents thought him intoxi- 
cated; he was incoherent—frequently counted his money, and did not know 
the silver from the copper coin. His eyes had fixed, brilliant, and dazzling 
gaze; he could neither hear nor speak plainly, and there was great thirst; he 
caught at imaginary objects in the air, and seemed to have lost all knowledge 
of distance. His fingers were in constant motion; there was headache, but 
neither vomiting nor purging. He attempted to get out of bed, with a reel- 
ing, drunken motion; his speech was thick and indistinct. The pupils were 
so strongly dilated that there was merely a ring of ‘iris, and the eyes were in- 
sensible to light. The eyelids did not close when the hand was passed suddenly 
before them. He had evidently lost the power of vision, although he stared 
fixedly at objects as if he saw them. The nerves of common sensation were 
unaffected. When placed on his legs, he could not stand. The pulse was 90, 
feeble and compressible; his mouth was in constant motion, as if he was eat- 
ing something. His bladder was full of urine on admission. He continued 
in this state for two days, being occasionally conscious ; when by a free evacua- 
tion of the bowels, some small seeds were passed; these were examined and 
identified as the seeds of belladonna, The boy gradually recovered, and left 
the hospital on the sixth day after his admission.’’(s) Total blindness is not 
an unusual effect of this poison. It was observed in a child, seven years of 
age, found wandering in the streets of London.(ss) Sometimes the cerebral 
Symptoms are much more aggravated than in the above case, there being fre- 
quently delirium or stupor, which, as well as the other symptoms, is slow in 
passing off. Ina case related in the Lancet, a lady was given by mistake a 
drachm of the extract in soap liniment; she fell into a comatose condition | 


(r) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., April, 1851, from Regina v. Clanderoy, Carrington and 
Kirwan’s Nisi Prius Reports, vol. ii. p. 707. 
(s) On Poisons; Am. ed., 617. (ss) Lancet, Dec. 1859, p. 561. 


638 


BOOK V.| ATROPIA. [$ 777 


in half an hour; the pupils were widely dilated, the hands and feet cold, 
and the pulse scarcely perceptible. Her jaws were rigid, and there was no 
vomiting; the stomach-pump was used, and she recovered in a few days 
gradually. Another instance is mentioned in the Annales d’Hygiéne, in which 
it caused serious symptoms, from having been put into soup instead of cara- 
mel. 'The toxical effects of belladonna are produced when applied locally, or 
introduced into the rectum. A lady suffering from hypogastric pain, applied 
to the abdomen a liniment composed of camphorated oil and extract of bella- 
donna. Forty-eight hours after commencing its use she was seized with deli- 
rium. The pupils became dilated, and there were irregular movements, lipo- 
thymia, redness of the face, and a fixed stare. The menses flowed abundantly, 
anticipating their proper epoch by ten or twelve days.(¢) A fatal case of 
the employment of an enema of a decoction of the root is recorded.(¢/) The 
extract varies very much in strength, and is sometimes quite inert. 

§ TTT. Atropia is a white, transparent, silky, crystalline powder, having no 
odor but a very bitter and acrid taste. When impure it is somewhat colored 
and has an unpleasant smell. Its effects are similar to, but more powerful 
than those of belladonna, of which it is the poisonous principle. About one- 
sixth of a grain is capable of producing unpleasant symptoms. It is chiefly 
used for dilating the pupil. A young man poisoned himself with two grains 
of this alkaloid. No trace of the poison could be detected in the stomach or 
intestines. Dr. Andrew, of the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh, had a patient 
who was under the use of atropia locally, to the eye. She swallowed one 
morning, by mistake, between five and six drachms of the solution, containing 
about two-thirds of a grain of atropia. She was immediately sensible of her 
error, her eyesight failed her, as well as her voice, the muscles of her face 
were convulsively moved, and she complained of a burning heat in her throat 
and stomach. She was very restless, but unable to stand. Although emetics 
and purgatives were given to her, the next day she was violently agitated and 
presented the symptoms of a person with delirium tremens. She recovered, 
but had double vision, spectral illusions, and various disturbances of the nerv- 
ous system for a week or two.(w) 

Three or four drops of a solution of atropia, containing two-thirds of a 
grain to the ounce of water acidulated with acetic acid, were put into the eye 
of a man with double cataract. In half an hour he had vertigo, and shortly 
after all the symptoms of poisoning with belladonna, flushed face, dilated 
pupils, and incessant hallucinations. His bladder became distended, and he 
was unable to empty it. Violent delirium continued during the night. He 
recovered in four days, these unpleasant symptoms having gradually disap- 
peared.(v) Dr. Bethune has reported a case in which a solution of two grains 
of atropia to the drachm was applied three times in one morning to the eye. 
In the afternoon the patient was attacked with delirium, and had an uncertain 
gait, sleeplessness, and difficulty of swallowing. On the day but one after he 


(t) Times and Gaz., August, 1859, p. 173. 

(tt) Casper’s Wochenschrift, Feb. 1845, p. 101. 

(uw) Edinb. Month. Journ., Jan. 1852, 

(v) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. (from Gaz. des Hopitaux), Oct. 1853, p. 540. 


639 


§ 778] DIGITALIS. [BOOK V. 


had another attack of delirium, which somewhat resembled delirium tremens, 
as he saw imaginary persons in the room.(vv) 

Atropia and belladonna must be recognized by their physical characters ; the 
former by its color, taste, and property of dilating the pupil, and the latter by 
the presence of the husks and seeds, when these have been taken, in the stools. 
The leaves may also be known by their botanical characters. 


XII. Digitalis Purpurea. (Foxglove.) 


§ 778. The leaves of this plant are the part usually employed, although 
the seeds contain also a large proportion of its active principle, which is called 
digitalin. The symptoms produced by digitalis in a poisonous dose have 
some peculiarities by which they may be distinguished from those caused by 
other poisons enumerated in this class. It is characterized by its remarkable 
property of causing slowness of the pulse. This symptom, which is quite 
familiar to physicians, was experimentally produced in nineteen patients in 
Andral’s clinic, the object being to test the efficacy of the pills of digitalin 
recommended by Homolle and Quevenne. In all of them the pulse was re- 
duced gradually about twenty-five beats, after the use of the pills for a period 
of time, which varied with each one.(w) The effects of this poison are cumu- 
lative; it may remain some time without any obvious effect upon the system, 
and then display its properties suddenly in a violent manner, and also after 
being discontinued, its action upon the system does not immediately cease. 

The following is an example of poisoning with the tincture of digitalis, 
where a teaspoonful was taken ina glass of water. The symptoms did not 
manifest themselves until five hours after the dose had been taken ; then they 
commenced with a feeling of nausea, which increased until violent and frequent 
vomiting took place. There was great precordial distress, intense frontal 
headache, dimness of vision, with dilated pupil, ringing in the ears, cramp in 
the muscles, very powerful, but at the same time, irregular and intermittent 
pulsations of the heart, with diminished frequency (44 in the minute), the 
pulse strong and tense, the respiration sighing, the thirst uncontrollable, re- 
tention of urine, sleeplessness, and great debility. The next day, in addition to 
these symptoms, there was violent delirium, and from that time they continued 
very gradually to decrease for ten or eleven days. The pulse was very long 
in regaining its frequency.(#) A case is recorded by M. Caussé of a young 
woman who was pregnant, and who secretly took a large quantity of the ex- 
pressed juice of digitalis, either to diminish the cedema of her limbs, or to 
produce abortion. The latter effect was produced, and death followed in 
twelve days, probably as much from the want of medical care as from either 
the abortion or the poison.(%x#) The tincture is often quite inert, or very 
feeble in medicinal properties; most of the fatal cases of poisoning by digi- 
talis which have occurred, have been either from the leaves in substance or in- 
fusion, or from digitalin. A decoction of the leaves, prescribed by a quack in 


(vv) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ., April, 1857, p. 201. 
(w) Union Méd., 1852, Nos. 52 and 53. 
(x) Union Médicale, No. 112. 1851. (xx) Bull. de Thérap. lvi. 101. 


640 


BOOK V.] QUINIA. [$ 780 


London, to the amount of six ounces, proved fatal in twenty-two hours. Dr. 
Leroux relates a case of poisoning by digitalin which nearly proved fatal. (y) 
The dose taken amounted to 0.03 grammes, which is equal to about half a 
grain. In another instance, in which 40 granules, equal to about two-thirds of 
a grain, were supposed to have been taken, the patient recovered under the 
use of emetics and stimulants.(yy) The symptoms, however, were not as urgent 
as in the preceding case. In still another case which recovered, the dose of digi- 
talin taken was also 40 granules, but the symptoms were somewhat different 
from those enumerated above. Within an hour the person, who was a female, 
states that she was seized with dizziness, debility, vomiting, and cold sweats, 
was unable to feel her pulse beat, or to pass her urine; she lay incapable of 
moving or speaking, her eyes felt strained, and actually projected considerably ; 
she had hallucinations; also continual nausea, extreme tenderness of the epi- 
gastrium, and great thirst; and the pulse fell to 46 in the minute. (z) 

Digitalin occurs in pale straw-colored scales, or in a white powder, and is 
so extremely bitter, as to communicate this quality to 200,000 parts of water. 
Its taste is most strongly perceived in the fauces, and it has a peculiar and 
faintly aromatic smell. It is soluble in alcohol, is neutral in its chemical 
relations, combines neither with acids nor bases, and is unchanged by exposure 
to the air. Its maximum medicinal dose is stated at 4, of a grain. 

§ 779. The morbid alterations in one case where these have been reported, 
were merely an injection of the “external membranes of the brain, and some 
redness of the mucous membrane of the stomach.” It need hardly be said 
that this evidence amounts to nothing. In M. Caussé’s case, the mucous 
membrane of the stomach near the lesser curvature of the pyloric orifice was 
covered with purplish patches. This was the only lesion referable to the action 
of the poison. Two cats accidentally shut up in a room where this plant 
had been spread out to dry, were found the next morning dead. ‘They had 
eaten of the leaves. Their bodies were very much relaxed, and, it is stated, 
putrefied very soon.(a) 


XIV. Quinia. 


§ 780. The occasional occurrence of alarming and even fatal effects from 
the use of sulphate of quinia, renders it necessary that we should briefly notice 
them. When given in larger doses than usual, continued for too great a 
length of time, or in persons peculiarly susceptible to its influence, it produces 
considerable cerebral disturbance, and may occasion severe headache, vertigo, 
deafness, diminution or loss of sight and of speech, delirium, coma, and great 
prostration.(b) Dr. M’Lean relates four instances in which complete blind- 
ness was produced, from which, however, the patients partially recovered in 


(y) Union Médicale, No. 99. 1852. 

(yy) Dr. Chereau, Union Méd. Jan. 10,1854. Quoted in Ed, Monthly Journ. for 
August, 1854. 

(z) Annuaire de Thérap. 1858, p. 102. 

(a) Archiv. fiir Pharmacie, Oct. 1858, p. 16. 

(6) Wood and Bache. 


4] 641 


§ 781] MEZEREON. [BOOK V. 


the course of a year. In one of these cases, three drachms were given in the 
“course of 36 hours; in another, an ounce; in the others the quantity was 
somewhat less, being in one, three drachms and a half in three days, and in 
the other the quantity is merely said to have been “‘large.”’(c) In the same 
journal will be found the paper of Dr. Baldwin detailing his experiments 
upon animals, and giving the particnlars of a case which came under his 
notice, where he considered that death resulted from the use of quinia, although 
not administered in large doses. Death was preceded by extreme restlessness, 
dilatation of the pupils, blindness, and convulsions. The disease was inter- 
mittent fever. Without presuming to deny the accuracy of Dr. B.’s opinion 
of the cause of death in this case, we may state that we have seen precisely 
the same alarming cerebral symptoms in a child seven years of age, with 
intermittent fever, which could not have been caused by quinia as none had 
been taken in any form. A man with acute rheumatism, under the care of 
M. Récamier at the Hotel Dieu, after taking about 100 grains of the sulphate 
of quinia in hourly doses of from four to five grains, was suddenly attacked 
with delirium and died in a few hours. A similar case occurred under M. Hus- 
son’s care, but the patient recovered. The whole quantity given was 93 grains, 
the symptoms coming on after the last dose.(d) Four cases are collected by 
M. Mélier in which it is said that this drug was fatal to life ;(e) and Guersant 
has given an account of a physician who died poisoned by sulphate of quinia, 
after taking nearly five ounces of it in ‘the course of eight or nine days.(/) 
In this, as in other similar cases, sight and hearing were lost, the limbs were 
cold, the breathing slow and labored, and the pulse feeble, irregular, and 
infrequent. Death took place by coma preceded by delirium. 

§ 781. Daphne mezereum.—The berries of this plant, which resemble those 
of the red currant, are actively poisonous. In two cases reported by Dr. 
Schwebes, the symptoms were nausea and vomiting, followed by complete nar- 
cotism ; there were convulsive movements of the eyes and upper extremities 
occurring at short intervals, the pupils were contracted and scarcely sensible 
to the stimulus of light. The children were restored by cold affusion to the 
head and other appropriate treatment.(g) Dr. Christison mentions the case 
of a child, aged eight years, which proved fatal, and three others which reco- 
vered. ‘The symptoms were similar to those described. 


(c) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. April, 1847, 515. 
(d) Gaz. des Hép. Dec. 1842. 

(e) Mém. de Acad. de Méd. x. 733. 

(f) Dict. de Méd. 26me éd. xxvi. 569. 

(g) Casper’s Wochenschrift. No. 35. 1848. 


BOOK V.| CARBONIC ACID GAS, [$ 783 


CHAPTER X. 
POISONOUS GASES. 
I. Carbonic Acid Gas. 


§ 782. Ist. Hffects.—This gas in itself is irrespirable ; the irritation pro- 
duced by it upon the glottis being so great that it closes, and respiration 
becomes impossible. When, however, it is mixed with the air, it may be 
respired, and then produces symptoms somewhat similar to those of asphyxia, 
but which, nevertheless, are due to its specific narcotic action upon the sys- 
tem through the mucous membrane of the lungs. Under the present head we 
include cases of poisoning by charcoal fumes, which, however, contain, besides 
carbonic acid, carbonic oxide and traces of carburetted hydrogen. The first 
symptoms produced by this gas are heaviness of the head, a sensation of 
weight or pressure upon the temples, ringing in the ears, and a disposition to 
sleep. Then nausea and sometimes vomiting follow ; the respiration becomes 
slower, difficult, and sometimes stertorous ; the pulsations of the heart, which 
are at first precipitate, then become irregular, and finally slower ; the muscles 
are paralyzed, and the individual falls into a comatose condition, which may 
last several hours before life is extinct. Occasionally, secondary phenomena, 
such as nasal or pulmonary hemorrhage and pneumonia, are observed. Still 
more serious consequences may result, as in the case of a man whose attempt 
to destroy himself with charcoal fumes but who was interrupted after he be- 
came insensible. An inflammation of the sciatic nerve occurred, followed by 
general paralysis, delirium, and death.(e) The general appearance of the 
body varies in different cases, according to the rapidity of death and the length 
of time elapsing before it is seen. Sometimes the face is red and swollen, the 
eyes bright and glistening, the limbs flexible, and there are red spots in various 
parts of the body ; in others, on the contrary, there may be remarkable pallor, 
and a tetanic stiffness of all the muscles. 

§ 783. The body has sometimes an appearance of complete repose in natu- 
ral sleep; but sometimes, also, the features are swollen, discolored and dis- 
torted. The internal appearances are a vivid red, or sometimes a violet color 
of the blood, or, again, this fluid may be black and thick ; the soft solids are 
everywhere of a brighter color than natural; the lungs are voluminous, and 
of a brownish black color on their exterior, and red internally ; the body 
retains its heat and flexibility for a considerable time, and putrefaction occurs 
more slowly than after other modes of death.(/.) The presence of carbonic 
acid in the air of a room where persons have died or been more or less affected 
by it, may be detected by the white precipitate formed by it with lime-water 
or a solution of subacetate of lead. The proportion in which it exists may 


(e) Arch. Gén. 5éme sér. ix. 476. (f) Briand, Méd. Lég. p. 414. 
643 


§ 785] CARBONIC ACID GAS. [BOOK V. 


be detected, as recommended by Dr. Taylor, by introducing into a measured 
“quantity, in a graduated tube over mercury, a strong solution of caustic pot- 
ash. The degree of absorption will indicate the proportion of carbonic acid 
present. (g) 

§ 784. Death from the inhalation of carbonic acid gas is almost always, 
where it is not suicidal, produced accidentally. There can be no doubt, how- 
ever, but that a person may be thus destroyed by criminal design when asleep, 
this gas being of so insidious and oppressive a nature, that the individual may 
pass readily, without waking, from natural sleep into a state of fatal coma. 
Attendant circumstances may awaken a suspicion of wilful poisoning, but 
there is evidently nothing in the medical aspect of the case by which death 
can be attributed to the action of another rather than to that of the indi- 
vidual himself. The study of the effects of carbonic acid upon the system, 
under the various circumstances where it is inhaled, is important only as ena- 
bling us to refute unjust suspicions of other violent causes of death, and es- 
pecially of poisoning by other agents. Such suspicions are very apt to be en- 
tertained. Dr. Christison relates a case, in which a man and woman who had 
survived the effects of the gas generated from a pan of burning coals in their 
apartment, while at the same time four other persons in the room perished, 
were imprisoned on suspicion of having conspired to murder their companions. 
Similar cases have frequently been the subject of examination before the coro- 
ner’s inquest. 

§ 785. Carbonic acid is disengaged not only during the combustion of fuel, 
but may be present in deleterious quantity in the atmosphere from other 
sources. ‘Thus it has been the cause of death by the non-renewal of the air 
where a large number of persons are confined in a close apartment, and are 
obliged to respire the same air repeatedly ; it is disengaged in breweries dur- 
ing the process of fermentation, and in green-houses, from the plants, during 
the night ; persons have been frequently destroyed by it who, for the sake of 
warmth, have laid themselves down near the vents of lime kilns; and it is well 
known that it accumulates in the shafts of coal mines, and has there been the 
cause of death to large numbers of persons. The only one of these cases that 
ean well become the subject of medico-legal inquiry is that in which death re- 
sults from the gases evolved by the combustion of fuel. (We use the word 
gases since, as already remarked, it is by no means certain that the fatal effects 
are always due to the disengagement of carbonic acid gas. Carbonic oxide, 
which is also evolved, is still more rapidly poisonous than carbonic acid 
gas.)(h) On the continent of Europe, and especially in Paris, self-destruction 
by the vapors of charcoal is one of the most common forms of suicide. In 
England and the United States, this agent is seldom resorted to, while 
accidental death from the gases escaping from burning coal or the smothered 
combustion of wood is very frequent. 


(g) Med. Jur. p. 529. 

(h) M. Chevalier, in the Oct. number of the Ann. d’Hyg. for 1854, has related a case 
of poisoning by the vapors of carbon. He shows that three or four per cent. of car- 
bonic oxide will suffice to destroy a strong dog, that would not have been killed by 
less than thirty or forty per cent. of carbonic acid in the air. Warm-blooded animals 
may be destroyed by one per cent. of carbonic oxide. 


644 


BOOK V.]| CARBONIC ACID GAS. {§ 787 


§ 786. 2d. Qualities.—Carbonic acid gas, when not heated, is heavier than 
common air, and will therefore be found in greatest quantity near the floor 
after combustion has ceased; but during combustion, or while the air is 
still warm, it will be equally diffused through the apartment. Dr. Taylor 
found, by experiment, that in burning a quantity of charcoal actively in an 
open brazier raised above the floor, in a large apartment, the proportion of 
carbonic acid was nearly equal in air taken a foot above and a foot below the 
level of the source of combustion, there being no current to affect the results. 
The inferences which he draws from this and from other considerations, are— 
Ist. That in a small and close apartment individuals are equally liable to be 
suffocated, at all levels, from the very equal and rapid diffusion of carbonic 
acid gas during combustion. 2d. That in a large apartment, unless the gas 
be very rapidly diffused by a current of air, the air around the source of com- 
bustion may become impregnated with a poisonous proportion, while that at 
a distance might still be capable of supporting life, because carbonic acid re- 
quires time for its perfect and equable diffusion in a very large space. (7) 

§ 787. The following case may serve to show the circuitous route by which 
carbonic acid may find its way into bedrooms:(7) A man and his wife were 
found dead in their bedroom ; the first in an easy bent position on his right 
side, on the floor; the latter in a similar position, and her countenance wore a 
mild and placid expression. No marks of violence were found upon the bodies, 
and with the exception of slight suggillations on the man’s back, the skin was 
perfectly natural in color and appearance. A post-mortem examination and 
a chemical analysis were made without any indication of poisoning being 
detected. There was a singular and intolerable smell in the house, strongest 
in the chamber. It was found, upon further inquiry and examination, that a 
straw mattress had been burnt in the cesspool of an adjoining yard, a few 
days previously, the embers of which were still in a state of ignition, and when 
stirred, gave off dense volumes of smoke and a disgusting smell resembling that 
in the house. The walls of this cesspool and of the foundation of the house 
were of loose stones, and under the influence of a strong west wind the pro- 
ducts of combustion had found their way through the foundation into the 
boarded walls of the house, and thence into the chamber. No sulphuretted 
hydrogen could be detected in the gas which still escaped into the room, but 
sufficient carbonic acid to fatally contaminate its atmosphere. Briand enume- 
rates several instances in which carbonic acid, coming from fires lit in an apart- 
ment other than that occupied by the deceased, has nevertheless penetrated into 
it and been the cause of fatal accidents.(£) In one of these cases a man and 
his wife were found dead in bed, suffocated by gas produced by the charred 
woodwork in the neighborhood of a fire in a room at the opposite end of a 
long corridor on the same floor. The gas had worked its way under the floor 
until it found a vent in a crack of the flooring in their apartment. In 


(t) Med. Jur. p. 535. 
(j) An account of two cases of poisoning with carbonic acid, in remarkable circum- 
stances, communicated by Jos. Law, Es., Surgeon, &., Ed. Month. Journ. Mar. 1853. 
(k) Méd. Lég. p. 418. 
645 


§ 788] LIGHTING GAS. [BOOK V. 


other instances the gas was driven through stove-pipes, and from one chimney- 
~ flue to another on different floors. 

§ 788. 3d. Lighting gas.—The ordinary illuminating gas, which consists 
chiefly of light carburetted hydrogen, contains also vapors of volatile liquid 
carburets of hydrogen, carbonic oxide, and other elements. Light carburetted 
hydrogen is in itself hardly poisonous, but the composite gas, which is now 
everywhere so freely used for burning, has frequently caused fatal accidents. 
Still, the atmosphere may be very offensively loaded with it, and yet be 
breathed for a short time with impunity. It does not appear to act merely 
as an asphyxiating agent, but rather like a narcotic. The first symptoms are 
nausea, headache, noises in the ears, and great prostration. All of these 
become aggravated; the breathing then becomes oppressed, the limbs are 
paralyzed, and death is preceded by coma and convulsions. 

The post-mortem appearances are, generally, intense cerebral and aphed 
congestion, redness of the bronchial mucous membrane and of the lungs, and 
a dark color of the blood. In the fatal cases which occurred at Strasburg, and 
which are reported by M. Tourdes, the bronchial tubes were filled also with a 
white, thick, and viscid froth, streaked with blood.(/) 

The following case is reported by Giirtner, of Stuttgard.(m) The gas 
affected a lady, her servant maid, and also an English pointer dog. The lady 
was first seized; her illness began with an affection of the head, sickness, 
vomiting, and purging of thin rice-water-like stools, in which whitish flakes 
were observed. After twelve hours she recovered, but felt very drowsy. On 
the fifth day she experienced pain in the back part of the head, lassitude, 
vertigo, tinnitus aurium and loss of appetite, accompanied by a loaded tongue, 
a small pulse of 90, and cessation of the menses. Blood of rather a dirty 
dark-red color, presenting no buffy coat, was abstracted from a vein. Next 
day, the patient was worse; she was quite insensible, and lay with closed eye- 
lids; the eyes were turned up, the pupils were much contracted, and unaffected 
by the light; the face was not swollen; there was trismus; the arms were 
flexed at the elbow-joints; the respiratory movements were very feeble; the 
pulse was hardly perceptible; and the skin warm, but insensible to the touch. 
She was, however, restored by venesection, and other remedies. 

In the servant girl similar symptoms occurred, but not with much severity, 
which may be attributed to the fact that the atmosphere of her chamber had 
not been so strongly impregnated with the gas. She had severe cramps of the 
extremities, great jactitation of the hands, flexion of the arms at the elbows, 
great restlessness, and inclination to yawn. Her blood presented no buffy 
coat. Latterly she had a non-febrile bloody diarrhea. She recovered in 
fourteen days from the date of her seizure. 

The dog was found insensible, and quite stiff, as if dead, but it soon 
recovered. 

A man employed to clean a covered passage for water, into which a gas- 
pipe had leaked several days before, was sickened by the smell of the air, and 


(7) Ann. d’Hyg. t. iii. p. 457. Vid. also Devergie, Méd. Lég. t. iii. pp. 72 and 75. 
(m) Ed. Month. Journ. Oct. 1854. 


646 


BOOK V.] SULPHURETTED HYDROGEN. [$ 790 


fell with his head under the water. In about five minutes he was with diffi- 
culty dragged out, by means of a noose round his neck. He was pale and 
breathed feebly, but gradually his warmth and pulse became natural; the 
breathing, however, was oppressed and gutteral, and the muscles of the trunk 
and limbs spasmodically contracted. Death took place in about seven hours. 
The body, which was examined thirty-five hours afterwards, was rigid, and 
everywhere seemed congested with blood. It exhaled a strong alliaceous odor, 
and the stomach and intestines were distended with a gas which took fire and 
burned when flame was applied to it.(n) 


II. Sulphuretted Hydrogen Gas. 


§ 789. This is the principal deleterious gas, which is evolved from privy 
wells, and from foul drains and sewers. Its familiar and extremely offensive 
odor affords such unmistakable evidence of its presence, that unless a person is 
obliged to inhale it, or is exposed to it in a concentrated form, accidents will 
rarely occur from it. The consideration of its effects, and the means of obviating 
them, is evidently more the subject of medical police or hygiene, than of legal 
medicine. A few observations may not, however, be misplaced. When not 
existing in a very large proportion in the atmosphere, it may be breathed for 
a certain time with comparative impunity, giving rise merely to lassitude, loss 
of appetite, and sometimes a typhoid febrile condition. Again, when inhaled 
in a greater quantity, the symptoms are, acute and oppressive pain in the head 
and pit of the stomach; and for this reason, this gas has received from the 
French the name of “ plomb des fosses.” If, after experiencing these sensa- 
tions, the individual does not immediately withdraw from his position, he 
loses his consciousness, and falls, completely deprived of sensibility and the 
power of motion; a reddish froth runs from the mouth, the body is cold, and 
the face livid; the eyes are dull, and the pupils dilated and immovable; the 
pulse very irregular, and almost imperceptible; convulsions ensue, and the 
person dies comatose. 

In a case reported by Dr. Radcliff, of Baltimore, a man who descended into 
a privy-sink nearly eighty feet deep, already almost emptied by machinery, was 
overcome by the gases and fell to the bottom, where he remained for two hours 
before he could be extricated. Meanwhile cold water was repeatedly thrown 
upon him. Fifteen minutes afterwards he was much asphyxiated and depressed, 
with hurried and difficult respiration, but he recovered rapidly.(o) 

§ 790. 2d. The post-moriem appearances usually described are the follow- — 
ing: A proneness to rapid putrefaction ; an offensive odor from all parts of 
the body; the blood dark and liquid; the right side of the heart congested, 
and the muscles of the body of a dark color, and insusceptible to the stimulus 
of galvanism. 

This is not the only noxious gas evolved from privies and drains, but it is that 
which is the most destructive to life. There are also ammoniacal emanations, 
which are extremely irritating to the respiratory mucous membrane; and 


(n) Annuaire de Thérap. 1857, p. 288. 
(o) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Oct. 1858, p. 377. 
647 


S701] EXHALATIONS FROM THE DEAD. [BOOK Vv. 


nitrogen gas, which sometimes accumulates in enormous quantity, but which, 
although irrespirable, is perhaps not positively noxious. (p) 


Ill. Exhalations from the Dead. 


§ 791. According to the testimony of Mr. Waller Lewis,(q) the noxious 
character of the air which is found in the vaults of grave-yards is chiefly due 
to the presence of carbonic acid. He says that he has never succeeded in ob- 
taining any traces of the presence of cyanogen, hydrocyanic acid, sulphuretted, 
phosphoretted, or carburetted hydrogen gases, even in the smallest quantity. 
In the vaults under St. Mary-le-Strand he found a very-minute proportion of 
sulphuretted hydrogen. He says, also: ‘‘I examined gases formed by bodies 
of persons of all ages, from the stillborn infant to those who had survived to 
the age of ninety-two; the coffins had been in the vaults various lengths of 
time ; those that had been there a week were examined as well as those that 
had remained there a century and a half. Death had been caused by accident, 
by age, by disease. 'The latter had been of the most various kinds—typhus, 
phthisis, smallpox, childbirth, dropsy, and cholera. Not one of the above 
circumstances seemed to influence in the slightest degree the composition or 
character of the gases. These were most remarkably similar in every instance. 
All the gases I analyzed, or otherwise examined, were composed of nitrogen 
and carbonic acid gas mixed with atmospheric air, and holding decomposing 
animal matter in suspension. There was but one ingredient that was some- 
times present and sometimes entirely absent; this was ammoniacal gas, which 
was sometimes present in very large quantities. When this was added to the 
other gases, it overcame all other odor; when it was absent, the smell much 
resembled that of very putrid moist cheese. In every instance I searched most 
carefully for the presence of the hydrogenous gases mentioned, but never found 
the slightest trace of any of them.’’ ‘The same results were obtained by Pel- 
lieux, in Paris, who examined all the cemeteries around that capital.(r) A 
lighted candle, let down into one of the vaults which had stood open for 
twenty-four hours, and was twenty feet deep, was extinguished at the depth of 
five feet. Pellieux endeavored to descend into it, together with the inspector, 
but could not remain longer than a few seconds. A grave-digger, accustomed 
for many years to assist in placing coffins in the vault, was obliged to descend 
twice before he could succeed in emptying a bladder of water and refilling it with 
the gas. The symptoms exhibited by those who endeavored to descend below 
the point at which the light was extinguished were, first, great oppression of 
breathing, a feeling of weight and pressure upon the temples and eyelids, suc- 
ceeded by dryness of the fauces, a peculiar hot and repulsive sweetish taste in 
the mouth, singing in the ears, and profuse perspiration. The countenance 
acquired a reddish hue, and the nose, cheeks, and lips became livid. They 
were obliged to return rapidly to the air to escape total asphyxia. The 
natural color soon returned, but severe headache continued for some time. 
Mr. Lewis says that in him the most prominent among the symptoms, after 


(p) Vid. Briand, Méd. Lég. (q) Lancet, 1851. 
(r) Henke’s Zeitsch, 1851, p. 459. 


648 


ue 
BOOK V.] ANALYTICAL TABLE.—WOUNDS. [S$ 791 


exposure to the putrefactive gases, were nausea and vomiting, succeeded by 
diarrhcea, and a throbbing pain in the upper part of the head, great prostra- 
tion, and entire loss of appetite, accompanied with an unpleasant earthy taste 
in the mouth. He also says that these symptoms, after being experienced for 
a long time, were followed by a series of boils and phlegmonous erysipelas. 
In one instance, a sexton, who preceded him with a candle in the vault under 
the church of St. Andrew, Holborn, was scarcely able to save himself from 
sudden death by carbonic acid. The candle went out, and the man, after much 
exertion, presented himself in a pitiable condition—his eyes half starting from 
their orbits, breathing deeply, and evidently much oppressed. 

It is hardly necessary to observe that in medico-legal examinations of bodies 
in a state of putrefaction the physician should guard himself against inhaling 
the noxious gases by the use of chloride of zine, charcoal, and other disinfect- 
ing agents. 


ie gales IPQ hlke 


] 


OTHE Ry? ORM Ss OteVITOLDEN TD “DH ATH, 


CHAPTER I. 


WOUNDS. 


I. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS, § 792. 
Ist. WHAT A wounp Is, § 792. 
2d. GENERAL DEFINITIONS, § 793. 
3d. How FAR DANGEROUS, § 794. 
4th. EXAMINATION OF THE BODY, § 796. 
5th. EXTERNAL PHENOMENA, § 797. 
6th. INTERNAL PHENOMENA, § 797. 
7th. WouNDS MADE BEFORE OR AFTER DEATH, § 798. 
8th. EccHYMOSES FROM NATURAL CAUSES, § 805. 


II. CLASSIFICATION OF WOUNDS, § 807. 
lst. INCISED AND PUNCTURED wounps, § 808. 
2d. LACERATED AND CONTUSED WouNDS, § 809. 
3d. GuNnsHot wounps, § 811. 
4th. WouNDs FROM WADDING AND GUNPOWDER, § 815. 


III. HOMICIDAL, SUICIDAL, AND ACCIDENTAL WOUNDS, § 816. 
1st. SrTUATION OF wounD, § 816. 
2d. Direction, § 817. 
3d. Position OF BODY AND OF WEAPON, § 819. 


IV. BLOOD STAINS. 
lst. GENERAL APPEARANCE, § 820. 
2d. CHEMICAL EXAMINATION, § 821. 
3d. .MICROSCOPICAL EVIDENCE, § 831. 
V. CAUSE OF DEATH IN WOUNDS, § 833. 
1st. HrmorraacE, § 834. 
2d. Suock, § 835. 
3d. MEcHANICAL INJURY, § 836. 
Ath. DISEASED CONDITION OF BoDY, § 837. 
(1.) Wounds inflicted on pregnant women, § 838.’ 
(2.) Indirect complications, § 839. 


649 


ANALYTICAL TABLE. [BOOK VY. 


(3.) Tetanus, § 840. 

(4.) Erysipelas, § 841. 

(5.) Hospital gangrene, § 842. 

(6.) Nervous delirium, &c., § 843. 
5th. SuRGICAL OPERATIONS, § 844. 


VI. WOUNDS OF VARIOUS PARTS OF THE BODY. 
Ist. INJURIES OF THE HEAD, § 846. 
(1.) Concussion of the brain, § 847. 
(2.) Fractures of the skull, § 848. 
(3.) Wounds of the substance of the brain, § 849. 
(4.) Wounds of the face, § 852. 
2d. Wounps oF THE NECK, § 853. 
3d. Wovnbs AND INJURIES OF THE SPINE, § 854. 
4th. WounDs oF THE CHEST, § 855. 
5th. WounpDs OF THE LUNGS, § 856. 
6th. WounDs OF THE HEART, § 857. 
7th. WounDs OF THE ABDOMEN, § 860. 
(1.) Superficial wounds, § 860. 
(2.) Penetrating wounds, § 861. 
8th. WounDs OF THE LIVER, § 861. 
9th. WouNDS OF THE DIAPHRAGM, § 862. | 
10th. Wovnbds AND RUPTURE OF THE BLADDER, § 863. 
llth. Wounds OF THE GENITALS, § 865. 


COAT P li tea 
BURNS AND SOA LDS. i¢ 860. 


OPEIA TPP yee. 
SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION. @2 874 


CHAPTER IV. 
HEAT AND SUNSTROKE. @ 880. 


CHAPTER V: 
LIGHTNING. 2 884. 


CHAPTER. Vi. 
C,O UD 7 ie o38. 


CHAPTER VII. 
STARVATION. 2888. 


CLAN TU or viele, 
SUPRFOCATIEO Ne 32 3930" 


CHAPTERS. 
STRANGULATION. 2899. 


CHAPTER X. 
HANGING. ¢4 30% 


CHA Presa 


DROWNING. 2 929. 
650 


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BOOK V.] WOUNDS. [$ 794 


CHALE EBook 1 
SIGNS,OF DEAT Hs: 2 943. 


| CA Er Ene Xx PLL, 
MEDICO-LEGAL EXAMINATIONS. 32 946. 


CHAP TH RL: 
WOUNDS. 


I. General Considerations. 


§ 792. 1st. What a wound is.—The term “wound,” in popular language, 
can hardly be misunderstood. It is a form of bodily injury caused by external 
violence, and involving a breach of continuity in the soft parts. It may be 
questioned whether burns and scalds can properly be ranked as ‘ wounds.” 
The immediate effect of the application of a burning or heated body to the 
skin may not be such as to cause more than a redness of the surface, or an 
elevation of the cuticle into a blister; but the surface of the skin may after- 
wards, by the: giving way of the cuticle, be exposed. Hence the reader will 
perceive that any legal limitations of the meaning of the word, whether based 
upon popular or professional definitions, are liable to be erroneous, if the 
intention be really to designate the results of external violence by a name 
which shall comprise them all. In treating of this subject in its medical 
aspect alone, we shall make use of the word wound as expressive of any form 
of bodily injury caused by external violence, since it is only by such a course 
that the medico-legal bearings of the subject can be properly considered. Hence 
we have used the term WOUNDS as a convenient designation for this chapter, 
entirely irrespective of the possible surgical or legal limitations of the word.(a) 

§ 793. 2d. General definitions. —Wounds are usually classified, in reference 
to their visible marks upon the skin, into incised, punctured, lacerated, con- 
tused, and gunshot wounds. Although a division into mortal and non-mortal, 
would appear to have a more direct and useful bearing upon legal medicine, 
yet the unexpected complications, and, the various extraneous causes which 
give gravity to the simplest cases, and, on the other hand, the favorable termi- 
nation of some injuries of apparently the most dangerous nature, render any 
such classification impracticable. These facts will become apparent in the 
course of this chapter, and the reader will not fail to perceive that in medico- 
legal practice, every wound must be judged by itself; the general principles 
and rules of surgery being subject to constant modifications from individual 
peculiarities. 

§ 794. 3d. How far dangerous.—The varieties and the degree of danger 
attending wounds in general, depend very much upon some of the following 


(a) The legal meaning of the term “ wounds” is considered in another treatise, 
Wh. Cr. Law (5th ed.), § 832. 


651 


$ 795] WOUNDS, [BOOK V. 


circumstances: ‘‘the extent of the injury; the kind of instrument with which 
it has been inflicted; the violence which the fibres of the part have suffered in 
addition to their division; the size and importance of the -bloodvessels and 
nerves which happen to be injured; the nature of the wounded part, in respect 
to its general power of healing favorably or not; whether the operations of 
the system at large and life itself can be well supported or not, while the func- 
tions of the wounded part are disturbed, interrupted, or suspended by the acci- 
dent; the youth or old age of the patient; the goodness or badness of his 
constitution ; and the opportunities which there may be of administering 
proper surgical aid and assistance of every kind.’’(b) 

§ 795. But in this country the physician is seldom called upon by a legal 
tribunal to offer an unconditional opinion upon the probable danger of a wound, 
his assistance is more frequently invoked for the purpose of deciding how far 
a given wound was the cause of death, and hence his testimony is required be- 
fore the coroner upon the post-mortem examination. No one should be will- 
ing upon theoretical grounds alone, to give an opinion as to the agency of the 
wound in producing death. A careful post-mortem inspection will either 
reveal the violent cause of death, or demonstrate that it was not due to ex- 
ternal violence; it is the duty of the physician whose opinion is desired, to 
make the examination most carefully himself, and to base his opinion entirely 
upon this, and not upon previous notions of the probable nature and effect of 
the wound. 

Whatever parts of this examination call for the application of knowledge of 
which he may not be possessed, as the use of the microscope, or chemical 
analysis, should be committed to one who is really an ‘‘expert’’ in these 
branches. The idea is much too prevalent, and should be corrected, that the 
practitioner of medicine must necessarily be acquainted with all the appliances 
and new modes of investigation which modern science has produced; in other 
words, that every physician is equally competent to undertake the examina- 
tion of a case involving the question of homicide. It is to this cause chiefly, 
viz., the disparity in the attainments of one physician as compared with 
another, and also to the natural division of medical science and practice into 
numerous departments, some of which may be cultivated to the exclusion of 
others—that the ‘disagreement of doctors” is really due. Men of equal medi- 
cal attainments will rarely differ upon an essential point of pathology or prac- 
tice, but ignorance, or defective knowledge in medicine, does not differ from 
that in any other branch of science in being usually associated with presump- 
tion and obstinacy. Still, there are few practitioners of medicine who are - 
thoroughly prepared to enter upon an examination of all the medical aspects 
of a case of violent death; familiarity with the means required to carry through 
such an investigation, can be gained only by special study, for which, to the 
majority, time is wanting. 

Circumstances may, however, impose upon the physician the duty of making 
an examination for which he does not feel himself fully competent. In remote 
or interior parts of the country the means for the successful prosecution of a 


(6) Cooper’s Dict. of Pract. Surgery. 
652 


eee a 


BOOK V.| EXAMINATION OF THE BODY. [$ 796 


medico-legal inquiry are usually not at hand; whoever may be obliged to 
undertake an examination under such circumstances, should endeavor to obtain 
the assistance of a colleague, and should candidly represent to the authorities 
the necessary imperfection of the examination, and what influence this may 
have upon the objects of the inquiry. 

§ 796. 4th. Haamination of the body.(c)—The following points must be 
carefully noted; the locality, the direction and the dimensions of the wound ; 
whether there is a loss of substance or not; and whether the wound was inflicted 
before or after death, with the grounds of the opinion; the probable cause of 
the wound, and position of the body at the time; the results of the injury 
(ecchymosis, swelling, hernia of internal organs, concussion, inflammation, 
suppuration, ulceration, gangrene); notice of the clothes of the deceased, 
especially the portion (if any) corresponding to the place of injury; com- 
parison of the weapon with the wound; medical assistance, and by whom 
rendered. Besides these general points which claim attention, a very carefully 
detailed account of the wound itself is required, not only to ascertain the 
nature of the weapon with which it was given, but also to learn how far it 
has penetrated the body, and what organs have been wounded. And, more- 
over, the importance of a general and careful examination of all the organs of 
the body should not be forgotten, for notwithstanding the immediate cause of 
death may be evident, it is still advisable to be sure that there was no cause of 
death in any other part. Although there may be no suspicion of poisoning, 
the stomach should be opened. In a case often referred to, a girl died while 
her father was chastising her for stealing, and on account of the marks of vio- 
lent treatment upon her body, it was supposed that this had caused her death. 
On opening the stomach, however, it was found to be inflamed, and contained 
a white powder, which was proved to be arsenic. The girl had taken the 
arsenic in dread of her father’s anger, upon the detection of the theft; she 
vomited during the flogging, and died in slight convulsions. 

It may even happen that although no marks of violence can be found ex- 
ternally, or at least none which will explain the person’s death, internal inju- 
ries may be discovered upon dissection, which will render it certain that the 
death was violent. Indeed, Casper goes so far as to declare that as a general 
rule when death follows an injury, suddenly or speedily, in consequence of 
internal hemorrhage or other effect of laceration of an internal organ, the 
signs of external injury are either slight or are entirely wanting. Among 
numerous instances of this description, furnished by Casper’s experience, the 
following is one of the most striking. Ona cold winter’s night a wagoner 
was descending the hill from Spandau with a heavily loaded wagon, and dis- 
mounted, in order the more easily to guide his team. In doing so, he was 
thrown violently against one of the poplar trees which line the road, and 
where, in the course of the night, he was found dead. The only external in- 
juries consisted of a slight abrasion upon the left-arm, and a similar one upon 
the right temple. In the head there was nothing worthy of note, except that 
the transverse sinus was unusually distended with blood. On opening the 


(c) A more detailed account of the changes after death will be found in Chap. XII. 
653 


§ 197] EXAMINATION OF THE BODY. [BOOK V. 


spinal canal, about a quart of dark fluid blood escaped. The spinous process 
of the first thoracic vertebra was broken off. The deeper spinal muscles were 
ecchymosed, but the spinal marrow was uninjured. The left pleural cavity 
contained about thirty ounces of liquid blood. The pericardium was torn 
completely across, and the heart severed from its large vessels, lay almost 
entirely loose in the cavity of the thorax. The open ends of the aorta and 
pulmonary artery were distinctly. visible. The heart itself was sound and 
firm, and on both sides, but in the ventricles especially, contained much dark 
coagulated blood. The left lung was entirely torn through its middle portion, 
and in the right lobe of the liver was a laceration two inches long, by half an 
inch deep. And yet the exterior of the body presented nothing remarkable. (d) 

A case is reported by Dr. Ellis, of Boston, of a woman who was knocked 
down and run over by a sleigh. She lived for ten days after the accident, and 
there was no mark of external injury. On examination after death, the liver 
was found to be lacerated, the common bile-duct was torn across, and several 
fractures appeared in the right kidney.(e) 

§ 797. The phenomena which intervene between death and putrefaction are 
often of assistance in throwing light upon the mode and period of death. The 
changes which take place in the body after death are due to physical and 
chemical laws. 

Sth. Haternal phenomena.—Soon after death, while the body is still warm, 
the peculiar cadaveric smell (not putrefactive) is perceived at the same time 
that the surface becomes pale. The blood sinks gradually to the more depend- 
ent parts, occasioning a discoloration of the skin resembling in some respects 
a contusion produced during life. 

The complete cooling of the body (with the disappearance of the peculiar 
smell just referred to) is accomplished much more slowly than is usually sup- 
posed. According to Bock,(/) it does not take place in less than from fifteen 
to twenty hours. Externally, the reduction of temperature occurs more rapidly 
than in the interior of the body, but in both cases it is dependent upon the 
temperature of the surrounding air. The bodies of old people and children, 
of the thin, anemic, and wasted, grow cold at quite an early period after 
death. But in those who die suddenly, in the fat and robust, the animal heat 
is more slowly parted with. Rzgidtty or rigor mortts, occurs generally within 
twelve hours after death, and lasts from thirty-six to forty-eight hours. It is 
more complete and lasting in those who have died suddenly, or in the course 
of acute inflammatory diseases, while in the weak and those exhausted by long 
illness it is feeble and transient. It may be distinguished from the rigidity 
occurring in cases of apparent death (syncope) by the fact that in the latter 
case the rigidity is spasmodic and partial, arises and disappears suddenly with- 
out any regularity, and returns after the contracted limb has been extended, 
which is not the case to the same extent in true post-mortem rigidity. 

6th. Internal phenomena.—The blood usually remains fluid for two or three 
hours after death. It accumulates in the veins, owing to the last contraction 


(d) Gericht. Med. i. 122 
(e) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. April 1860, p. 222. 
(f) Gerichtliche Sectionen des Menschlichen Kérpers. 


604 


BOOK V.] DISTINCTION OF WOUNDS BEFORE AND AFTER DEATH. [§ 799 


of the heart and arteries having more or less completely emptied the arterial 
system. The amount of blood found in the cavities of the heart, and the 
existence of coagula, depend upon the nature of the blood itself, and the 
mode of death, whether rapid or protracted. 

§ 798. Tth. Wounds made before or after death._—The distinction between 
wounds made before and those made after death, depends upon the signs of 
vital reaction in the wound and its vicinity. If the signs of inflammation, or 
its products, are found; if the wound be swollen and discolored ; if plastic 
lymph have been thrown out between its edges; if suppuration, or gangrene, 
or cicatrization have taken place; we have not only certain proof that the 
wound was inflicted during life, but also that death could not have been im- 
mediate. The question, therefore, as to post or ante-mortem infliction of the 
wound, cannot arise when any of the processes referred to have taken place. 
But when none of these signs are recognized, there may be room for doubt as 
to the period of its infliction. Many cases occur in which no traces of suggil- 
lation or inflammation can be detected, although an injury was received during 
life. This is especially the case when death results rapidly from hemorrhage 
from a large artery or vein, so that if a wound is made upon the dead body 
near to that which occasioned death, it will be impossible to distinguish the 
one from the other by any characteristic sign. 

If death have resulted from a wound, not immediately, but still before the 
effusion of plastic lymph, its edges will be found swollen and everted, and co- 
agulated blood effused in the track of the wound and in the adjoining cellular 
tissue. When, however, it has proved immediately fatal, as in some penetrat- 
ing wounds of the heart, aorta, and spine, the above mentioned characters 
will not be found. This fact is most probably due to the rapid drain from 
the capillaries, in consequence of internal hemorrhage, or to the sudden cessa- 
tion of the action of the heart. Thus, in a case related by Casper, in which 
a woman was instantly killed by a table-knife which was thrust through the 
arch of the aorta, entering the chest between the first and second ribs, the 
wound presented sharp and smooth edges, without a trace of either fluid or 
dried blood ; in fact, it was exactly like a wound made upon the dead body.(q) 
It is therefore of importance to remember, that in wounds which prove im- 
mediately fatal, there may be no signs of vital reaction, and no outward effu- 
sion of blood. A case is very easily supposable, in which a wound in the 
region of the heart might be designedly inflicted after death ; as, for instance, 
to divert attention from the real cause of death, which may have been due to 
poisoning. Although no distinction should be possible, from an inspection of 
the external wound, the absence of internal hemorrhage would, in such a case, 
betray the period at which the wound was made. 

§ 799. Dr. Taylor endeavored to solve the question of the differences be- 
tween wounds inflicted before and after death, in an experimental way. In 
one experiment, an incised wound, about three inches long, was made in the 
calf of the leg, two minutes after its amputation. The skin retracted consi- 
derably, the adipose tissue underneath protruded between its edges, but the 


(g) Gericht. Leichen-éffnungen, 1s. Hundert. Fall. 9, 1853. 
655 


§ 800] WOUNDS BEFORE AND AFTER DEATH. [BOOK V. 


quantity of blood which escaped was small. Examined after the lapse of 
’ twenty-four hours, the edges of the wound were found red, bloody, and everted ; 
the skin not in the least tumefied, but merely flaccid. A small quantity of 
loosely coagulated blood was found at the bottom of the wound, but no clots 
were found adherent to the muscles. In the second experiment, which was 
made ten minutes after the limb was amputated, the skin appeared to have 
already lost its elasticity, the edges of the wound became very slightly everted, 
and scarcely any blood escaped from it. On examination, twenty-four hours 
afterwards, the wound presented none of the characters of a wound inflicted 
during life, except that, at the bottom of the wound, a few coagula were 
found. Other experiments were made at a still later period after the removal 
of the limbs, but it was found that the wounds then made possessed still fewer 
points of similarity -with wounds inflicted during life. From these experi- 
ments, one fact, at least, may be fairly inferred—that the coagulation of the 
blood is not a safe criterion of the time at which the wound was made, but 
that, as long as the body retains its warmth after death, this apparently vital 
process may still take place. If, therefore, a wound be made upon a person 
just dead, it is not impossible that the blood will coagulate in the wound. 
Facts, more pertinent than the above experiments, are, however, required to 
establish the fact beyond a doubt, as the accidental determination of the ques- 
tion upon the entire body would be naturally more conclusive than experiments 
upon separated limbs. On dissecting the body of a person who died of the 
low typhus fever which prevailed during the autumn of 1847, in a district 
inhabited by the lowest class of negroes, the blood was quite fluid, although 
death had taken place but six or eight hours before; but when allowed to 
stand in a cup, or in the chest whence the lungs had been removed, it speedily 
formed a dark and moderately firm coagulum.(h) Several cases in which the 
blood retained its coagulability after death are reported by Casper. In one 
of these, relative to a man who was suffocated by coal gas, it is stated that 
four days after death, and during very cold weather in January, the blood 
flowed freely when the body was opened, but coagulated quite rapidly, and so 
firmly, that the clots could be raised quite easily with the handle of a scal- 
pel.(z) Although the swollen and everted condition of the lips of the 
wound is a good indication of its having been inflicted upon the living person, 
this appearance may be removed by causes acting after death. Thus, if the 
body have lain in the water, this, together with the blood effased in the wound, 
may have disappeared before the inspection is made, by the maceration to 
which the body has been thus subjected, and it is also often materially changed 
by the advance of putrefaction, since, by this process, the skin very soon be- 
comes puffy, and many of the relations of the wound are changed. ‘This is 
strikingly true of fat bodies, in which wounds, and especially incised ones, often 
assume, when the body begins to swell, an appearance which it is very difficult 
to distinguish from the effects of the inflammatory process. . 

§ 800. The amount of hemorrhage is generally a reliable test of the period 
at which the person was wounded, but is, of course, only applicable in wounds 


(h) A. Stillé, Gen. Pathology, p. 426. 
() Gericht. Med. i, 29. 
656 


BOOK V. | WOUNDS BEFORE AND AFTER DEATH. [$ 802 


involving a solution of continuity. In those made after death, even while the 
body is yet warm, the amount of blood poured out will, of necessity, be far 
less than while the active circulation of the blood is going on: This is espe- 
cially true of wounds of certain parts which prove unavoidably fatal by copious 
and sudden hemorrhage, such as those of the heart, aorta, or any of the great 
bloodvessels. In fact, wounds involving the left side of the heart, or the ar- 
teries, would probably, if made after. death, be attended with no hemorrhage 
whatever ; whereas, in the division of any of the venous trunks, soon after 
death, the amount of blood lost would be far smaller than would have been 
poured out during life, and would depend, in a great measure, upon the posi- 
tion of the part injured. In a celebrated case of assassination, tried in Ber- 
lin, the head of the murdered person had been severed from the body, but, at 
the same time, other injuries of a fatal nature had been inflicted. Dr. Casper 
gave his opinion that the neck had been severed before life was extinct, for the 
reason, that a very large amount of blood was found to have been effused 
from the cervical vessels. The chief distinction, therefore, between hemor- 
rhage before and after death, is, that in the latter case the amount lost is 
comparatively trifling and exclusively of a venous character. 

§ 801. While the signs we have referred to are the principal means of dis- 
crimination in wounds, involving a loss of blood, there is another large class 
of wounds to which they do not have so extensive an application. Thus, 
although in contused wounds, the coagulation of the blood under the surface 
injured sometimes affords, especially in injuries of the head, an indication of 
the blow having been given during life, yet, on the other hand, the want of 
coagulation is no proof that it was not inflicted till after death. The blood 
may, from various causes, remain fluid after death. Its coagulability may be 
impaired by disease, or by the mode of death. If, for instance, the person 
murdered has been affected with scurvy, or his death caused partly by any mode: 
of asphyxia, the fluidity of the blood under contused wounds, or indeed in any 
kind of wound, in such an individual, would not be inconsistent with* the 
opinion that the wound was given while the person was alive. 

§ 802. Hcchymosis, or suggillation.—The meaning of this term is an effu- 
sion of blood under the skin, but in general medical parlance the name is. ap- 
plied to the discoloration of the skin produced by this extravasated blood. In 
cases where it ig necessary to discover whether the person was living at. the 
time his injuries were received, it is customary to rely upon the presumptions. 
afforded by the appearance of the ecchymoses. Their color varies according 
to the time elapsed since they were produced ; at first they are purple, and 
pass through various shades to black, then through violet, green, and. yellow, 
until their disappearance. In general, the discoloration appears within. twelve 
hours after the injury, and- sometimes, immediately after it, the violet color is 
seen on the third day, the green from the fifth to the sixth day, and the com- 
plete disappearance of the spot is, in healthy persons, from the tenth to the 
twelfth day. The changes are more rapid in the young than in the old, and 
depend also upon the force and extent of the blow. 

If the extravasation be deeply seated, the external discoloration will not 


immediately occur, but may be delayed even for several days, and in parts 
42 657 


§ 803] ECCHY MOSIS. [BOOK V. 


‘where the cellular tissue is abundant, will not always correspond to, the spot 
on which the injury was received, but will be found over that to which the 
blood has gravitated. Indeed, the cutaneous discoloration may not appear 
until after death. Thus, in a person who died in thirty-five hours after 
having received a violent kick from a horse, rupturing the bladder, there was 
no ecchymosis in the seat of the blow until after death.(7) The amount of 
blood extravasated, except it lie immediately under the skin, cannot be deter- 
mined by the degree of the external bruise, since, in many of those cases of 
violent death, in which a heavily loaded vehicle has passed over the body, or 
a great weight has fallen upon it, there has been, externally, no discoloration 
whatever, or in such a slight degree, that the vast amount of internal disor- 
ganization and hemorrhage could hardly be suspected. In the case already 
quoted from Casper, in which a wagoner was crushed to death, and upon 
opening the body the lungs and liver were found to be ruptured, and the 
heart completely torn from its attachments, the only external injuries dis- 
coverable were two trifling abrasions of the skin upon the temple and the arm. 

§ 803. The marks observed in those cases where contusions have been pur- 
posely made upon the dead body, resemble, in some cases, those which are made 
during life. From experiments made by Dr. Christison, it appears that blows 
inflicted two hours after death will produce a discoloration of the skin, similar 
to what might be expected during life, except in regard to extent, which does 
not correspond with the severity of the blow. The experiments of Dr. 
Christison establish a strong presumption, that when contused wounds have 
been inflicted ammedzately after death, the external similarity will be stil] 
greater, and the correspondence between the amount of violence and the dis- 
coloration more exact. While this author was performing his experiments 
to ascertain whether blows given after death would produce similar appear- 
ances to those inflicted during life, he selected as a subject for a series of 
these experiments, the body of a female who had died in the infirmary. The 
body being afterwards carried to the dead-house, and there seen by some per- 
sons who were not aware of the experiments having been performed, was not 
allowed to be buried until an inquiry had been made into the circumstances, so 
persuaded were these persons that the woman must have died in consequence 
of barbarous treatment received during life. | 

In this connection, the following remarks of Casper are not without import- 
ance:(k) ‘ Where death has been caused by violence, it is extremely common, 
especially where the bones lie immediately under the skin, to find suspicious 
spots upon the body. They are from one to three-quarters of an inch in 
diameter, usually rounded, red or reddish-brown, or dirty yellowish-brown, 
more or less hard to the touch, and tough under the knife, but exhibiting no 
real suggillation. These spots may perplex the examining physician, and, 
indeed, when the mode of death is unknown or attended with suspicious cir- 
cumstances, demand the closest examination and description, because they may 
possibly indicate and throw light upon a struggle in which life was lost. In 
the majority of cases, however, these pseudo-suggillations are produced at the 


(j) Taylor, Mel. Jur. p. 177. (k) Op. cit. i. 127. 
698 


et | . 


BOOK Y. | ECCHYMOSIS FROM NATURAL CAUSES. [$ 805 


moment of death by the body grazing or falling against some hard substance, 
and consequently have no relation to the cause of death. They may even be 
produced after death by the rough handling or carrying of the body, and may 
be imitated, after the lapse even of several days, by friction with a coarse 
brush or cloth, and so as not to be distinguishable from similar injuries pro- 
duced during life.” ‘‘ When,” says Engel, “ these excoriations are found upon 
parts of the body in which the blood cannot settle after death, the portion of 
dried integument acquires a yellowish-brown color, and is translucent at the 
edges; on the other hand, if they form in situations where the blood tends to 
accumulate, their color is a very dark-brown, and they cannot be distinguished 
from excoriations produced during life.’ Casper insists upon the practical 
importance of these distinctions, declaring that the cases are numberless in 
which ignorance of them or inattention to them has led to the most erroneous 
conclusions and mischievous consequences. 

§ 804. The inference from the considerations here presented, is not that 
there is no distinction possible between ecchymosis produced before and after 
death, but that great caution is necessary in giving an opinion upon this 
point. The external bruise must be carefully compared with the effusion into 
and under the skin and adjacent tissues. If the latter be at all extensive, and 
especially if the blood be coagulated, we think there need be little hesitation in 
declaring that the injury must have been inflicted during life. Moreover, there 
are few cases of vital ecchymosis, without attendant swelling of the skin and 
other signs of vital reaction. If, while the body is fresh, the ecchymosed spot 
be found at all swelled, there can be no suspicion of post-mortem violence. 
Also, if the ecchymosis, though trifling in extent, be accompanied with exco- 
riations or abrasions of the skin, as is often found in cases of strangulation 
with the hand, the fact of the violence having been done upon a living person 
will be manifest. The difficulty of discriminating between contusions made 
before and after death, will be much enhanced by the putrefactive process, the 
effect of which is to so alter the consistence and color of the skin and subja- 
cent parts as to destroy all characteristic signs. 

§ 805. 8th. Hechymoses from natural causes.—It can hardly be necessary 
to caution the physician against the possibility of mistaking the ecchymoses 
observed in certain diseases for the effects of violence. The morbid states of 
the system in which they are seen, have so many other striking peculiarities 
during life and after death, that it would hardly be pardonable for a profes- 
sional inquirer to overlook or misinterpret them. Thus in scurvy, purpura 
hemorrhagica, and petechial typhus, the shape, size, and diffusion of the spots 
in various parts of the body, the absence of swelling or other indications of 
violence, and the pathological changes in the mucous membrane of the mouth 
and the intestines, together with the fluidity of the blood, will afford more than 
sufficient reasons for rejecting all suspicion of violence. 

The spots and blotches (suggillations) produced by cadaveric changes are 
more likely to give rise to mistakes. In persons unaccustomed to inspect the 
bodies of the dead, the stasis or congestion of the blood in the capillary ves- 
sels of the skin, which sooner or later invariably occurs, may lead to the sus- 
picion of violence having been inflicted before death. This lividity is most 

659 


§ 806] ECCHYMOSIS FROM NATURAL CAUSES. [BOOK V, 


apparent and extensive in those who have died suddenly in full health, by some 
asphyxiating cause. It occurs in almost any part of the body, but is usually 
deeper and more distinct in those which are the most dependent. The time at 
which it is developed varies from the moment of dissolution up to the occur- 
rence of rigidity, and is, of course, hastened or retarded by various causes, 
such as the mode of death, the season of the year, and the age of the subject. 
The blood is merely superficially diffused in the outer surface of the skin, and 
this mark alone ought to suffice to distinguish these discolorations from those 
produced by violence, since in the latter the blood is effused in the whole sub- 
stance of the cutis and generally also in the subcutaneous cellular tissue, mus- 
cles, &e. 
—  § 806. The forms assumed by the marks of cadaveric lividity are various : 
sometimes the skin is mottled, at others large blotches spread over the surface, 
and at others again the lividity is more uniformly diffused, without necessarily 
appearing on a dependent part. The marks of the clothing which the de- 
ceased wore, if they have remained upon him until rigidity has taken place, 
give a very singular appearance to the skin. Those portions which have com- 
pressed the body tightly will be recognized by the paleness of the surface, 
while the intervening spaces may be deeply tinged. The folds of a sheet often 
thus communicate to the body an appearance of flagellation, the back being 
covered with stripes. These are called vzbeces, and are familiar to every one ~ 
accustomed to the inspection of persons recently dead. This stage of cadaveric 
lividity which is due to the congestion of the capillary vessels, runs gradually 
into another at the approach of putrefaction. This stage is characterized by 
the uniform purple or dark red discoloration of all the depending portions of 
the body, and arises from a transudation of the serum and coloring matter of 
the decomposed blood. Hence, when an incision is made into parts thus af- 
fected, as, for instance, over the occiput, the skin and subjacent tissues will be 
found thickened and infiltrated with bloody serum. But neither of these stages 
of cadaveric lividity ought to mislead the physician; the diffusion, the super- 
ficial character of the infiltration, or, as in the latter case, the peculiar kind of 
effusion, the want of any external injury to correspond with the internal marks 
of apparently great violence, and many other considerations, which it is hardly 
necessary to specify, ought to render the distinction an easy one. We are dis- 
posed to think that the possibility of serious error arising from the distant 
resemblance between cadaveric lividity or the discoloration of the skin caused 
by certain diseases of the blood, has been in general over-estimated by writers 
upon legal medicine. 

Blisters produced by heat, says Bécker, although when laid open they 
may disclose a red skin, do not present characters which enable us to determine 
whether they were raised before or after death. For intense heat produces the 
same immediate effects in either. Scalding liquids, however, do not blister the 
dead body, they only cause the epidermis to peel off in shreds. The skull, 
when subjected to the action of flame, cracks and exfoliates. 

660 


BOOK V.| CLASSIFICATION OF WOUNDS. [$ 808 


‘ II. Classification of Wounds. 


§ 807. Wounds are classified according to the nature of the means by which 
they were produced, as, for example, “ an incised wound,” ‘a lacerated wound.” 
It will at once be seen that, in legal medicine, the name by which the injury 
is designated, thus indicating the means by which it was inflicted, may, unless 
much discrimination be used by the physician, lead to incorrect inferences. It 
becomes important, therefore, to establish the relation between the injury and 
its supposed cause. In other words, it being recognized that the wound was 
produced on a living person by mechanical violence, by what instrumentality 
was it effected? This is not always evident upon a first inspection. In order 
that a correct judgment may be had, the earlier the post-mortem examination 
is made the more likely will it be to yield useful and positive results, for the 
occurrence of putrefaction, maceration in water, and various disturbing causes 
may materially alter the aspect of wounds. 

In some kinds of wounds the nature of the cause is far more apparent than 
in others; thus incised and punctured wounds convey the idea of the employ- 
ment of cutting or pointed weapons, whereas the cause of a contused or la- 
cerated wound is much less easily discovered. Hence the caution is necessary 
that the means by which the injury was inflicted should be described in general 
terms only, and especially should the physician avoid giving too positive an 
opinion as to the particular weapon or other means by which it was produced, 
since he will often find himself deceived in his opinion. By indicating upon 
insufficient grounds any particular weapon as the one by which the homicide 
was effected, the ends of justice may possibly be defeated, or an innocent per- 
son wrongfully suspected or accused. 

§ 808. Ist. Incised and punctured wounds.—Such is the name given to 
wounds made by weapons with a sharp cutting edge or point. In the former 
the superficial extent of the wound is usually greater than its depth; in the 
latter, the reverse is the case. In both these kinds of wounds the edges 
are cleanly cut, the edges separated and not contused unless the cutting por- 
tion of the weapon have been dull or possessed considerable convexity. The 
regularity and evenness of the incision is, therefore, a mode of distinction 
between wounds inflicted with weapons, properly so called, and those made by 
glass, crockery, nails, &c. ‘The shape of the wounds differs somewhat accord- 
ing to the region of the body and the tissues divided, as well as the state of 
tension or relaxation of the skin, and the direction in which the blow is given. 
Thus, when the weapon has penetrated in an oblique direction through the 
tissues, or when the latter are irregularly stretched, the shape of the wound will 
not correspond to that of the weapon ; in such cases an incision is apt to as- 
sume a crescentic form, and if inflicted on a limb in a state of tension, its edges 
will be widely apart, and in the skin more so than in the subjacent parts. Ifa 
punctured wound have been made obliquely through the skin, it will present an 
oval or elliptical shape, and the orifice will usually be smaller than the diame- 
ter of the weapon producing it. A wound made in parts where the skin is 
thrown into wrinkles may present the appearance of several distinct wounds, 
as in the neck. From the experiments of M. Filhos, in 1833, it appears that 

661 


§ 809] LACERATED AND CONTUSED WOUNDS. [BOOK Vv. 


a conical and rounded weapon produces small elongated wounds, with two 
acute angles; but these trials having been made upon the dead subject, the 
results are not fairly applicable to wounds on the living, because the vital con- 
tractility of the skin will necessarily greatly modify the shape of the wound. 
Nevertheless, several punctured wounds, made by the same weapon, may differ 
in shape, and be either triangular or oval, according to the circumstances 
already indicated as influencing the shape of the wound. Superficial wounds, 
and especially incised wounds, may, it is well known, give rise to fatal hemor- 
rhage, if they happen to reach a large superficial bloodvessel. In such cases, 
as Casper has remarked, it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to deter- 
mine where was the commencement and where the end of the incision, whether, 
e.g. it was made from left to right or in the opposite direction. And such 
- points become of the greatest importance when we are called upon to deter- 
mine whether a homicide ora suicide has been committed. Attendant circum- 
stances, as whether blood is found upon the right or the left hand, or on which 
portion of the clothing a cut exists, will help to remove doubt. 

It is often also very difficult, or quite impossible, to determine the precise 
vessel from which the fatal hemorrhage took place. Nor is it often necessary ; 
for the existence of the wound on the one hand and of the hemorrhage on 
the other suffices to explain the result. 

A punctured or penetrating wound may be single upon the skin, and yet 
two or more internal wounds have been made by the same weapon. This is ~ 
effected by the weapon having been only partly withdrawn after the outer 
wound was given, and then plunged into the body in another direction, as is 
often the case in a close struggle. Thus, in a case related by M. Bayard, the 
deceased presented a single gaping wound in the breast, out of proportion to 
the weapon found at the spot where the murder was committed, but the left 
ventricle of the heart was perforated entirely through, and its walls were 
wounded in another part also.(/) 

§ 809. 2d. Lacerated and contused wounds.—These being frequently due 
to accident, and seldom presenting any peculiarity by which the use of a 
weapon can be positively inferred, an opinion can rarely be given, merely from 
an inspection of the wound, of the cause by which the injury was produced. 
A medical witness may indeed be enabled to state the possibility of the wound 
having been made with a blunt instrument, similar to that which is perhaps 
shown at the inquest or trial, or found near the deceased, but can seldom, on 
the other hand, deny that it may have been of accidental origin, or caused by 
a fall. Blunt instruments produce their effects partly by pressure, and crush, 
tear, or only bruise the part struck, according to the force of the blow and the 
resistance which it meets. A smooth blunt weapon produces ecchymosis and 
swelling; angular instruments, in addition, give rise to punctures, fissures, 
and laceration. When an instrument is at once smooth, blunt, and heavy, it 
may cause internal injuries of which little or no trace is visible upon the sur- 
face. In general, all such wounds bleed but little, and tend to heal by suppu- 
ration.(m) When, however, they are situated upon the skull, they often bear 


(1) Briand, Méd. Lég. p. 317. (m) Bocker. 
662 


BOOK V.] LACERATED AND CONTUSED WOUNDS. [$ 810 


the aspect of incised wounds, the edges being apparently cleanly cut, and 
capable of being adjusted together. The division of the integuments is not, 
however, straight and regular as in an incised wound, and the angles of the 
wound are generally less acute. ‘The contusion of the neighboring integu- 
ments, the extravasation of blood under portions of the skin, not embraced in 
the apparent incision, and often the existence of an irregular fracture of the 
bone, with internal extravasation, will not permit of more than a momentary 
mistake. But, practically, the chief difficulty in judging of the origin of 
lacerated and contused wounds, is that injuries of this kind may be received 
by a fall in a quarrel, or in the retreat of one of the parties, and similar in 
appearance to those which might have been produced by a direct blow. In 
such cases, the position of the wound compared with the known relative 
position of the parties at the time of the receipt of the injury, will be the 
chief source from which information will be derived. 

An effect, and by no means an unusual one, of blows inflicted with blunt 
weapons, is the rupture of internal organs. Sound organs, says Casper, never 
rupture spontaneously, and only when subjected to extreme violence. Fissures 
of the base of the skull, rupture of the liver, lungs, kidneys, &c., are sure evi- 
dences of such an agency. ‘The first of these always occur transversely, never 
longitudinally, and generally are within the anterior third of the skull. Rup- 
ture of the brain is extremely rare, and so is that of the trachea and cesopha- 
gus, that of the lungs is not common, and laceration of the pericardium or 
heart is even less so. Rupture of the liver, on the other hand, is both 
positively and relatively frequent. The direction of the fissures is usually 
transverse. A case is mentioned by Casper in which the anterior edge was 
entirely separated from the body of the organ. Rupture of the spleen, and of 
the gravid uterus also, takes place transversely ; this injury of the remaining 
abdominal organs is extremely rare. 

Casper appears to question the occurrence of rupture of the bladder, and 
states that he never met with an instance of this injury. It is not, however, 
extremely rare. (7) 

§ 810. In some cases it may not be unimportant to consider whether the 
wound may not have had a spontaneous or accidental origin. A number of 
criminal trials have taken place in Scotland in consequence of women, for 
the most part pregnant, having died of hemorrhage from the pudendum. In 
most, or all of these cases, it has been averred that the wound was inflicted 
with criminal intent by the husband or others. A case occurred at Dundee, 
in which there were no grounds for suspicion that the woman had received 
a wound. She lived on good terms with her husband and neighbors. She 
had been straining at the night-stool when the hemorrhage came on. A 
large quantity of blood was found about her person; it had flowed from 
the genital organs, but not from the uterus, which was fully expanded in 
pregnancy. On examining the vagina, Dr. Kyle found a recent aperture in 
one labium, which he traced into a large vein; one of a plexus which 
extends some distance into the vagina. A case is related by Dr. Thomson, 


(n) Vide § 863. 
663 


§ 811] ' GUNSHOT WOUNDS. [BOOK Y. 


in which the woman, however, recovered after losing a large quantity of 
blood. In this instance, the woman’s husband, a cattle drover, had been long 
absent from home, and on his return, remained alone with his wife about half 
an hour. The bleeding commenced immediately after this visit. A wound 
was discovered large enough to admit the finger to the depth of about half an 
inch, in the anterior wall of the vagina, at the union of its upper with its 
‘middle third. It was probably an accidental laceration, but if death had ac- 
tually resulted, the existence of the wound might have given rise to suspicions 
of criminal violence.(a@) Dr. Menzies relates that a woman three weeks after 
delivery, on rising from bed, accidentally fell on the top rail of a common stuff- 
bottomed chair. Profuse hemorrhage ensued, which, on examination, was 
found to proceed from a wound in the vagina nearly half an inch in length, 
and which looked exactly as if it had been inflicted with a sharp instrument.(aa) 
In another case reported by Dr. Ellis, and also of a pregnant woman, death 
by hemorrhage resulted from a lacerated wound of the vagina supposed to 
have been inflicted by her falling on the post of a crib.(b) Ina third case, 
related by Dr. Morland, a woman five months advanced in preguancy fell upon 
the roof of a wood-shed, by slipping upon one of the steps by which the roof 
was ascended. The hemorrhage was very profuse, and but for timely assist- 
ance, would probably have been fatal. The wound was an inch and a half 
long, by half an inch deep, upon the internal surface of the left nympha.(c) 
In these cases there was nothing in the character of the wound to distinguish 
it from those in which the absence of contusion has been supposed to indicate 
a homicidal origin. They also appear to show the peculiar danger from 
hemorrhage to which wounds of the genitals expose pregnant women. Dan- 
- gerous hemorrhage may also occur from varicose veins in the leg. The orifice 
from which the blood escapes being very small, and situated immediately over 
the enlarged vein, can hardly be mistaken for an intentional wound. Casper 
relates a case in which a woman, raising a broken chamber vessel under her 
clothes, for the purpose of urinating, wounded herself therewith in the vena 
saphena. ‘The wound was one inch and three-quarters long and three-quarters 
of an inch wide, and the vein was opened to the size of a pea.(g) 

§ 811. 3d. Gunshot wounds.—Gunshot wounds present striking differences 
in their appearance, according to the distance at which the piece was fired, 
and the number and character of the projectiles. If exploded in immediate 
contact with the body, the wound is large and circular, the skin denuded, 
blackened, and burned, and the point at which the ball entered is livid and 
depressed. The blackened and burned appearance of the skin is due to the 
imperfect combustion of the grains of powder, and the point of entrance of the 
ball is larger than that of its exit. The hair, clothes, or other organic sub- 
stance in the line of the shot, exhibit traces of burning. When, however, the 
weapon is fired at a greater distance, the appearance due to the imperfectly 
burned powder and the flame are no longer seen, the ball itself being then the 


(a) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. April, 1850, p. 535, from Edinb. Monthly Journ. Feb. 
(aa) Edinb. Med. Journ. iv. 624. 

(b) Boston Med. and Surg. Journ. Sept. 1857, p. 158. | 

(c) Ibid. Jan. 1859, p. 520. (g) Ger. Leichenéff, 2 Hundert. Fall. 48. 


664 


BOOK V.| GUNSHOT WOUNDS. j [§$ 812 


only cause of the wound. In the celebrated case of Peytel, tried in 1839, for 
the murder of his wife, it was found that she had been killed by two balls 
which entered near the nose. The eyebrows, lashes, and lids were completely 
burned, and a large number of grains of powder had imbedded themselves in 
the cheek. Experiments being made in order to determine the distance re- 
quired to produce these effects, it was found that the weapon must have been 
held within a foot’s distance. As already stated, the point of entrance is 
here smaller than that of exit. M. Matthysens has shown this by experi- 
ments upon the dead body. A pistol fired at twelve paces distance, with 
a ball fifteen millimetres(gq) in diameter, made a wound in the breast of 8.5 
millimetres in diameter; and at its point of exit on the back, one of ten milli- 
metres. In two experiments, at the same distance, upon the forearm, the 
entrance wound was four millimetres less in diameter than that of exit; and 
when a larger ball, with a diameter of seventeen millimetres, was used, the 
same relations were preserved, both in the entrance wound being less in size 
than the ball with which it was made, and also three millimetres less in diame- 
ter than the wound of exit.(h) Dr. Taylor, speaking of the present class of 
cases, in which the weapon is fired from a certain distance, says that the orifice 
of exit is generally three or four times as large as the entrance aperture, which, 
it will be observed, is a much greater difference than is stated by M. Matthy- 
sens. But, strange as it may appear, in regard to a question apparently so 
simple, the very opposite statement is made by some writers. Of these may 
be mentioned Ollivier (d’ Angers), cited by M. Malle,(hh) who himself, after 
numerous experiments, concludes that in gunshot wounds the orifice of entrance, 
far from being constantly smaller than the orifice of exit, is, on the contrary, 
usually larger; and also Casper, who goes further, and declares that the former 
is always larger, adding that ‘‘all the more recent original observers very pro- 
perly unite in this conclusion, which is the opposite of that which was formerly 
maintained.” (2) 

According to M. Nélaton, when the wound is recent, the orifice which the 
ball has made on entering the body is depressed and contused, while that made 
by its exit is lacerated and prominent. In the former there is an actual loss 
of substance; in the latter merely a solution of continuity, and its edges, if 
brought together, would almost completely close the wound. Still, the irre- 
gularity of its flaps renders it the larger, notwithstanding the loss of substance 
in the entrance wound. After some days the case, however, is different. The 
contused margins of the wound of entrance slough away, while those of the 
other become partly united, and its size is thus diminished, while that of the 
former is enlarged. (77) 

§ 812. It is important, however, to observe that the relative size of the 
wounds depends not only upon the distance at which the weapon is held, but 
also upon other causes affecting the velocity of the ball. Thus the quality 
and amount of powder, the length and calibre of the weapon, the compression 


(gg) A millimétre is equal to 0.03937 inch. 
(h) Quest. méd. lég. sur les plaies par les armes & feu, Gaz. des Hopitaux, No. 145. 
(hh) Ann. d’Hygiéne, xxiii. 462. (7) Op. cit. i. 291. 
(ii) Observations on Gunshot Wounds, made in Paris during the Summer of 1848, 
by Edw. Waters, M. D., Month. Jour. Sept. 1848. ve 
9) 


§ 815] WOUNDS OF ENTRANCE AND EXIT. [BOOK V. 


of the wadding, and the form of the projectile, all require attention. Hence 
the relative size of the wounds of entrance and exit varies continually; and 
unless the velocity of the ball can be approximately ascertained, from a know- 
ledge of the weapon used and its proximity to the wounded person, it would 
be unsafe to draw a positive conclusion from this circumstance alone as to the 
position of the body and the direction of the line of shot, both of which are 
points occasionally of extreme importance. More reliance is to be placed 
upon the depressed and clean character of the entrance wound, and the bulging 
and lacerated aspect of that of exit. This fact has been substantiated by the 
experiments of M. Dévergie. When, however, the ball enters a portion of 
the body well covered with fat, this often protrudes between the edges of the 
wound, and will entirely mask its character. 

If the ball have traversed the clothing before attaining the body, it carries 
a portion of this with it; and should it have lost much of its force before 
reaching the body, the clothing is merely pushed before it into the wound, and 
upon pulling this out, the ball will often come with it. The hole made by a 
bullet in the clothing is smaller than it is itself, owing to the elasticity of the 
material, and also is depressed like that in the skin. The wound is usually 
circular in shape, but is oval if the ball have entered the body obliquely. If 
caused by a rifle-ball, it is said that a large and ragged hole is made, which is 
attributed to the spiral groove of the barrel, and the tightness with which this 
kind of ball fits the bore of the weapon. The wound made by the Prussian 
needle gun, which carries a conical ball, differs from that made by an ordinary 
bullet.(7) It is quite insignificant in appearance, small, scarcely marked by 
suggillations, presents a slight contusion of the surrounding soft parts, is not 
always circular, and not unfrequently triangular, and in these slight marks 
gives but little indication of the complete disorganization which exists within. 
The orifice of exit is in all respects like that of entrance. In a case communi- 
cated by Mr. Tufnell to the Surgical Society of Ireland (March 11th, 1854), 
it was shown that the form of the wound made by the conical bullet of the 
Minié rifle was ‘a small semilunar. split in the integument,” about a quarter 
of an inch in length. There was no contusion nor inversion of the edges of 
the wound. 

§ 813. It is evident that one ball may produce several wounds upon the 
body; either, for example, by traversing a limb, and then entering the trunk 
or head, or, as has been witnessed in some instances, by the splitting of the 
bullet upon a projecting ridge of bone. At the same time, it should be remem- 
bered that the piece may have been charged with more than one bullet, and 
this circumstance may give rise to some perplexity, since, upon examination 
of the body, only one may be found, the other either having passed out of the 
body, or been overlooked in the examination. Casper lays great stress upon 
the difficulty of finding balls in the body, even when there appears to be a 
certainty that they could not have traversed it, no aperture of exit bein 
found.(/) 

A ball, after entering the skin, is deflected from its straight course by very 


(j) Casper, Ger. Med. i. 293. (k) Ger. Leichendff. 2tes Hundert. 
666 


BOOK V. | WOUNDS FROM SMALL SHOT. [$ 815 


slight causes. Many examples of this fact are given by all authors on military 
surgery. ‘The following is a singular illustration of it: In a duel with pistols 
between two students at Strasburg, one fell, apparently mortally wounded ‘in 
the neck, but almost immediately got up, without feeling any inconvenience 
from his wound. It was found that the bullet had struck the larynx obliquely, 
and, glancing from the cartilage, had gone completely around the neck, and 
stopped on the opposide side of the larynx from where it had entered. It was 
taken out by making simply an incision over it. Other examples might be 
cited in which balls have made a circuit around the cavities of the body without 
entering them. Ina wound of the head, thorax, or abdomen, the ball may 
make a half circuit of the body, and lodge or emerge at a point opposite that 
at which it entered, thus leading one to suppose that it must have passed 
directly through. In the battle of Suddozam, a soldier was struck by a bullet 
just above the right haunch bone. The ball passed around the trunk, entered 
the abdominal parietes on the left side, then passed downward throngh the 
sciatic notch, and ‘“‘at length contented itself with remaining in the left 
nates.’’(/) 

§ 814. Wounds from small shot.—These are too characteristic to be mis- 
taken for any other injury. It is chiefly important to understand the character 
of the wound as affected by the distance at which the piece was fired. When 
this has happened sufficiently near to the person for the charge to enter the 
body in one mass before separating, the wound is of considerable extent and 
eravity. Its edges are ragged, contused, and blackened; and as the shot 
diverge after entering the body, great laceration and injury of the parts 
underneath take place. Dr. Lachése, of Antwerp, found, upon experiment, 
that for the opening to be single, the distance should not exceed ten or 
twelve inches. At distances greater than this, the wound will no longer 
be perfectly regular, but more or less lacerated; and when the distance is so 
great that no central wound is made, each grain will make a distinct though 
trifling wound. Nevertheless, a single grain of shot may occasionally produce 
death. Thus, in a case related by Ollivier d’Angers, a thief, scaling a wall, 
received, at the distance of fifteen paces, a charge of shot from a fowling-piece. 
He fell dead immediately. The charge had struck him in the breast, scattering 
over an extent of three to four inches, but one grain had penetrated the aorta 
over the attachment of sigmoid valves, and another had traversed the anterior 
wall of this vessel. 'The wounds had the form of linear incisions, two lines in 
extent, and such as would be made by a fine double-edged and pointed instru- 
ment. If the shot have had to penetrate the clothing, especially if this be 
loose and thick, before entering the body, the usual character of a near wound 
from this cause will be modified; the shot is spread out of its course by this 
obstacle to a certain degree, and does not enter the skin in a mass, causing a 
round tolerably regular opening, but being somewhat scattered, will either pro- 
duce a large, lacerated wound or a number of small wounds, according to the 
position in which the weapon is held. 

§ 815. 4th. Wounds from wadding and gunpowder.—According to some 


(1) Cole’s Military Surgery. 
667 


§ 815] WOUNDS FROM WADDING AND GUNPOWDER. [BOOK V. 


experiments made by Dr. Swift, it was found that a pistol loaded with powder 
‘and wadding alone, at twelve inches distance, tore the clothes and abraded the 
skin, without penetrating it; at half this distance, the wadding penetrated to 
the depth of half an inch; at two inches, a ragged and blackened wound was 
made, and the wadding was imbedded at the depth of two inches; at one inch 
and a half from the chest, the wadding passed between the ribs into the thorax, 
and in a second experiment, carried away a portion of the rib.(m) M. La- 
chése found in his experiments that the distance at which the wadding of a 
gun would enter the body in one mass, did not exceed six inches from the 
muzzle, but that even at this distance it only occurred when a double charge 
of fine powder was used, and with an army cartridge.(n) Hence it is proba- 
ble that an ordinary wadding, such as loosely wrapped paper, rag, or similar 
material, used in a fowling-piece, or in a musket by those not accustomed to 
the military use of the weapon, would not produce a rounded opening which 
would resemble that made by a bullet. Even if held at a less distance than six 
inches from the body, it is doubtful whether such a wound could be produced. 
Yet, although the opening may not be mistaken for that made by a bullet, it 
is certain that dangerous and fatal wounds are often made with wadding at 
short distances, by its penetrating the body and lacerating some important 
bloodvessel. 

A curious and interesting case, which led to experiments confirmatory of the 
above, occurred in Paris in 1858. In the circus a cannon was fired in the 
direction of the boxes, at a distance of about 150 feet. The cannon was about 
four feet long, four inches in calibre, and loaded with three ounces of powder, 
retained by a wad made of old theatre bills torn from the street walls, loosely 
rolled together and rammed home with moderate force. On one occasion a 
man was seated in a box opposite the muzzle of the gun, and at the distance 
already mentioned; he was leaning forward, with his arms crossed upon the 
handle of his umbrella, and, as the explosion took place, he fell violently back- 
ward, and was afterwards found to have his arm broken above the elbow. Seve- 
ral portions of wadding were found upon the ground underneath the place where 
the man had sat; but no marks existed upon his clothing, and none upon the 
anterior part of the arm, which, indeed, must have been inaccessible to any pro- 
jectile that did not first strike the forearm. It was concluded that the fracture 
had been caused by the sudden and violent starting of the man backwards, 
which must have brought his arm against the hard edge of a partition; and 
various experiments tried with the cannon proved that any wadding which 
could be made of paper was dispersed in pieces, or lost all power of mischief, 
at a much less distance than one hundred and twenty feet. (nn) 

Gunpowder alone is capable of producing wounds which may prove fatal. 
When a pistol or gun charged with gunpowder alone is fired at an uncovered © 
portion of the body at a distance of a few inches, a blackened, burned, and 
slightly lacerated wound will be produced, or if the grains of powder be large, 
the skin may present the appearance of having been struck with small shot. 


(m) Phil. Med. Exam., March, 1846. 

(n), Orfila, Méd. Lég., 4me edition, 2,p 464. 

(nn) Annales d’Hyg., Avril, 1859, p. 420. 
668 


BOOK Y.| SITUATION OF THE WOUNDS. [$ 816 


The burnt appearance of the skin, the singeing of the hair in the neighborhood, 
or the burning of a portion of the clothing, will all indicate that the charge 
has been fired close to the body. 


Hil. Honucidal, Suicidal, and Accidental Wounds. 


§ 816. The mode of obtaining a satisfactory solution of the question, 
whether a wound found upon a dead body was of accidental, suicidal, or 
homicidal origin, is by an examination of the wound itself, and of the circum- 
stances under which it was produced. Under the first head, the considerations 
are purely of a medical nature; under the second they are so to a limited 
extent only, and will, therefore, be more appropriately examined in connection 
with the legal remarks upon homicide. We shall allude to them, therefore, in 
this place only in a cursory manner. 

Ist. Situation of the wound.—Suicidal wounds are inflicted upon those 
parts of the body most accessible to the hand, such as the head, neck, and 
anterior part of the trunk. ‘They are usually either made by fire-arms, or by 
cutting instruments. If by the former, the wound will most frequently be 
found in the head, or over the heart ;(0) and if by the latter, the throat is 
usually selected. If, therefore, a wound is found in some part of the body 
which it was manifestly impossible for the suicide to reach, this circumstance, 
in connection with the direction of the wound, will make the intervention of 
another or the occurrence of accident evident. Yet, as in the greater number 
of cases, wounds exist upon the front of the body, or at least in such situa- 
tions that they could have been self-inflicted, the locality of the wound alone 
affords merely a presumption at most of its mode of origin. Moreover, it 
must be remembered, that all suicidal wounds are not inflicted always by 
means of the hand, but sometimes by violently striking the body against some 
solid substance, by precipitation from a height, and by various other means, 
especially in persons of deranged intellect, who not unfrequently contrive to 
mortally wound themselves in such a manner as would hardly be thought of 
by another. 

Orfila relates a case, in which an insane person killed himself with a pistol- 
shot, fired behind the right mastoid process; the ball was found in the cere- 
bellum. 

A woman in this city endeavored to destroy herself by placing her head 
upon a block and dealing upon the back part of it numerous severe blows 
with a hatchet. A similar instance is reported by Mr. Tarleton, in which an 
insane gentleman was found lying insensible in his kitchen with the cleaver by 
his side. Upwards of thirty wounds were found over the occipital bone; they 
were horizontal, many of them superficial, but one, however, had removed a 
portion of the skull from the middle of the lambdoidal suture, so that the 
brain had escaped. This person, who survived his injuries four days, admitted 


(o) M. Brierre de Boismont states that in 297 out of 368 cases of suicide by fire- 
arms, the head was the part injured, and that in 71 only were the chest or the abdo- 
men attacked. In 234 of the first group of cases the weapon was fired into the mouth. 
Du Suicide, p. 531. 

669 


§ 818] DIRECTION OF THE WOUND. [BOOK v. 


_ that he had inflicted them himself.(o00) Suspicion of criminal violence would 
very naturally be entertained in such cases as these, provided the body was 
accidentally discovered in a deserted place. 

§ 817. 2d. Direction.—The direction of the wound will more frequently 
serve to distinguish a homicidal from an accidental wound than from one 
which has been self-inflicted. Thus, on the trial of Mrs. Mackin, in Edin- 
burgh, in 1823, for murder, it was stated in the evidence that the deceased 
died from a stab. The prisoner alleged in her defence that she merely held 
the knife in her hand sloping upwards, to deter the deceased from attacking 
her; but that he, being drunk, stumbled forwards upon it. This statement 
was disproved by the medical testimony, which showed that the direction of 
the stab was backwards, and very much downwards in the lungs, having pene- 
trated the chest over the cartilage of the second rib.(p) A similar instance 
is given by Elvert, in which the downward direction of the wound, and its 
having been made in the manner of the German butchers, viz., a second inter- 
nal wound after a partial withdrawal of the instrument, not only disproved 
the accidental origin of the wound, but indicated also the occupation of the 
murderer.(q) In England, a few years since, a murder was fixed upon a man, 
from the fact that the wound in the neck of the deceased had been evidently 
made by a knife cutting from within outwards, as is done in slaughtering 
sheep. . 

The direction of suicidal wounds is subject to too much variety to be relied 
upon as a criterion, for although in many cases we may obtain from it a pre- 
sumption that the wound was voluntary, yet it is evident that a wound 
inflicted by a murderer may assume any direction which could possibly be 
given to a suicidal wound, Besides, the deceased may have been left-handed, 
or ambidexter, a consideration of some importance in this relation. In short, 
but little information of value can be obtained from the direction of a wound, 
unless the circumstances under which it was received are known; hence its 
chief importance is in corroboration of other evidence. 

In any case in which a person is found lying dead or dying from wounds or 
other bodily injuries, an accurate inspection of the locality, and of the posi- 
tion of the body in respect of surrounding objects is of the highest import- 
ance, and should be minutely noted before the body is removed. 

§ 818. That part of the circumstantial evidence which requires medical 
knowledge for its elucidation, is often most curious and important, and as it 
has to deal with conditions incessantly varying, and is founded upon no familiar 
principles, nor any positive scientific basis, but rather upon loose and badly 
observed facts, must partake of the same nature, and often appear discordant 
and improbable. Each medical witness may put together in a different man- 
ner the materials with which he is required to reconstruct the scene immedi- 
ately preceding death ; and a successful result will most naturally reward him, 
who with the most acute perception unites the largest and most familiar 
acquaintance with similar facts. In estimating the probabilities in reference 


(oo) Taylor, Med. Jur. p. 191. 
(p) Christison, Month. Jour. Nov. 1851, p. 401. (q) Kopp’s Jahrb. i. p. 143. 
670 


BOOK V.]| POSITION OF THE BODY, ETC. [S$ 819 


to the manner of death, the physician has need of all the aid which a general 
observation of the workings of the human mind can afford him, his psycho- 
logical knowledge and his medical experience must here go hand in hand, for 
it is his task and duty to offer an explanation of the mutual dependence of 
motives and results, and that, in the same disinterested and merely scientific 
manner, that would be required in the demonstration of any curious fact in 
physics. 

That portion of the indicatory evidence upon which medical testimony may 
possibly throw some light, we may now cursorily allude to. 

§ 819. 3d. Position of body and of weapon.—The position of the body 
and that of the weapon (if the latter be found) sometimes throw light upon 
the mode of death. 

These two circumstances serve also generally to explain each other; separ- 
ately considered they are not of so much importance. In cases of suicide the 
weapon may be found grasped in the hand or not, according to the manner 
of death. Thus, if death ensue upon sudden and abundant hemorrhage, as in 
wounds of the throat, stabs in the heart or great vessels, the person dies by 
syncope, and hence the hand being relaxed the weapon falls from it. When, 
however, death is occasioned by a pistol-shot through the head, the weapon 
will, in most cases of suicide by this means, be found firmly grasped in the 
hand. In other cases where death has not been immediate, it is purely a mat- 
ter of accident whether the weapon be still held by the deceased or not. In 
like manner, the position of the body will be affected by the suddenness and 
mode of death. Where death is sudden the body will usually be found lying 
upon the back, but if it have not been immediate, the face and trunk will gen- 
erally be turned to the ground. The position of the body alone cannot be 
considered as indicative of the voluntary, accidental, or homicidal character of 
the injury, but if it be found in a position indicating immediate death from 
hemorrhage or from the instantaneous loss of muscular power, and the weapon 
be found at a distance from it, the act may be considered in all probability 
as homicidal. Where, on the contrary, it is found in this position and the 
weapon by which death apparently was caused lies close to the body, it is ims 
possible, of course, to determine whether it has been placed there by another 
after assassination or has fallen from the hands of a suicide. Should the 
weapon be found firmly grasped in the hand of the deceased, there can be little 
doubt that the act was suicidal. The only objection which can be made to 
the supposition is, that it might have been placed in the hands of the person 
before life was extinct, and instinctively grasped by him. No case, however, is 
yet reported which would show that this has been done. Where after death 
by assassination a weapon is placed in the hand of the victim, it cannot be 
forcibly grasped, but will lie there loosely. Sometimes the fact of the razor 
being shut (when this has been the weapon used) has been considered as indi- 
cative of homicidal interference ; but such an inference is not justifiable unless 
it can be shown from the position of the body and the character of the wounds, 
that death must have been instantaneous, and even here the question might 
naturally arise whether the fall of the razor to the ground might not sufficiently 
account for its being closed. Thus, for example, in a case of suicide related 

671 


§ 819] POSITION OF THE BODY, ETC. [BOOK VY. 


by Dr. Casper, the man, after having first inflicted with a razor some superficial 


~ wounds at the bend of both elbows, stood before a mirror and drawing down 


his cravat, cut his throat in an oblique direction from left to right, dividing 
the larynx and both external jugular veins. The razor was found bloody and 
closed, two feet distant from the body.(r) The same author reports another 
case of suicide by a pistol-shot in the breast, traversing the diaphragm and 
spleen, and subsequent drowning. In this case the pistol was found in the 
pocket of the deceased, and the fact of its having been fired against the naked 
chest was shown by the circumstance that his coat and shirt were not perfo- 
rated, and the former was buttoned up to the chin. 

The following case illustrates the nature of the difficulties which sometimes 
environ ‘the questions treated of in this chapter. At Paris, in 1858, an 
auctioneer and appraiser, thirty-one years of age, arrived at the Lyons rail- 
road station, about six o’clock in the morning, and having engaged a coupé 
and placed his luggage upon it, entered the vehicle, carrying a double-barrelled 
fowling-piece in his hand. At some previous period he had been twice con- 
victed of official misconduct, and his present position was not a prosperous 
one. But there was nothing to indicate his being humiliated or desperate; on 
the contrary, his habitual behavior was gay and even frivolous. On the way 
to its destination an explosion was heard in the carriage ; it was stopped, and 
the body of the occupant was found seated in the left-hand corner, the legs 
crossed, and in the posture of a person seeking repose. ‘The greater portion 
of the left side of the skull from the centre of the forehead was carried away ; 
the legs were crossed, and between them lay a cane, and a double-barrelled gun, 
the left barrel of which was still loaded and cocked. The thumb and index 
finger of the left hand were bloody, and the fingers clenched. Within the skull 
were found numerous grains of shot. The deceased had, several months before, 
insured his life for about $30,000, which sum the insurance company refused 
to pay to his family, on the ground that his death was suicidal. Hence a law- 
suit, in which the facts of the case were investigated. It was evident that at 
the moment of the explosion the forehead must have been upon or very near 
the muzzle of the gun, which was also grasped by the left hand. From these 
facts, M. Tardieu concludes that the death was suicidal,(s) and M. Brierre de 
Boismont draws the same inference, chiefly from the fact that there was no 
evidence of a previous inclination to this crime!(¢) The court, however, con- 
demned the insurance company to pay the amount of its policy. To us it 
seems perfectly natural that a sportsman, weary with a night’s ride in a rail- 
road car, should, when seated in a hackney-coach, have leaned his head upon 
the muzzle of his gun, embracing but not covering the end of the barrel with 
his hand, and that a jolt of the vehicle should have caused the trigger to catch 
in his pantaloons and explode the charge. Too many accidents of a similar 
nature have occurred, displaying an almost inconceivable negligence of the 
simplest precautions in handling firearms, for us not to adopt this conclusion — 
in the present case as not only the most charitable, but also the most logical. 


(r) Gericht. Leichenéff. 1 tes Hund. p. 17. 
(s) Ann. d’Hyg. Avril, 1860, p. 443. (t) Ibid. Juill. 1859, p. 138. 


672 


BOOK V.] BLOOD STAINS. ; [§$ 821 


The inference to be drawn relative to the suicidal or involuntary cause of 
death, from the various other circumstances under which the body is found, do 
not belong to the physician, and require in general no medical knowledge for 
their explanation. This portion of the indicatory evidence is treated of in the 
legal part of this subject. 


IV. Blood Statins. 


§ 820. Ist. General appearance.—The color of stains of blood is dependent 
upon their age and the material upon which they are found. Those of a recent 
origin are of a deep red color, which ultimately becomes brown. The period 
required to effect this change is not determined; it occurs, however, most 
rapidly in warm weather. The recent stains of menstrual blood are also of a 
brown color. The depth of the color depends also upon the porosity of the 
substance. Thus marks of blood upon white stuffs and upon light wood are 
paler and duller than those on articles of greater density, as varnished wood, 
iron, and stone. Where it has coagulated, this will usually be shown by one 
portion of the spot being thicker and darker than the other. 

On colored stuffs, especially on those which are brown, blue, or black, the 
spot is more easily recognized by candle-light than by day. This important 
fact was discovered by Ollivier d’Angers. He had been directed to re-examine 
the room of a person accused of murder; having already visited it in the day 
time, his second examination was conducted at night, and he now discovered 
by holding a lighted candle near to the paper hangings, which were of a pale 
blue color, a number of drops of an obscure dirty red, which by day had the 
aspect of small black specks, and were lost in the general pattern of the paper. — 
On a further examination, other spots of the same kind were found on the © 
furniture. On the chimney jamb, which was painted blue, there was a large 
stain of blood, which appeared red by the light of the candle. The next day 
by day-light Barruel and Lesueur could not find these spots, and were obliged 
to make use of artificial light to discover them.(u) The same remarks will of 
course apply to spots of blood upon dark woollen cloth, in which they can also 
be detected by the stiffening of the material. If the stain be upon a weapon, 
such as the steel blade of a knife or poniard, the color will be of a pale red 
where the layer is thin, and of a dark brown color where it is of greater 
thickness. 

§ 821. 2d. Chemical examination of suspected stains.—If the stain be 
upon linen or other similar stuff, it should be cut out and suspended by a 
thread in a small test-tube containing an amount of distilled water sufficient 
fully to dissolve the stain; the coloring matter of the blood soon begins to 
detach itself and seek the bottom of the vessel, the supernatant liquid remain- 
ing tolerably clear. The coloring matter will be dissolved in the course of a 
few hours; the fibrin, if any were contained in the spot, remaining attached to 
the stuff as a soft grayish or rosy white substance. The colored liquid in the 
test-tube may now be subjected to various tests; but one or two very simple 


(u) Briand, Méd. Légale, p. 782. 
43 673 


§ 823] BLOOD STAINS.—TESTS. [BOOK V. 


ones are all that is necessary to establish the certainty of the presence of blood. 
Supposing the liquid to hold in solution the coloring matter of the blood and 
albumen, the effect of heat carried gradually to the boiling point is to coagu- 
late it and destroy its color. According to the amount of albumen, will be 
the degree of coagulation, if the liquid contain merely a trace of it, boiling 
merely renders it opalescent. But the alteration of color is peculiar to blood. 
It changes from its more or less red color to a grayish green without a trace 
of red, the upper portion of the liquid acquiring also an indistinct yellow tinge. 
The grayish coagulated portion may be redissolved with potassa, and acquires 
thereby a brownish-red color by refracted, and green by reflected light. An- 
other important test for blood is the absence of any change of color by the 
addition of ammonia, except when very concentrated or added in large 
quantity. (v) 

§ 822. These tests will suffice to distinguish the colored serum of the 
blood from any stains resembling it. Thus the red soluble dyes or stains from 
the juices of fruits are not coagulated by heat, nor do they lose their color on 
exposure to it, but the red color is changed either to a crimson or to a green, 
sometimes passing through a violet shade by the addition of ammonia. M. 
Raspail’s statement, that a stain possessing similar chemical characters with 
that of blood, could be formed by exposing to heat a mixture of madder and 
white of egg, has been corrected by Orfila,(w) who, in fact, denies its accuracy. | 
He found that a solution of this artificial stain although coagulated by heat 
preserved its orange-red color, and the coagulum was of a pale red. In its 
further reactions, also, it was quite dissimilar to blood. Dr. Taylor says, 
“having for some years performed numerous experiments on this subject, by 
making artificial mixtures of human serum or animal albumen, with the red 
coloring matters of cochineal, lac, and madder, and neutralizing the effects of 
the alkali contained in the serum by the addition of a small quantity of acetic 
acid, I feel justified in stating that in no respect whatever, except in regard to 
color, can such mixtures be confounded with blood. The objection is, there- 
‘fore, more theoretical than practical. These red liquids may easily deceive 
those who trust to a red color alone; and herein we see the necessity for 
placing the investigation of such subjects in the hands of professional persons 
only.” | 

§ 823. Other tests have been proposed, but none of them are as distinctive 


(v) Rose’s method is thus given by Casper (op. cit. i. 160): The dried blood is 
thoroughly treated with cold distilled water, which is from time to time poured off 
from the undissolved fibrin until all the coloring matter is removed. The residual 
fibrin can then be examined with the microscope. If the coloring matter in solution 
is now treated with chlorine water in excess, it becomes decolorized, and white flakes 
separate and float upon the liquid. Three parts of nitric acid to one part of the solu- 
tion give a grayish-white precipitate, and four parts of tincture of galls to one of the 
solution give a pale violet precipitate. If a portion of the solution is boiled it is coagu- 
lated in a greater or less degree. The clot is of a dirty red color, dissolves readily in 
a heated caustic solution of potassa, to which it gives a greenish tint by transmitted 
light, and, as before stated, appears brownish red by refracted light. When a very 
small quantity, as a single spot of blood, is examined, all of these reactions cannot be 
observed. In this case it is advised to boil the solution and treat it with caustic 
potassa, afterwards adding an excess of chlorine water or of nitric acid. 

(w) Méd Lég. ii. 618. 


674 


BOOK V.| TESTS OF BLOOD. . . [§ 826 


and reliable as those mentioned. Thus nitric acid coagulates the albumen and 
changes the color to a gray or dirty brown, according to the amount of hema- 
tin; the tincture of galls occasions a precipitate without altering the color, 
and hypochlorous acid changes it to a greenish-brown color. 

§ 824. When the spot of blood is upon a hard substance, it may, in most 
cases, be removed by careful scraping. If upon the point of a weapon, it may 
be macerated for a short time in a narrow vessel containing water, but if on 
any other part, if not easily removable by scraping, as when the.blood has 
dried in a film or in streaks, the stained part should be laid upon a clean plate 
of glass, after having been previously moistened with distilled water. The 
two surfaces should be in immediate contact with each other, but care should 
be used that the metal be not left too long exposed to the action of the water. 
Blood stains upon iron and steel may sometimes be mistaken for rust or salts 
of the oxide of iron made by some of the organic acids. In the case of rust 
the color is different, being more or less yellow, but occasionally this distinc- 
tion is not sufficiently evident. If, however, the spot be detached and placed 
in distilled water it does not dissolve, although part of it may remain sus- 
pended in the water. By filtration, however, the rust is entirely separated, 
the filtered liquid remaining colorless. The residue upon the filter will give 
the proper reactions with the ferrocyanide of potassium or the alkalies, after 
having been first digested with dilute hydrochloric acid. If, however, the 
stain be due to lemon-juice or other organic acid, it will be observed in the 
first instance that the color is darker than that of blood, being often nearly 
black ; it is also very soluble, and although slightly coagulable the solution 
yields at once to the tests for iron, giving an intense blue color with the ferro- 
cyanide, and a deep red with the sulphocyanide of potassium.(7) 

§ 825. There is a number of insoluble stains which present a certain simi- 
larity to those of blood. Such are, madder and logwood dyes, iron moulds 
and red paint. The insolubility of these stains ought to be a sufficient in- 
dication of their being due to some other cause than the presence of blood. 
The coloring principle in madder is, however, rendered yellow by acids and 
violet by alkalies, a change which of course will not be produced in a spot of 
blood. 

§ 826. Still, the spot may be soluble, and yet not be due to blood. In some 


(x) Dr. Carl Schmidt, Diagnostik der verdachtigen Flecke in criminal Fallen. Leip- 
zig. 1849. 

The detection of blood-stains upon iron is difficult, but important. Vauquelin 
was the first to remark that iron rust upon domestic utensils and instruments con- 
tains ammonia, hence, if on being heated it yields ammonia, this is no proof of the 
presence of blood. If this experiment is performed with a gentle heat upon iron rust 
in a glass tube, and if after the ammonia is driven off, the heat is increased, a pecu- 
liar odor, such as always attends the carbonization of albuminous substances, is 
exhaled, and a brown, offensive, empyreumatic oil is deposited on the less heated por- 
tions of the tube. Still stronger evidence is afforded by the following test: Melt a 
small quantity of the slightly heated rust with an equal volume of potassium or 
sodium in a very small glass tube closed at one end ; when cool, mix with water, filter, 
and decompose the liquid with a very small quantity of a solution which contains 
both the protoxide and the peroxide of iron, and saturate the whole with an excess of 
hydrochloric acid. If blood be present, a greater or less quantity of Prussian blue 
will be developed, but if the ferruginous solution is in too great quantity, the color 
will be green. (Casper, loc. cit.) 


675 


§ 828] CHEMICAL EXAMINATION. [BOOK V. 


cases stains, somewhat similar to blood-stains, are made by the juices of fruits, 
or by soluble coloring matters. Dr. Albert found on the clothes of a young 
man accused of attempted assassination, a large number of red spots which 
had the appearance of blood. On examination, however, he found that a 
portion of them only were caused by blood, and the rest by red chalk, the 
prisoner’s trade being that of a wall-colorer. All the stains were soluble, but 
those which were:really due to blood were distinguished from the others by 
their more shining appearance, the appearance of fibrin in the solution, which 
sank to the bottom, the want of change upon the addition of caustic ammonia, 
and their appropriate reaction with nitric acid and with tincture of galls. The 
spots made by the red chalk disappeared in a fine powder on being rubbed, 
communicated their color uniformly to the water, and the solution was changed 
to a violet-brown color by caustic ammonia, dark brown by nitric acid, and 
remained unchanged upon the addition of tincture of galls.(y) 

— § 827. If the suspected stain on the clothing be caused by tron rust, it will 
be readily dissolved out by hydrochloric acid, and then may be subjected to the 
appropriate tests. Dévergie reports an instance in which iron mould awak- 
ened considerable suspicion of violent means -having been used. The body 
of a young man, bearing the marks of many injuries upon it, was taken out 
of the Seine, where it was supposed to have lain for three weeks. Red stains 
were found on the shirt, which were supposed to be of blood, but, upon exami- 
nation, they were satisfactorily proved to have been due to the rusting of a 
steel guard-chain and a bunch of keys onthe person of the deceased. Dr. Tay- 
lor gives an instance in which spots of ved paint upon the dress of an indi- 
vidual, were the occasion of his being arrested on suspicion of being concerned 
in a murder which had been perpetrated shortly before. The color in this 
instance was due to the peroxide of iron, which was readily detected. 

§ 828. The distinction of arterial from venous blood, except when recently 
effused, is manifestly impracticable. Their chemical reactions are very nearly 
alike, and the only ground of distinction is in the more florid color of the for- 
mer when recently poured out, and occasionally also in the form of the spots ; 
those made by arterial blood being generally of an oval or elongated shape, in 
consequence of the blood having been thrown in a jet from the divided vessel. 
Moreover, in practice the two kinds of blood will almost always be mingled 
together, as it is difficult to conceive a wound being made which shall not 
involve both sets of vessels. Dr. Taylor makes some interesting observations 
on the form and direction of spots of blood, suggested by the case of Reg. v. 
Spicer :(z) ‘“‘ At the top of the stair, and at the height of four or five feet 
above the level, several spots of blood were observed upon the brick wall, 
‘which was whitewashed. The spots took an oblique direction from above 
downwards, were of a pale-red color at the upper part, but dark-red below, 
terminating in a point consisting of the fibrin, and the greater part of the red 
coloring matter. Their form and regularity proved that they had proceeded 
from a small artery, and that the wounded individual could not have been very 


(y) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1855. H. ii. p. 392. 
(z) Berks’ Lent. Assizes, 1846. 


676 


BOOK V.] BLOOD OF MAN AND ANIMALS, [$ 830 


distant from the wall, while their shining lustre rendered it probable that they 
were of recent origin, and their well-defined termination in a firm coagulum 
showed that they had proceeded from a living bloodvessel. The deceased had 
died from fracture of the skull and vertebral column, by a fall from the top 
stair; one branch of the right temporal artery was found divided, and this 
wound could not have been produced by the fall. It was therefore evident that 
a murderous assault had been made upon her at the top of the stairs; this had 
led to the spirting of the arterial blood on the brick. The height at which 
the spots existed, and their appearance, proved that the jet of blood had 
been from above downwards; thereby rendering it probable that the deceased 
was standing up, or that her head was raised at the time the wound was 
inflicted. Further, as the brick with the spots was on the left hand in the 
descent, and the wounded artery was on the right side, it is probable that the 
deceased was face to face with her assailant in the act of ascending the stairs, 
and that she was killed by being precipitated to the bottom.”’(a) It has been 
supposed that menstrual blood could be distinguished from other kinds by the 
absence of fibrin; but, although this discharge does not usually coagulate, it 
nevertheless contains fibrin, and sometimes in very appreciable quantity. Dr. 
Franz Simon says: “There can be little doubt that there is fibrin in the 
menstrual secretion ; its determination is, however, usually rendered impossi- 
ble by the presence of a large amount of mucus, which seems to deprive the 
blood of its power of coagulating.’’(b) M. Robin has given as characteristic 
qualities of menstrual blood, that it contains, besides blood-disks, epithelial 
cells and globules of mucus (leucocytes) ;(c) but the latter elements are want- 
ing whenever the menstrual flow is excessive, and in such cases, therefore, the 
liquid presents no distinctive characters. 

§ 829. The presence of fibrin in a blood-stain is merely corroborative proof 
of the origin of the spot, but does not indicate with any certainty that the 
stain was derived from the blood of a living person; nor, on the other hand, 
does its absence give any support to the opinion that it was derived from a 
body already dead, since, if the stain be superficial, it may yield no traces of 
fibrin, even though it came from a living vessel, and coagulation in a dead 
body is not complete immediately upon the extinction of life. Hence, if the 
physician be able clearly to discover the traces of blood by the reactions of 
the colored serum before indicated, it is superfluous to inquire for the presence 
of fibrin; and, on the other hand, this element of the blood could hardly be 
detected without ample proof of the nature of the fluid having been already 
obtained from other sources, since the quantity required would be considerable. 

§ 830. The discrimination of the blood of animals from that of man by 
chemical means, is too uncertain to be used as evidence. M. Barruel has stated 
that, if one-third or one-half its volume of pure sulphuric acid be added to 
blood and agitated, that a peculiar odorous principle is evolved, resembling 
that of the animal from which the blood was derived. Thus, human 


(a) Med. Jur. p. 203. See also case of Drory, by the same author. Guy’s Hospital 
Rep. vol. vii. 1851. 

(6) Animal Chemistry. Syd. Soc. ed. p. 338, 

(c) Ann. d’Hyg. 2éme sér. x. 421. 


617 


§ 831] MICROSCOPICAL EVIDENCE. [BOOK V. 


blood is said to give off an odor of perspiration ; that of the cow, horse, 
sheep, pig, &c., a smell, recognized as peculiar to the animal. M. Barruel 
claims to have discovered this property even in blood which had been dried. 
According to Schmidt, the experiment succeeds only with the blood of the 
ram, sheep, and cat. But more recently, an experiment was made by MM. Tar- 
dieu, Barruel, and Chevalier, which shows how little confidence can be placed 
in this test. These experts were charged with the duty of determining whether 
some blood found in the cellar of a woman accused of murder was human, or, 
as she alleged, that of a sheep. Being undecided in opinion, they procured 
the blood of sheep, oxen, and of the living and dead human subject, and these, 
with the blood from the cellar, and that upon the clothes of the accused, were 
placed in separate test-tubes by an assistant, and numbered. Sulphuric acid 
was then added to each, and the mixture stirred. ach expert was required 
to write secretly his opinion as to the source of the blood in each glass. The 
result was the greatest confusion, the human blood being constantly mistaken 
for that of the animal, and a correct opinion seemed only to be obtained by 
- chance.(d) 

§ 831. 8d. Microscopical evidence.—An additional and valuable means of 
detecting the presence of blood in suspected stains, is by the microscope. If 
the spots are recent (a week old, for example), three to six hours are sufficient 
to disaggregate the mass of globules, but a solution of the sulphate of soda 
penetrates very slowly those which are old, and several days may be required 
for this purpose. ‘When the tissue has been well soaked, the stains may be 
carefully detached with a scalpel, and the liquid thus removed should be placed 
upon a glass slide, and immediately covered with another one. Upon examin- 
ing a blood-stain thus prepared, many other objects will be seen besides the 
blood-globules, such as filaments of tissue, &c., but the observer should abstract 
his attention from these, unless there is reason to suppose that they may indi- 
cate the locality from which the blood came, as in the case of mucus, &c., in 
attempts at rape. A portion of the globules will be found free, while others 
will be attached to the fibres of the stuff, but they will preserve their natural 
color, volume, and, more or less, their shape also, to such an extent, however, 
as to be readily recognized.(e) The microscopical characters of spots upon 
woollen cloth are less easily recognized than those on linen, hemp, or cotton. 
The investigation should, of course, be conducted only by one familiar with 
the use of the microscope. If this be done, there can be no hesitation in say- 
ing that the results will be fully as valuable as, and open to fewer objections, 
than the chemical tests. 

The stain to be examined should be treated either with a solution of sulphate 
of soda or of white sugar, in order to preserve the natural shape of the blood- 
corpuscles. If the stain have been previously washed, it is very possible that 
the microscope will afford only negative results; but whenever it is possible 
to recognize distinctly even a single blood-disk in the liquid examined, this 


(d) Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, 1854. H.i. p. 120. See also, Henke’s Zeitschrift, 
1855.—H. ii. p. 392, for a number of experiments made with a similar result, by 
Dr. Albert, of Kuerdorf. 

(e) Robin. Briand, Méd. Lég. p. 790. 


678 


BOOK V.] MICROSCOPICAL EVIDENCE. [$ 831 


is quite sufficient to attest the presence of blood. Dr. Taylor says he has 
obtained ‘‘clear evidence of their existence in, and separation from, a minute 
fragment of dried blood, which had heen kept in a dried state for a period of 
three years.” M. Robin detected them in spots from eight to twelve years 
old. But such certainty cannot be expected if the spots have been washed, or 
if, while fresh, they have undergone putrefaction. Sometimes, when the red 
corpuscles cannot be detected, it may be possible to distinguish the lymph- 
globules, which are larger than these, but few in number, and colorless. Pro- 
fessor Wyman says that when blood is allowed to dry in masses, he has failed 
to detect the presence of the blood-disks. “The lymph-globules, on the con- 
trary,’’ he says, ‘‘may be softened out after they have been dried for months, 
and their characteristic marks readily obtained.’? He found it easy to detect 
them in blood which had been dried six months.(a) Virchow also states that 
they resist being dried and moistened anew better than any other constituent of 
the blood.(6) Still, they are much fewer in number than the red corpuscles, 
and, according to the best authorities, not in greater proportion than 1:400.(c) 
Virchow lays great stress upon their presence in blood subjected to medico-legal 
examination, on account of their power of resisting the influence of desiccation 
and subsequent moistening, and, further, because their presence may confirm a 
doubtful opinion regarding the existence of red corpuscles in the spot examined. 
Much will depend, however, upon their number, for if it should equal that of 
the red corpuscles, or nearly so, they must be regarded as belonging to pus 
rather than to blood. The possibility of their number being explicable by 
leukemia, or leucocythemia, a.disease in which they. may become one-third as 
numerous as the red corpuscles, is also to be borne in mind. 

The red corpuscles of man have an average diameter of 3:55 of an inch, 
and this size is not affected by age, being the same in the young and the old. 
They have a flattened shape, depressed centre, and circular outline. These 
characters suffice to distinguish them from those of birds, fish, and reptiles, in 
which creatures they are of an oval or elliptical form, and have a distinct 
central nucleus. They have the same shape also in the camel tribe. But the 
globules in all the mammalia (with this exception of the camelidz) are so 
nearly alike in size and other characters to those of man, that, practically, no 
distinction can be made. Thus, the blood of an ox or of a sheep cannot by the 
microscope be, for medico-legal application, distinguished from that of a human 
being, for although the globules are somewhat smaller than those of human 
blood, yet the size of the globule of human blood varies according to whether - 
it is fresh or dried, and the difference between its size in man and animals 
is too slight to be made a point of evidence in cases where such momentous 
consequences may depend upon the decision.(d) 


(a) Statement by Prof. Wyman in Bemis’ Webster case, p. 90. 

(b) Archiv, xii. 335. 

(c) See Kélliker, Mikroskopische Anatomie, Bd. ii. p. 576. 

(d) For the comparative size of the blood-globules in man and animals, the reader 
may consult with advantage Kélliker’s Mikroskopische Anatomie, Bd. ii. p.580; Briand, 
Manuel Pratique de Méd. Lég. 781; Todd and Bowman’s Physiological Anatomy, part 
iv. p. 299; C. Gulliver on the size of the red corpuscles of the blood in the vertebrata, 
in the Proceedings of the Zoolog. Soe. ciii. 1842; R. Wagner, Beitriige zur vergl. Phy- 


679 


§ 831] MICROSCOPICAL EVIDENCE, [BOOK V. 


An additional and still more certain proof of the presence of blood is derived 
from certain microscopical crystals which this liquid. contains. They were dis- 
covered in 1853 by Teichmann, and the method of detecting them has subse- 
quently been perfected by Briicke, Virchow, Biichner and Simon, and Bryk. 
Blood-crystals most frequently are seen as rhomboidal plates, but sometimes. 
as rhomboidal columns, and, when less perfectly developed, have the form of 
a shuttle, or that of a §. Like other microscopical crystals, they tend to 
intersect one another, and often form a St. Andrew’s cross, a stellate figure, or 
a rounded body studded with points like a stramonium apple. Their prevalent 
color is a dull brownish red, but it may vary from a dirty yellow to deep black, 
according to the amount of coloring matter of the blood which is present in 
the solution. Their number is likewise subject to great variations. ‘They are 
wholly insoluble in water, alcohol, ether, and chloroform, and in acetic, phos- 
phoric, and muriatic acids; slightly soluble in ammonia, and in dilute sul- 
phurie or nitric acids; but entirely so in solution of potassa, to which they 
give a dark-green color, also in English sulphuric acid, and in fuming nitric 
acid. 'To the last-named liquid they impart a brownish-red color. In chlorine- 
water they become disintegrated and corroded, and lose their color.(dd) - 


siologie des Blutes, i. 1833, ii. 1838; Partium Elementarum Mensiones Micrometrice, 
1834. Carl Schmidt has also conducted such measurements with great industry (see 
an excellent paper upon blood-stains, by Dr. Fleming, Am. Journ. Med. Sci. Jan. 1859, 
p- 110), but his results, while they show a considerable average difference between the 
size of the human blood-globule and that of various domestic animals, are still insuffi- 
cient to be brought in evidence in the decision of medico-legal questions. This also is 
the emphatically expressed opinion of Virchow and of Briicke. (Virchow’s Archiv, 
xii. 336.) : 

In the following case of presumed infanticide, in which a medical expert was required 
to determine the nature of some spots found upon a towel (described as having served 
to envelop the child) which was found concealed under a threshing-floor, the reader 
will perceive the nature of the investigation sometimes required :— 

(1.) The towel was of coarse huckaback, quite rotten, as a year had elapsed since 
it was concealed in the locality in which it was discovered, and the letters J. E. A., 
20, were marked in red cotton upon one corner. It was very much torn, and full of 
holes. 

(2.) In one corner three spots of a dark-red color, resembling blood, were found. 

(3.) On another portion of the towel numerous large spots of a dark-green color were 
seen, resembling dried meconium. The texture of the cloth was so penetrated with 
this matter that even upon the opposite side it was slightly tinged with green. 

(4.) Spots of various sizes, of a grayish-yellow color, were found on other parts of the 
towel. These spots were dry, and could be detached in scales. 

(a.) The red spots were cut out and softened in some fresh liquor amnii, and revealed, 
upon examination by the microscope, all the characteristics of globules of human blood. 

(b.) The portions discolored by the green material were also cut out and placed in 
distilled water, others in alcohol. These solutions, when treated with concentrated 
sulphuric acid, and a few drops of a solution of sugar (according to Pettenkofer), gave 
traces of a violet color, which was considered to indicate the presence of bile. 

(c.) Some of the same spots, dissolved in liq. amnii, and examined by the micro- 
scope, were found to consist of biliary cells, cylindrical epithelium, and fatty crystals. 

(d.) The grayish-yellow stains being prepared in a similar manner, exhibited epider- 
mic cells, and cells from the sebaceous follicles. Hence it was inferred that the various 
discolorations upon the towel arose—1. From blood; 2. From the secretions of the liver 
and intestines; and 3. From the cutaneous secretion; and that they could all be ex- 
plained on the supposition of a new-born child having been wrapped in it. It was 
further supposed, from the ragged condition in which the cloth was found, that it had 
been torn by some animal which had carried away and devoured the body of the 
child.— Wistrand, Hyqied, Bd. xiv. p. 220. 

(dd) Biichner and Simon, Virchow’s Archiv, xv. 52. 


680 


BOOK V.] HAIR AND CEREBRAL SUBSTANCE. [$ 831 


These characteristic crystals have been obtained from all kinds of blood— 
from that of man, quadruped, fowl, and fish; from fresh and putrid blood; from 
newly-drawn blood and from spots several years old; from arterial, venons, 
and menstrual blood; from pure blood and from that which was mingled with 
all sorts of impurities. It is to be observed that various coloring matters, 
mostly from the vegetable kingdom, form crystals which bear some analogy to 
those peculiar to the blood—as indigo, alkanet, logwood, madder, &c. But 
the blue color of the first of these, and the want of color in the rest, with the 
rhombic forms of their crystals, are sufficiently distinctive, to which, however, 
may be added their ready solubility in many liquids, and, for the most part, 
even in water. Purpurate of ammonia presents some difficulties. It forms, 
both with and without the addition of acetic acid, crystals very closely resem- 
bling those of hematin, in form and in color. Its acetic solution gives a 
residue, after evaporation, of a clear brick-red color, but blood similarly treated 
is a dull brownish red. The same residue becomes purplish red on the addition 
of water; muriatic acid destroys its color, and solution of potassa gives it a 
blue tint; whereas blood-crystals are insoluble in the first liquid, and form a 
dark-green solution with the other. 

In making this examination, the suspected spots on soft substances—as 
clothing, &e.—should be cut out, and those on hard substances carefully 
removed by scraping, and liquids thought to contain blood should be concen- 
trated by evaporation. Spots a few weeks or months old yield their coloring 
matter readily to water, but older and faded stains require maceration or boil- 
ing in acetic acid until the latter is reddened. Indeed, this is the speediest and 
most certain process for all blood-stains, except when they are upon a substance 
the coloring matter of which is extracted by the acid. The acetic solution 
thus obtained should be gradually evaporated in a watch-glass at a tempera- 
ture of 100° to 140° F. If blood is present, a thin, reddish, transparent 
crust is left behind, in which the crystals of hematin lie firmly imbedded, and 
ready for examination by the microscope. It is not necessary, as was at one 
time supposed, to add common salt to the acetic solution. On the contrary, 
this addition tends to confuse the result where the blood-crystals are abundant. 
Still, it must be admitted, as Biichner and Simon insist, that if a first trial 
without salt gives a negative result, the experiment should be repeated with 
this addition ; and if enough only of the suspected material is preserved for a 
single experiment, the use of salt should not be omitted. It is essential that 
a very minute grain of salt should be added to the solution before it is heated. 

The following important details respecting the application of the above 
method to the examination of blood-stains under different circumstances are 
furnished by Prof. Bryk.(e) Spots of blood left by fleas or bugs yield no 
crystals. Blood-stains on wood differ with the character of the wood. If 
smooth, dry, and hard, it does not interfere with the formation of crystals; 
but if it imbibes the blood, it will still, during the first six or eight days, yield 
by maceration a solution of the hematin which will furnish crystals. At the 
end of six or eight weeks this is no longer the case with soft wood, the tannin 


(e) Prager: Vierteljahr. lxii. anal. p. 106. 
681 


§ 832] HAIR AND CEREBRAL SUBSTANCE. [BOOK V. 


of which apparently renders the coloring matter insoluble. On clean iron the 

susceptibility to crystallization remains so long as rust does not form. On 
clay and chalk blood also remains indefinitely, unless it is in a very thin layer, 
or is exposed to the action of the weather. 

§ 832. For the modes of detecting hair, and also dried cerebral matter, 
under the microscope, we would refer the reader to the suggestions of Orfila 
and Robin, in Briand’s Manual de Méd. Lég. pp. 810-816. For cases in 
which evidence from these sources was considered of importance, see the same 
work ; also Med. Gaz. vol. xlviii. p. 729, where it was necessary to distinguish 
between the hair of a human being and an animal; also Taylor’s Med. Jur. 
p. 249, where some cotton-fibres detected by the microscope on the edge of a 
razor showed that the weapon had cut through the strings of a cotton night- 
cap in giving a fatal wound upon the neck; and, finally, one in Henke’s Zeit- 
schrift, 1853, p. 834, in which an assassin was detected and convicted partly 
upon the indicatory evidence furnished by a lock of hair remaining firmly 
grasped in the hand of the murdered man. The hair resembled, in all its 
physical character, that of the prisoner; the individual hairs were found to be 
some of them broken, others torn out by the root, and others cut, and a bare 
place was found on the prisoner’s head to which they corresponded. 

The value of microscopical evidence of the character of stains and of hair is 
well illustrated by the following case,(ee) which occurred in Norwich, Eng- 
land. A female child, nine years old, was found lying on the ground, in a 
small plantation, quite dead, with a large and deep gash in the throat. Suspi- 
cion fell upon the mother of the murdered girl, who, upon being taken into 
custody, behaved with the utmost coolness, and admitted having taken her child 
to the plantation where the body was found, whence the child was lost by get- 
ting separated while in quest of flowers. -Upon being searched, there was 
found in the woman’s possession a large and sharp knife, which was at once 
subjected to minute and careful examination. Nothing, however, was found 
upon it, with the exception of a few pieces of hair adhering to the handle, so 
exceedingly small as scarcely to be visible. The examination being conducted 
in the presence of the prisoner, and the officer remarking: ‘Here is a bit of 
fur or hair upon the handle of your knife,’ the woman immediately replied : 
“Yes, I dare say there is, and very likely some stains of blood, for, as I came 
home, I found a rabbit caught in a snare, and cut its throat with the knife.” 
The knife was sent to London, and, with the particles of hair, subjected to 
a, microscopic examination. No trace of blood could at first be detected 
upon the weapon, which appeared to have been washed; but upon separating 
the horn handle from its iron lining, it was found that between the two a fluid 
had penetrated, which turned out to be blood—certainly not the blood of a 
rabbit, but bearing every resemblance to that of the human body. ‘The hair 
was then submitted to examination. Without knowing anything of the facts 
of the case, the microscopist immediately declared the hair to be that of a 
squirrel. Now, around the neck of the child, at the time of the murder, there 


(ee) Quoted by Dr. Fleming, loc. cit., from Chambers’ Journal, part xxxv. Dec. 
1856. 


682 


HOORY.| CAUSE OF DEATH IN WOUNDS. [§ 834 


was a tippet or ‘ victorine,” over which the knife, by whomever held, must 
have glided ; and this victorine was of squirrel’s fur. The woman was con- 
victed, and, while awaiting execution, fully confessed her crime. 


V. Cause of Death in Wounds. 


§ 833. Wounds become the cause of death either by direct or indirect influ- 
ence. In the first case the tendency to death is necessary and immediate, or 
nearly so. In the second, the injury is the remote cause of death, other causes 
intervening by which the fatal result is accelerated or rendered inevitable. The 
mode in which a wound proves directly fatal is either by hemorrhage, shock, or 
great mechanical injury. . 

§ 834. Ist. Hemorrhage.—The rapidity of dissolution, when this is brought 
on by loss of blood, is proportionate to the amount and suddenness of the 
hemorrhage. These, in their turn, depend upon the size and nature of the ves- 
sel wounded. Thus a person may sustain the loss of an enormous quantity of 
blood, provided it ooze but slowly from the body; while a far smaller amount 
would produce fatal syncope, if rapidly poured out from some large vessel. 
Blood escapes also from a wounded vein more slowly than from a divided 
artery, and venous hemorrhage is therefore less likely to prove fatal than arte- 
rial, as well as because the blood which, is lost is not so essential to life. A 
third form of hemorrhage becomes, in some special cases, of serious import- 
ance. This is capillary hemorrhage, in which the blood effused upon the 
surface of the wound is extremely serous in its character, less dark than venous 
blood, and appears in the form of drops, which quickly run together and cover 
the wound. It occurs in persons of a hemorrhagic disposition upon the most 
trifling wound, and is exceedingly difficult and often impossible to control. In 
these persons a common epistaxis becomes a matter of grave importance, a 
scratch with a knife, the bite of a leech, or the extraction of a tooth, is fol- 
lowed by an oozing of blood which no hemostatics will arrest. This hemor- 
rhagic disposition sometimes is hereditary, and, according to the large number 
of observations now on record, is generally confined to the males in a family. 
Most of these cases have been collected by Dr. Beck.(/) 

Age and disease have also their influence upon the fatality of hemorrhage. 
Children readily succumb from a trifling loss of blood, and those whose consti- 
tution has been impaired by chronic disease, have, as might be expected, little 
power of recovering from hemorrhage. A number of small wounds may ogca- 
sionally lead to as grave results as a single large one. A singular case is 
related in which a dealer in leeches was set upon by highwaymen, who, after 
having plundered him of his money, thrust his head into the sack containing 
the leeches and bound him fast. The unfortunate man, a short time afterwards 
was discovered still alive, but notwithstanding medical aid was given him’ 


(f) Med. Jur. vol. ii. p. 595 et seq. Vid. also Schneider—Die Bliiter, erbliche Blu- 
tung oder so genannte Bluterkrankheit, &c. Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1847, H.i. The 
following additional cases may also be consulted: Dunlap, N. York Jour. (N. 8.) iv. 
314; Strong, Am. Jour. of Med. Sci., July, 1854, p. 80; Miller, Edinb. Jour., Jan. 1856, 
p- 638; Townsend, Boston Med. & Surg. Jour., Jan. 1857, p. 447; Huss, Archives 
Gen., Aug. 1857, p. 165 ; and Heymann, Virchow’s Archiv. xvi. 183. 


683 


§ 836] HEMORRHAGE.—SHOCK. [BOOK V. 


he perished in consequence of the loss of blood from the multitude of leech- 
bites. (ff) 

Where the hemorrhage is internal, besides the exhaustion attending it, 
death is accelerated by the mechanical action of the blood. Thus, if an inter- 
costal artery have been wounded, the blood being effused into the cavity of the 
chest, will compress the lungs and seriously embarrass respiration. In wounds 
of the pericardium the blood effused into this sac is most probably the imme- 
diate cause of death, owing to its interference with the functions of the heart. 
If the throat has been cut the blood may flow into the trachea and lungs, and 
thus cause death by asphyxia. But the mechanical effects of hemorrhage are 
best seen in those injuries of the head in which any of the cerebral vessels have 
been wounded. Here the fatal result of compression from a clot is evident in 
the apoplectic state induced by it, when perhaps the actual loss of blood hag 
been trifling. 

All of the above-mentioned circumstances must be taken into careful con- 
sideration, in the post-mortem inspection of persons who have died soon after 
receiving one or more wounds. Where death has resulted from hemorrhage 
alone, the fact is usually indicated by the pallor and waxy appearance of the 
skin, the absence of cadaveric blotches, and the paleness of the internal 
organs. Putrefaction occurs also later than usual. These appearances will 
be found more marked in those cases in which the hemorrhage has not been 
very rapid. : : 

§ 835. 2d. Shock.—The possibility of a person dying from the shock 
attendant upon an injury, which by itself appears to be unimportant, is attested 
by experience. Many theoretical explanations have been offered to account 
for this fact, a consideration of which would here be out of place. The shock 
from an injury may prove fatal in two cases.. Ist. When the blow leaves no 
trace behind it; and, 2d. Where great violence has been done to some import- 
ant organ without occasioning a sufficient amount of hemorrhage to produce 
death. If a person receive, for instance, a violent blow in the pit of the sto- 
mach, or behind the ear, he may be almost instantaneously deprived of life. 
On post-mortem examination, there may be found externally but slight marks 
of contusion, and internally neither laceration, fracture, nor hemorrhage by 
which the cause can be brought into any visible relation with the fatal result. 
“Mr. Lambert, a respectable individual in New York, received a blow on the 
stomach from some rioters, immediately after coming from a supper party. 
He died almost immediately. On dissection no mark of injury could be dis- 
covered, except some small red spots on the internal surface of the stomach, 
and there was no mark of external contusion. The brain was healthy. Dr. 
Post and other witnesses concurred in believing that the blow was the cause 
of death, and not sudden fright. The prisoners were convicted of manslaugh- 
ter.”(g) A similar-case is related by Sir Astley Cooper, and another by Mr. 
Wood.(h) | 

§ 836. 3d. Mechanical injury.—lf, again, some part of the body, espe- 


(ff) De Neufville. Henke’s Zeitschrift. Erg. H. 1851, p. 40. 
(g) Beck, Med. Jur. vol. ii. p. 337. (h) Med. Gaz. vol. xliv. p. 213. 


684 


BOOK V.] MECHANICAL INJURY. [$ 836 


cially any of the internal organs, have suffered any great mechanical injury, as 
from being crushed by a heavy weight or projectile, or by a fall from a height, 
there will very frequently be no external mark of violence and no internal 
hemorrhage sufficient to account for death. But the fatal result is no less evi- 
dently due to the powerful impression made upon the nervous system by the 
violent disruption or laceration thus produced. The following may serve as 
an example: An American Philhellene was struck by a cannon ball, in the 
batteries of Napoli di Romani, which carried off the right hand that had been 
resting on the haunch, a portion of the right half of the pelvis, and part of 
the thigh. The abdominal viscera were laid bare but not torn, and there 
was trifling hemorrhage from the wounds. He conversed calmly about the 
Greek wars, in which he had taken an active part, asked if a man could live 
who had lost the half of his body, and died suddenly three hours after being 
injured. (2) 

Under this head might perhaps be properly introduced instances of death 
from ill-treatment or from a large number of trifling wounds, unattended with 
any serious hemorrhage. Death in such cases takes place rather from the 
exhaustion and terror of the sufferer than from the momentary shock of the 
injury, but it may also be due to inflammation of internal organs following 
upon extensive injury to the skin. Examples of this mode of death have been 
known to ensue from severe flogging ordered by military authorities. (/) 
Such also is probably the immediate cause of death in many cases of extensive 
burns or scalds, where the function of a large portion of the skin is at once 
destroyed. (j7) 


(7) Navy Medical Reports, by Sir John Liddell, M. D., &c. Med. Times, April, 1854. 

(7) Vid. Lancet, 1846, for an account of the case at Hounslow. A case of epilepsy 
and one of congestion of the brain produced by this brutal punishment are recorded 
by Dr. Davidson, Med. Times and Gaz., Dec. 1853, p. 623. Quite recently, April, 
1860, a boy of fifteen died at Hasthourne, Eng., from the effects of blows upon his 
back and legs, inflicted by his tutor with a skipping-rope with wooden handles, and 
with a thick walking-stick. This punishment was resorted to as a means of conquer- 
ing the boy’s obstinate and perverse disposition and obliging him to learn. Ibid. 
May, 1860. It is evident that the boy was insane. 

(jj) A painfully interesting chapter on the cruelties and injuries inflicted upon chil- 
dren has been written by M. Tardieu. (Ann. d’Hyg. Avr. 1860, p. 361.) These are 
various in their character as the instruments which are employed ; cuffs, blows, kicks, 
stripes, and bruises from rods, cords, thongs, whips, clubs, forks, shovels, tongs, and 
every variety of instruments. Sometimes children are dragged, pinched, or have 
their flesh torn; they are deprived of all means of cleanliness, coarsely fed or starved, 
hid away in dungeons, closets, or boxes ; exposed to icy cold or tortured with hot coals, 
or iron, or corrosive liquids ; their limbs are mutilated, the ears and nose lacerated, 
or the hair torn out; or they are suffocated with food, or obliged to swallow the most 
disgusting and loathsome substances. 

The victims of these cruelties are generally very young. In seventeen out of thirty- 
two cases, they were under the age of five years, and in seven cases, from five to ten 
years old. In nearly all the instances the cruelties were inflicted by the parents; 
eleven times by both together, eight times by the mother and five times by the father 
only, four times by a stepmother, four times by a school-teacher, and once by a woman 
to whom the child was apprenticed. 

Their aspect is generally peculiar; they are pale and thin, and sometimes wasted 
almost to the bones, with a dull, downcast, saddened look, and a timid manner. The 
marks of their cruel treatment generally consist of bruises, wheals, and excoriations. 
The bruises are usually upon the face, limbs, and back, and are peculiar in not gene- 
rally occupying prominent parts, as they would do if produced by a fall. Their 
shape is often distinctive, and resembles that of the hand, nails, stick, shoe, &c., which 
inflicted them ; or they are red, oval, and ecchymosed from pinching ; present double 


685 


837 DISEASED CONDITION OF. BODY. BOOK V. 
¢ 


The causes now enumerated which render wounds directly fatal without the 
intervention of secondary causes, may be variously combined. Practically 
there are few fatal wounds in which they are not united. This fact should not 
be lost sight of by the medical witness in giving his opinion as to the imme- 
diate cause of death. 

§ 837. 4th. Diseased condition of body. —Sometimes a wound which, 
under ordinary circumstances, would not be immediately fatal, becomes so, in 
consequence of the existence of some abnormal or diseased condition of the 
body. The cases which fall under this remark are exceedingly numerous. An 
undue thinness of the skull, a displacement of the viscera, an abnormal distri- 
bution of the arterial trunks, an aneurism, a hernia, and many other similar 
defects may prove the occasion of a wound being rapidly fatal, which other- 
wise would not necessarily have been so. ‘Thus, if a person have an aneurism 
of the aorta in the chest or abdomen, and be struck with a certain degree of 
violence over these cavities, he may suddenly die from a rupture of the aneu- 
rismal sac caused by the blow. Or if he have at any time been subjected to the 
operation of trepanning, by which a portion of the skull is removed, which is 
not again reproduced, a blow or wound on this part will necessarily prove 
eminently dangerous.(Z) A constitutional disposition to hemorrhage upon 
slight causes has often brought on a fatal termination in. trifling wounds. (/) 
It is hardly necessary to state that old age, infirmity of any kind, or that even 


parallel and bruised lines when produced by blows with a ruler, or the stripes occa- 
sioned by a whip-lash, &c. The wounds are contused, lacerated, accompanied with 
fracture of bones, or are produced by fire or by corrosive agents; or certain marks, 
such as deep furrows in the skin, or a permanent stiffness of the limbs, or a deformity of 
the bones, indicate the use of cords, or the confinement of the body in a constrained 
osition. 

i In 18 of the 32 cases collected by M. Tardieu death was caused, either directly or 
indirectly by blows or prolonged ill usage, and it is to be observed that the former may 
be fatal by their direct shock to the nervous system. 

As illustrations of this painful subject, a brief notice of two cases contained in the 
paper above referred to may here be presented. 

A father and mother were condemned to hard labor for life upon conviction for 
having cruelly maltreated their daughter from the age of eight to that of seventeen 
years. She was incessantly whipped, knocked down, beaten with all manner of in- 
struments, and lashed upon the back with a cat-o’-nine-tails while hung up by the 
wrists. One night, while she was naked and firmly bound down, her father applied 
red-hot coals to her back and limbs, renewing them as fast as they ceased to burn; 
and on the following night, after she had been flogged with the cat, her mother applied 
a sponge soaked with nitric acid to the wounds. These abominable and unparalleled 
atrocities were several times repeated, with variations of intenser cruelty. The un- 
happy victim slept in a chest about six feet long by twenty inches high and twenty- 
four inches wide, upon a litter of stinking straw, with which, after her back had been 
made raw, they mingled nettles and brambles. In this she was confined by a lid 
secured by means of a padlock, and only raised enough to permit her to breathe. If 
it was possible to add anything to these cruelties, it was done by the father of the 
victim, who addressed her in filthy language, and attempted indecently to touch her 
person, and finally, after binding her firmly with her limbs asunder, he thrust a wooden 
plug into her genitals. It is remarkable that the girl attempted to explain all of the 
injuries found upon her person in such a manner as not to accuse her parents. 

The remaining case is, briefly, the following. The stepmother of a fine, robust boy, 
four years of age, suffocated him by forcing food into his throat. The mouth and 
throat were distended by a compact mass of doughy bread, large quantities of which 
were also found in the stomach and csophagus, and some portions of it even in the 
trachea. 

(k) Vid. Hinze, Hufeland’s Journal, 1819, p. 79. (1) Vid. Beck, ii. 295. 


686 


BOOK V.]| WOUNDS OF PREGNANT WOMEN. [§ 839 


a highly excitable condition of the nervous system, may rapidly accelerate the 
approach of death. 

It is also of importance to remember that owing to internal disease death 
may occur during a quarrel although no blow shall have been given. Two 
women were engaged in a violent altercation, when one was seen suddenly to fall 
down dead. On examination she was found to have died of congestion of the 
brain; yet, but for the witnesses of her mode of death, her adversary might 
have been suspected of dealing her a fatal blow. (J/) 

§ 838. 5th. Wounds inflicted on pregnant women.—Pregnancy obviously 
renders the prognosis of a wound more grave. The mere shock of the injury 
may bring on premature birth of the child, ‘and hence endanger the life of the 
mother. But wounds which involve the abdomen, and especially those in 
which violence is done to the uterus, are necessarily of extreme gravity for the 
woman and her child. The injury may result in the death of either or both. 
The amount.of external violence necessary to produce this result it is of course 
impossible to determine, since many instances are on record in which very 
severe injury has been inflicted under these circumstances without being fol- 
lowed by fatal results. On the other hand, contusion of the abdomen from 
kicks or similar violence, may produce death by shock or peritoneal inflamma- 
tion, and wounds of the impregnated womb are always attended with severe 
bleeding and the danger of a premature delivery. 

§ 839. 6th. Indirect complications.—A wound may prove ¢ndirectly fatal 
in a vast number of ways. We shall only enumerate the more common and 
important of these, as it is, we conceive, of more consequence that the prin- 
ciple of the remote dependence of death upon a wound, perhaps not necessa- 
rily mortal, should be understood, than that all the circumstances which may 
possibly intervene between the period at which the wound was given and that 
of the fatal result, should be enumerated. 

Should the person not die from the immediate effect of the wound, he may 
nevertheless succumb from some one of the chain of disturbing causes to 
which it has given rise, or from the wound itself, rendered fatal after a length 
of time, by extraneous causes. In many instances the fatal result can be 
traced to its origin in the wound, partly from the evidence derived from a 
post-mortem inspection, and partly from the history of the patient’s condition 
from the time he received his injury. The length of time that may elapse 
after the infliction of violence, before death follows it, is of course indetermi- 
“nate. 

Without the supervention of any of the complications to be presently enu- 
merated, the wound may have interested parts not essential to life, and yet 
may render its protraction for any considerable period impossible, since the 
changes produced by it in the organism may go on gradually increasing in their 
gravity till death result. Thus injuries to the spine, producing paralysis of the 
lower limbs and of the sphincter muscles of the bladder and rectum, or blows 
on the head, giving rise to chronic disease of the brain, will gradually under- 
mine the powers of life, and bring it to a deplorable end, after long confine- 


(il) Prager, Vierteljahrs. lxvi. 26. 
687 


§ 841] : TETANUS. | [BOOK V. 


ment, suffering, and distress. Such is often, also, the result of gunshot 
wounds, where the ball remains in the body, and the patient is wasted away by 
suppuration and hectic. 

The old division of wounds into those which are necessarily, and those 
which are conditionally mortal, gave rise to so many errors of prognostica- 
tion, that it has now much less authority than formerly. It will, of course, 
always be necessary to discriminate concerning the gravity of wounds, but it 
will never be possible to draw a line of distinction, which will be universally 
recognized, between the absolutely and the conditionally mortal. The truth 
of this statement will, we think, be fully borne out, when the multitude of 
circumstances is considered which may influence the result favorably or the 
reverse. 

§ 840. (3.) Tetanus.—Among the most frequent and serious complications 
of wounds, is tetanus, or lockjaw. This disorder occurs most frequently after 
punctured or lacerated wounds, especially such as interest the nerves or ten- 
dons. It is said to be occasionally epidemic, and to be of more frequent oc- 
currence in warm than in temperate climates. In fact, it may occur idiopathi- 
cally ; that is, without any wound having been received. The wound giving 
rise to it is often exceedingly unimportant. Thus, it has been caused by the 
sting of a bee, the stroke of a whip, or the irritation of a small splinter of 
bone. But it is “mostly connected with wounds of fibrous and ligamentous 
structures, accompanied with tearing, bruising, partial injury, and exposure of 
the nerves ; with wounds of the joints, of the face, neck, fingers, toes, and of 
the spermatic cord: it usually begins during the suppurative period, and even 
during or after the scarring of the wound, Foreign bodies in the wound, 
especially splinters of bone, ligatures of arteries, if a nerve be included in the 
ligature, are all to be considered as not unfrequent causes of tetanus. Like- 
wise, hot seasons of the year, cold, frequent change of the temperature, espe- 
cially in low districts and in the neighborhood of rivers, and the influence of 
a moist, cold, foul air upon nerves after their exposure by the separation of 
sloughs.”’(m) The time at which it may supervene after the injury, is not 
precisely known. Occasionally, it ensues upon recent wounds immediately, 
and in other cases does not occur for several days. Not unfrequently the 
wound is entirely healed before the attack. Brodie mentions the seven- 
teenth day as the latest period after the accident in which he had known 
tetanus to come on.(n) Sir James McGrigor notices a case twenty-two days 
after,(o) and Blane speaks of it as happening within a month.(p) It isa 
very serious complication of a wound, proving fatal in the majority of cases. 
Dr. O’Beirne states, that of two hundred cases which he saw, not a single one 
recovered.(q) Hennen says: ‘I have never been fortunate to cure a case of 
acute symptomatic tetanus: in some instances of the chronic species I have 
effected or witnessed a cure.”(7) 

§ 841. (4.) Lrysipelas.—This affection, which increases greatly the gravity: 


(m) Chelius’ Surgery, by South, Am. ed. vol. i. p. 417. 

(n) Lond. Med. Gaz. vol. ii. p. 344, (o) Med.-Chir. Trans. vol. vi. p. 453. 
(p) Diseases of Seamen. (q) Dub. Hosp. Rep. vol. iii. 

(7) South’s Chelius’ Surgery, vol. i. p. 419. 


688 


BOOK V.] SECONDARY HEMORRHAGE, [$ 844 


of wounds, is a frequent accompaniment of those which are lacerated and con- 
tused, and especially if seated upon the scalp. It spreads rapidly in the wards 
of hospitals under certain conditions of the atmosphere, which are not well 
understood ; and an important question will therefore arise as to the degree of 
responsibility of the person who inflicts the wound, when the injured man dies 
from an attack of erysipelas. This disease is, however, far less frequently 
fatal than traumatic tetanus. 

§ 842. (5.) Hospital gangrene.—Such is the name given to an ulcerative 
and gangrenous disorder which seizes upon the wounds of persons placed in 
close and crowded apartments. It is rarely seen except in military hospitals 
in.time of war, or in other situations where fresh air and cleanliness are want- 
ing. 

§ 843. (6.) Nervous delirium, secondary hemorrhage, and purulent re- 
sorption, may be mentioned as other causes rendering wounds fatal. All of 
these accidents may ensue upon surgical operations undertaken for the relief of 
the injured person, as well as be induced by the wound alone. Thus gangrene 
or erysipelas may attack the stump of an amputated limb, or the patient may 
die from secondary hemorrhage, or from any of the foregoing diseases notwith- 
standing the best care and foresight and most judicious treatment. 

§ 844. 7th. Surgical operations.—Death, indeed, sometimes takes place 
during or immediately after surgical operations undertaken for the relief of 
the wounded person. The question of responsibility in this case, belongs to 
the legal portion of the subject. It may not, however, be out of place to 
remark that the surgeon can seldom foresee, with confidence, the issue of capi- 
tal operations, for there are many individual peculiarities and causes beyond 
his control, which may make it unfavorable. The same may be said of any 
plan of treatment, whether it involves a serious operation or not. The ques- 
tion may arise, whether the surgical treatment employed was the best that 
could be devised, and whether, had some other course been pursued, a favorable 
result might not have been obtained. Or, it may be alleged that the treatment 
was so unskilful, or the patient so much neglected, as to be the occasion of 
the fatal termination of the injury. That these facts should be established 
beyond dispute, it ought to be shown that the treatment was marked by the 
omission of something universally recognized as of primary importance. But 
as every surgeon has some peculiarities in his practice, and as the mode of. 
treatment of bodily injuries, from the progressive nature of the medical art, 
is various, this omission should be looked for only in those points which betray 
an ignorance of the fundamental principles of surgery. However much the 
opinions of competent persons may differ respecting the choice of remedial 
means, they will generally, we think, be found united upon the principles 
which should govern their application. Still, occasionally, the plan of treat- 
ment may be so singular, although apparently founded upon correct notions 
of the curative process, as to call for reprobation. Thus, in a case which 
occurred in Saxony, a surgeon was deprived of the liberty of practising his 
profession in that country for having attempted to promote bony union be- 
tween the fragments of a fractured patella, by the novel expedient of firing a 
pistol between them. Although no permanent injury was done to the patient, 

44 689 


§ 846] RESPONSIBILITY OF THE SURGEON. [BOOK Y. 


who, indeed, a few months after the operation, declared that his leg was nearly 
as good as the other one, and that he was even able to dance and to walk long 
distances, yet the medical commission charged with the case very properly con- 
sidered the operation as likely to prove a dangerous precedent if it were not 
condemned. (s) 

§ 845. The difficulty is not so great where the original wound has been 
trifling, chiefly because its comparatively innocuous character can be clearly 
shown. Thus, for instance, if the hand have been wounded and one of the 
arteries divided, compression may be necessary to arrest the hemorrhage. But 
if a surgeon, with this view, should apply a bandage so firmly, or on the other 
hand, leave it on so long as to cause mortification of the part, and death ensue 
in consequence, it is evident that the treatment has not only been unskilful, 
but that it has really been the cause of death, since the wound of the hand was 
neither, in itself, mortal, nor would it have produced death in the manner 
described. But, in severe injuries, in which various complications arise and 
require the exercise of the greatest skill that learning and experience can give, 
it cannot be expected that some will not terminate fatally, which, perhaps, 
under more favorable circumstances, or a better plan of treatment, might have 
had a fortunate issue. The most humble surgeon may chance to receive the 
charge of an injury which calls for the enlightened tact and experience of a 
highly educated man ; if his treatment should not prove successful, he should 
be prepared to show, if required, that his patient had the best care which he was 
able to afford him, and, if possible, that he consulted with one or more col- 
leagues respecting the treatment. In the language of Judge Woodward, “The 
implied contract of a physician or surgeon is not to cure—to restore (e. 9.) a 
fractured limb to its natural perfectness, but to treat the case with diligence | 
and skill. * * * He deals not with insensate matter, like the stonemason 
or bricklayer, who can choose their materials and adjust them according to 
mathematical lines, but he has a suffering human being to treat, a nervous 
system to tranquillize, and a will to regulate and control.’’(¢) 

§ 846. The voluntary and persevering refusal of surgical assistance, when 
this holds out the only probable means of safety, may be enumerated among 
the causes which indirectly increase the fatality of wounds. Thus, if the am- 
putation of a limb, the tying of an artery, or the observance of a prescribed 
medical course, be resisted and refused by a patient, he may very often pay 
the penalty of his obstinacy or timidity with his life. Such instances are by 
no means rare among the ignorant, with whom often the most assiduous medi- 
cal attention has to contend against every obstacle to success. 


VI. Wounds of Various Parts of the Body. 


Ist. Injuries of the head, from their frequency and gravity, as well as from 
the various medico-legal questions they often give rise to, are deserving of par- 
ticular attention. 


(s) Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, 1852, Bd. 1, H. 1. 
(t) McCandless v. McWha, Error to Common Pleas of Beaver County. Am. Journ. 
Med. Sci. Jan. 1854, p. 273. 


690 


BOOK V.]| WOUNDS OF THE HEAD. [§ 848 


§ 847. (1.) Concussion of the brain.—This term is applied to those cases 
in which, either from direct or indirect violence to the head, the brain receives 
a shock which may prove fatal, without being revealed after death by any phy- 
sical alteration. Thus, a blow upon the head, or a fall from a height upon 
the feet, knees or buttocks, may, without producing any serious external lesion, 
be the cause of death by a commotion or concussion of the brain. Cases are 
also related, in which a blow, familiarly designated as a “‘box on the ear,’’ has 
resulted fatally in this manner. In Hennen’s Military Surgery, a curious 
example of concussion of the brain is quoted from an old German author, in 
which a cannon ball took away the queue from the nape of a soldier’s neck, 
without injuring the integuments in any sensible degree. He continued in a 
complete state of stupor for many days, during which he was bled at least 
twenty times.(w) Sometimes, indeed, the immediate cause of death is found in 
a laceration of the brain, a rupture of a bloodvessel in the brain, causing a 
compression of this organ by extravasation of blood, or, again, inflammation 
is set up with a like fatal result. Such accidents are thus conjoined occasion- 
ally with concussion. | 

The question has sometimes arisen as to the distinction between the symp- 
toms presented by a person laboring under concussion of the brain, and one in 
a state of ¢ntoxication. Very often they are coincident in the same individual. 
Symptoms of slight concussion are, however, so similar to those produced by 
intoxication, that it is sometimes difficult to know which cause they should be 
attributed to. There are indeed few peculiarities by which a physician could, 
better than an unprofessional person, recognize the difference, and, practically, 
the history of the case and the odor of liquor upon the breath will be the only 
sources upon which a judgment can be founded. Mr. South says, “It is often 
very difficult to distinguish between drunkenness and either concussion or com- 
pression ; especial care should therefore always be taken to ascertain, as far as 
possible, the condition of the patient previous to the accident, lest he should 
be lost by too slight consideration of his symptoms.’’(v) 

Injuries of the head may prove fatal, whether they involve immediately the 
contents of the skull or not. Among the most serious of the external wounds 
are those affecting the tendinous aponeurosis of the occipito-frontalis muscle 
and the pericranium. Erysipelas is very apt to follow these injuries. Inflam- 
mation of these parts is, moreover, readily propagated to the membranes of 
the brain, and especially after contused wounds. The prognosis must. there- 
fore be always reserved, since wounds of these parts, in appearance trifling, 
may result fatally. 

§ 848. (2.) Fractures of the skull vary in their danger according to their 
situation, their extent and the amount of depression. Fractures of the base 
of the skull are the most dangerous, both from the fact that they are not within 
the reach of surgical. interference, and also because the effusion of blood result- 
ing often from the laceration of the lateral sinuses, exercises a compression 
upon that portion of the encephalon, most intimately connected with the 
functions of both organic and animal life. These fractures are often not 


(u) Hennen’s Surgery, p. 318. 
(v) Chelius’ System of Surgery, vol. i. p. 451. 


691 


§ 848] WOUNDS OF THE BRAIN. [BOOK V. 


recognized during life, in consequence of their position; and it should not 
be forgotten that the portion of the skull which is broken does not always 
correspond in situation with the part where the blow was received, but may 
indeed be produced by counter-stroke, at a point directly opposite to it. The 
cranium is composed of two tables of bone, between which is a vasculo-cellular 
substance, called the diplée. The external table alone may be fractured, and 
although no compression be thereby exercised upon the brain, yet from the 
intimate vascular connection between the diplée and the dura mater, the inflam- 
mation resulting may be communicated from it to the latter. Or necrosis may 
follow the contusion, resulting fatally ata later period. The inner table, which 
from its great brittleness is called witreous, may be fractured without fracture 
of the outer one, and by compression of the brain by fragments of bone, effused 
blood, or by subsequent disorganization from necrosis, a fatal result ensue. 
M. Bayard relates several cases of this kind. In one, a man received a blow 
from the fist upon the forehead; no mark was left, but he became dizzy and 
fell to the ground. He suffered afterwards from headache, nausea, and vomit- 
ing, and on the twenty-sixth day, became paralyzed and died in convulsions. 
The inner table of the skull, under the right eyebrow, was found to be necrosed. 
Both hemispheres of the brain were covered with a purulent exudation, and 
the ventricles were filled with the same.(w) When, however, as it is generally 
the case, the whole thickness of the bone is broken, the danger is proportion- 
ably increased, and although the injury is, by no means, necessarily fatal, yet 
if the bone press upon the brain, and there be an extravasation of blood over 
the membranes or into its substance, death is the common result, unless the 
bone be elevated by surgical aid, and the compression removed: The cases in 
which it is proper to trepan, and the appropriate place for the application of 
the instrument, are fully discussed in surgical works. Questions arising out 
of the neglect of trepanning or its alleged unnecessary employment, have a 
bearing not unfrequently in charges of mal-practice, as well as in homicide.(x) 
Any abstract of surgical opinion on this subject must necessarily be extremely 


(w) Ann. d’Hyg. vol. xxxv. 

(x) Such questions are often difficult of decision, as may be learned from the fol- 
lowing case, which is discussed at length in Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1860, Bd. 79, s. 177. 
In Dresden, on the 21st June, 1856, a jealous husband inflicted repeated blows upon 
his wife’s head with a hatchet, and left her for dead. The scalp was badly lacerated 
and the parietal bone was fractured and depressed. The woman’s consciousness was, 
however, only momentarily suspended, and she was soon able to arise from the ground 
and enter the litter in which she was carried to the hospital. Here she improved rapidly, 
and on the 2d and 3d of July was able to make a full and clear deposition of all the 
circumstances of the assault. On the 4th of the month, however, she suddenly became 
worse, and died on the 5th. ‘On examination, one of the fractures seated in the parietal 
bone was found to be depressed and to project a quarter of an inch upon the inner sur- 
face of the skull. The membranes of the brain were uninjured, but underneath them 
the brain itself was softened, and pus was found covering the whole hemisphere. The 
medical gentlemen commissioned as experts to examine the case reported that the 
original violence was really the cause of death, but not necessarily so, because a timely 
use of the trephine might have prevented the disorganization which proved fatal. It 
was objected to this criticism that it was a mere matter of opinion extraneous to the 
proper functions of medical experts, and so the court held, declaring that the only 
question for decision was whether the blows inflicted by the prisoner were or were not 
the cause of death. He was convicted, and sentenced to death, and the sentence was 
confirmed by the court of appeal, but it was afterwards commuted by the king to 
imprisonment for life. 


692 


BOOK V.] WOUNDS OF THE BRAIN. [$ 849 


imperfect. The standard surgical authorities should be consulted in every 
case. Simple fissures of the skull, or separation of the natural sutures, are 
not without their gravity, for though seldom rapidly fatal, they often give rise 
to a slow effusion of blood, which having no external issue, extends over the 
surface of the brain and sinks between its lobes, thus causing a fatal com- 
pression of the organ. 

§ 849. (38.) Wounds of the substance of the brain are not in themselves 
necessarily fatal. Many instances are recorded in which a portion of the brain 
has been lost, others in which it has been traversed by a bullet,(y) and others, 
again, in which a foreign body has remained in it for a considerable time, and 
the person has yet escaped with his life. 

A man fired a gun, which burst and inflicted a large wound with fracture 
of the skull in the middle of the forehead. Consciousness and the senses were 
unimpaired, and no pain was felt. After the discharge of several fragments 
of bone and a small piece of iron, the wound healed. A month or six weeks 
later the man was sent to jail and put to hard labor, at which he continued for 
three weeks, when he complained of headache, and died rather suddenly at the 
end of a week. There was an abscess of the right anterior lobe of the brain, 
and between the dura mater and the right orbitar plate of the frontal bone 
was a piece of iron which weighed an ounce and a half.(z) In another case, 
a man had a knife-blade penetrating the brain to the depth of two inches 
without pain or characteristic symptoms, for twenty-four hours after he received 
the wound. He then became comatose, and so died. (a) 

The following extraordinary case of recovery from the passage of an iron 
bar through the head, reported by Dr. Bigelow, Professor of Surgery in Har- 
vard University, will illustrate the violence which the brain is capable of 
enduring. Phineas P. Gage was occupied in charging with powder a hole 
drilled in the rock, for the purpose of blasting. His assistant having neglected 
to cover the powder, as is usual, with sand, Mr. Gage, who was not aware of 
the omission, dropped the head of the iron upon the charge, to consolidate or 
“tamp it in.” The iron struck fire upon the rock, and the charge exploded. 
The bar of iron was projected directly upwards in the line of its axis, passing 
directly through his head and high into the air. It was picked up at some 
distance, smeared with brains and blood. ‘From this extraordinary lesion, 
the patient has quite recovered in his faculties of body and mind, with the loss 
only of the sight of the injured eye.” The weight of the iron bar was thir- 
teen and a quarter pounds, its length three feet seven inches, and its diameter 
one and a quarter inches. The end which entered first was pointed, the taper 
being seven inches long, and the diameter of the point one quarter of an inch. 
The track taken by the bar was the following, as ascertained by an experiment 
upon an ordinary skull—the entering hole was under the zygomatic arch, 
encroaching equally upon its walls. ‘In the orbit, the sphenoid bone, part 
of the superior maxillary below, and a large part of the frontal above, are cut 
away, and, with these fragments, much of the spheno-maxillary fissure ; 
leaving, however, the optic foramen intact about a quarter of an inch to the 


(y) Med. Facts and Obs. vi. 91. (z) Lancet, Sept. 1858, p. 307. 
(a) Charleston Med. Journ. xv. 256. 
693 


§ 850] WOUNDS OF THE BRAIN, [BOOK V. 


inside of the track of the bar.”’? The base of the skull upon the inside of the 
cranium presents a cylindrical hole of an inch and a quarter in diameter, and 
the calvarium is traversed by a hole, two-thirds of which is upon the left, and 
one-third upon the right of the median line, its posterior border being quite 
near the coronal suture. ‘‘It is obvious that a considerable portion of the 
brain must have been carried away; that, while a portion of its lateral sub- 
stance may have remained intact, the whole central part of the left anterior 
lobe of the front of the sphenoidal or middle lobe must have been lacerated and 
destroyed. This loss of substance would also lay open the anterior extremity 
of the left lateral ventricle, and the iron, in emerging from above, must have 
largely impinged upon the right cerebral lobe, lacerating the falx and the 
longitudinal sinus.” 

Immediately after the injury the patient was slightly convulsed, but spoke 
in a few minutes. He was carried to an ox-cart which stood at a short dis- 
tance, and rode in it, sitting erect full three-quarters of a mile. He got out of 

the cart himself, and, with a little assistance, walked up a long flight of stairs, 
into the hall, where he was dressed. He retained his senses and memory per- 
fectly, and gave an intelligent and connected account of the accident.(b) Many 
other instances of surprising recoveries after wounds of the brain might be 
related, but the preceding case gives, we think, ample proof that, even in very 
extensive injuries of the cerebrum, with fracture, hemorrhage, and loss of sub- 
stance, death is not the necessary termination. 

§ 850. Wounds of the central portion and of the base of the brain are more 
uniformly and speedily fatal than those of the hemispheres. Wounds of the 
cerebellum are said to be constantly mortal. In whatever portion of the brain, 
however, the injury may be seated, or whether the organ be merely compressed 
by effused blood, the important fact is still applicable, that the individual may 
recover, apparently, from the immediate shock or consequence of the injury, 
and die unexpectedly from it afterwards. Thus a person has received a blow 
upon the head, causing extravasation of blood, and has been able to continue 
on his way apparently not much injured; he dies, nevertheless, a few hours 
afterwards, with symptoms of compression of the brain. The Prince of N 
was thrown from his horse, but felt himself quite well, and mounted his horse 
again a few hours afterwards. Before, however, he had proceeded far, he dis- 
mounted, complained of nausea, was seized with convulsions, and died coma- 
tose. No fracture was discovered, but under the dura mater, on the great falx 
and in the base of the cranium, there was found a considerable extravasation 
of blood.(c) In the Lancet for October, 1843, is related the case of a man 
who walked nearly a quarter of a mile after having been kicked on the head 
by a horse. Two or three fractures were found at the base of the skull. 
Months or even years occasionally elapse before the injury terminates fatally. 
A sailor received a blow upon the head, from which he soon recovered, and 
suffered no ill consequences, with the exception of a discharge from the ear. 
After a time, however, he suffered violent pain in the head, and had fever and 
convulsions. He was trepanned, and issue given to a large quantity of pus, 


(b) Am. Jour. of Med. Sci. July, 1850. (c) Langenbeck. 
694 


BOOK V. | WOUNDS OF THE FACE. [$ 852 


with temporary relief. He died one year after the injury. The dura mater 
was covered with a purulent exudation, which extended also into the spinal 
canal.(d@) The great orator and statesman, Daniel Webster, was thrown from 
his wagon May 6, 1852, and for a few minutes was insensible. On the 24th 
of the same month he delivered a speech to the people, nor then nor subse- 
quently, up to the time of his death, was any mental disorder to be observed. 
He died on the 24th of October following, and on examination his brain was 
found covered with a thick layer of fibrin extending over both hemispheres, 
and which must have been the remains of an effusion of blood occurring at the 
time of the fall.(e) Where bullets have penetrated and remained in the brain, 
they often give rise gradually to fatal disorganization. Morand relates the 
case of a soldier who was wounded at the battle of Parma, in 1784. He re- 
turned on foot to Paris, and died nine and a half months after his wound. 
The ball was found between the bone and the dura mater. One-half of the 
cerebrum was destroyed by suppuration. Reich found in a soldier who had 
received a gunshot wound at the battle of Leipzic, and died eleven months 
afterwards, a portion of the brain in a gangrenous condition, and the ball 
adherent to the tentorium. He had suffered only from headaches and occa- 
sional epileptiform attacks.( /) 

§ 851 The physician may be required to determine whether an extravasation 
of blood in or upon the brain is the effect of violence or disease, and if being 
due to the former, it has not been favored by the excitement of passion. Ex- 
travasation of blood, ensuing upon violence to the head, is perhaps most 
generally found over the dura mater, or upon the surface of the brain; that 
which arises from disease, in the substance of the brain or in the ventricles. 
Apoplexy is comparatively rare in the young and healthy, and it is hardly pro- 
bable that in such persons a diseased condition of the vessels would be found 
occasioning the effusion. If, however, the blow has been inflicted upon an old 
person, and the extravasation is found in the cerebral hemispheres, there may 
perhaps remain a doubt whether a predisposition to the effusion did not already 
exist, and was awakened by the violence inflicted. If, however, it can be 
shown that the blow was sufficiently violent to produce this result, there can 
be no doubt, medically speaking, that it was the cause of it. Passion has, 
moreover, by the excitement of the circulation, a direct influence in causing an 
already weakened vessel to give way, and when a blow comes opportunely in, 
it would certainly perplex the most learned casuist to say which of the three 
causes of death was the effective one. The legal responsibility will be else- 
where set forth. 

§ 852. (4.) Wounds of the face cannot in general be considered as danger- 
ous to life. They are often followed by serious deformity and tedious sickness. 
The parts about the eye and this organ itself form the seat of more dan- 
gerous wounds. Blindness, without any apparent external alteration in the 
eye, has been produced by blows dividing or injuring the supra or infra-orbitar 


(d) Denmark, Medico-Chir. Trans. vol. v. 1814. 
(e) Jeffries, Am. Journ. of Med. Sci. Jan. 1853, p. 110. 
(f) Henke’s Lehrbuch, 19te. Auff. p. 246. 


695 


§ 853] WOUNDS OF THE NECK, [BOOK V. 


nerve.(b) Severe neuralgia may be produced by the same cause. Penetrat- 
ing wounds of the orbit, it is evident, may reach the brain and cause fatal 
injury, and many instances of this form of injury are on record. Even where 
the orbitar plate of the frontal bone has not-been broken, serious consequences 
may ensue from the spreading of inflammation from the eye and its append- 
ages to the membranes of the brain. In comminuted fractures of the nose 
from external violence, the blow may have been so severe as to injure the eth- 
moid bone, in which case, the brain may readily become involved. 

§ 853. 2d. Wounds of the neck.—In this region there are numerous struc- 
tures and organs, the wounding of some of which is generally attended with 
fatal results. The neck being traversed by important bloodvessels and nerves, 
by the esophagus, larynx, and spinal marrow, injuries which involve any of 
these parts, must be looked upon, in general, as serious. Hemorrhage resulting 
from the division of any of the large arterial trunks, as the carotid, lingual, or 
vertebral, is most rapidly fatal, and life is usually extinct before the requisite 
surgical aid can be rendered. The loss of blood from the internal jugular 
veins is equally fatal with that from the arteries, and in addition, the entrance 
of air into these vessels is considered to be frequently the cause of instantane- 
ous death. <A division of the principal nerves of this region or of the cesoph- 
agus, is usually accompanied with a destruction of other parts more essential 
to life, hence it is but seldom, as, for example, in punctured wounds of the 
throat, that the dangers from such injuries need be separately estimated. 

Incised wounds of the larynx and trachea are not in themselves directly fatal, 
and more or less perfect recoveries are often made from them. But they may 
become fatal through the effusion of blood into the air-passages, or by subse- 
quent inflammation. While in wounds of the carotids and jugulars death is 
often immediate, the fatal result in those wounds of the neck which do not 
implicate the bloodvessels is seldom so rapid. There are also many cases 
of wounds of the neck which may terminate fatally, although none of the 
above-named parts are wounded. Such are those in which the cellular tissue 
becomes inflamed, in consequence of which abundant and exhausting suppura- 
tion takes place. / 

A case is related by Dr. Simeons, in which an old woman was struck on the 
neck with a pewter soup-ladle; she died in a few hours afterwards, asphyx- 
iated. Upon examination after death, blood was found extravasated under 
the muscles of the neck, and into the anterior mediastinum from a rupture of 
the external jugular vein. The cricoid cartilage, and some of the rings of the 
trachea were broken, by which injury the size of the respiratory tube was 
necessarily much diminished.(c) The skin was not broken. 

A division of the esophagus is not only in itself almost always fatal, if . 
complete, but because also, being situated behind the trachea, it can hardly be 


(b) Hippocrates was aware of this fact. Hesays: “‘ Visus obscuratur in vulneribus 
supercilii et paulo altius, prout autem vulnus recentius est, plus vident, cicatrice vero 
diutius persistente plus excecantur.” Anfangsgr. der Wundarzneik ii. § 320. In a 
case where the amaurosis resulted both from concussion and from laceration of the 
eyebrow with a cricket-ball, the loss of sight was temporary, vision being gradually 
restored under the use of mercury. Med. Times & Gaz. Sept. 4, 1852. 

(c) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1848, H. i. 


696 


BOOK V.] WOUNDS OF THE SPINE. [$ 854 


incised without the important bloodvessels of the neck being injured. A case 
of recovery from a wound dividing the larynx and cesophagus to the posterior 
wall of the latter is given by Dieffenbach, and an example of complete restora- 
tion to health after an entire division of both of these passages with a pruning- 
knife is related by Boey.(d) 

Dr. Ryan related to the Medical Society of London a case of suicide, in 
which, after several ineffectual attempts to divide the thyroid cartilage, a 
man had succeeded in inflicting upon himself a wound five inches in length, 
between this cartilage and the os hyoides, dividing completely the~pharynx to 
the vertebree. The fourth vertebra was roughened by a cut, and there was 
another cut in the intervertebral cartilage. Some branches of the carotid 
arteries were divided, but neither these vessels, the jugular veins, nor the 
sterno-mastoid muscles were injured. (e) 

As Dr. Ryan properly remarks, ‘‘a person wonders at the possibility of a 
wound of this sort without cutting the larger vessels; and had the occurrence 
taken place in a lonely dwelling, where no third party was present, it might 
become a serious question, particularly under unhappy domestic discussions, 
whether the wound was self-inflicted, as its extent, the two incisions on the 
thyroid cartilage, the two on the vertebra, and that on the intervertebral car- 
tilage would argue a determination of purpose and strength of wrist which 
fall to the lot of few.” 

§ 854. 3d. Wounds and injuries of the spine.-—The danger to life in wounds 
that interest the spinal marrow is exceedingly great ; indeed, they are almost 
uniformly fatal, either immediately or indirectly. These injuries are, however, 
more rare than those of other parts of the body, and are often the result of 
casualty, such as a fall from a height, or being crushed under a heavy weight. 
In many cases of death from falls upon the seat, the spinal marrow will not 
exhibit any material lesion. In such cases it is supposed to have suffered con- 
cussion, by which some elementary change in its structure has been produced 
inconsistent with the maintenance of life. In concussion of the spine, death 
may be almost immediate, but usually it approaches gradually. 

Any substance compressing the spinal marrow will interfere with or arrest 
its functions below the point of pressure. Hence the height at which the 
injury has been inflicted has an important bearing upon its gravity. If the 
compression be above the origin of the pneumo-gastric nerves, death is imme- 
diate, owing to the sudden suspension of respiration. Below this point a 
wound or injury is not inconsistent with the maintenance of life for a con- 
siderable period. A division of the spinal marrow at any part interrupts, of 
course, if complete, the functions of the part below it more effectually than 
compression. Dr. Staub gives an instance of immediate death from a wound 
of the spine by a knife, between the atlas and epistropheus; the spinal marrow 
was divided almost completely in the middle, between the corpora olivaria.(/) 

Another rare instance of injury of the spine by criminal violence is 
related by Dr. Simeons, of Mayence. A robust young man, twenty-six years 


(d) Reference to both of these cases may be found in Henke’s Lehrbuch, p. 254. 
(¢) Lancet, Am. ed. 1852, p. 218. (f) Henke, Zeitsch. Bd. xxxv. 8. 406. 


697 


§ 854] WOUNDS OF THE SPINE. [BOOK V. 


of age, quarrelled with three others, who fell upon him, threw him on the 
ground, and after having kicked and dragged him for some time, finally left 
him helpless. He was soon found, and carried into a neighboring house. He 
survived two days, completely paralyzed, but retaining his consciousness. The 
fifth cervical vertebra was found to be completely separated from the sixth, all 
the ligaments being torn; the whole of the spinal canal was filled with partly 
coagulated blood, and the muscles in the vicinity of the injury much infiltrated. 
No other injury of importance was detected. (q) 

‘“‘A bone-setter, named Richard, famous in the neighborhood of Napoléon 
Vendée, but still more famous by having been: fined five francs, which made 
him a martyr, and increased his practice fivefold, was consulted on June 4th, 
1853, by a farmer of the commune of St. Denis, named Lachavasse, who 
complained, after a heavy fall, of violent pain in the neck. The bone-setter, 
meeting him, made him enter a neighboring cottage, and said that he would 
soon put his neck right. With both hands he seized the patient’s head, and 
by a rapid motion from left to right he three times turned the head over the 
shoulder. At the third time a crack was heard, and the bone-setter exultingly 
exclaimed, ‘It is done; the neck is reduced.’ But at this very instant the 
patient was seized with paralysis of the arms and legs; his speech became 
very difficult; he complained of violent pain, and died the next day, firmly 
convinced of the skill of the operator, and asserting to the last that his neck 
was properly set. Examination of the body showed an effusion of blood at 
the level of the second and third vertebre, the ligaments between which were 
stretched and torn; there was another effusion between the cerebellum and the 
base of the skull, evidently arising from lesion of the cord and its mem- 
branes.’’(h) 

In cases where the vertebre are fractured, the injury done to the spinal 
marrow may be due to the constriction it undergoes from pressure, its irrita- 
tion by a spicula of bone, or to the effusion of blood upon it. To whichever 
cause it may be attributed, the ultimate effect is, in the majority of cases, fatal. 
It is not unimportant to observe that sudden death may take place from the 
spontaneous Iuxation of the second cervical vertebra; the odontoid. process, 
which maintains it in its place, being liable to caries and consequent sudden 
fracture. This circumstance, as well as the existence of caries of the spine in 
any other and more usual position, may, in some cases of death after ill usage, 
explain the facility with which death has come on. Hence it is of great mo- 
ment that, in case of death from supposed injury to the spine, the absence of 
this disease should be carefully ascertained. Sir Astley Cooper mentions the 
case of a woman in the venereal wards of St. Thomas’s Hospital, who, while 
sitting in bed, eating her dinner, was observed to fall suddenly forward. The 
patients, on hastening to her assistance, found that she was dead. At the 
autopsy it was ascertained that the dentiform process was broken off, and the 
head, in falling forwards, had forced the root of the process back upon the 
spinal marrow, which occasioned her instant death.(¢) 


(g) Ibid. Bd. lvi. H. 3, p. 131. (h) Rév. Thérap. du Midi. 
(7) Dislocations and Fractures of the Joints, p. 463. 


698 


BOOK V.]| WOUNDS OF THE CHEST. [$ 856 


Another case of extensive disease of the cervical vertebra, with death from 
fracture of the odontoid process, is admirably reported by Dr. Buckminster 
Brown, of Boston.(j) 

§ 855. 4th. Wounds of the chest.—Wounds which do not penetrate the 
cavity of the chest, or which are not accompanied with very great violence, 
offer but little gravity. In the latter case, however, one or more of the ribs or 
the sternum may be fractured, a complication which at once enhances the im- 
portance of the injury. The same force which has produced the fracture may 
also cause serious disturbance of the subjacent organs and their rupture. The 
broken ends of the bones frequently also cause hemorrhage, a disorganization 
of the lungs, or wound of the heart. The danger of penetrating wounds of 
this cavity cannot, of course, be too highly estimated, although it is, perhaps, 
less than in similar wounds in the abdomen. From the great vascularity of 
the organs contained in the chest, and from the fact of their functions being 
the aération and the propulsion of the blood, the immediate danger of any 
injury to them lies in the sudden and abundant arterial hemorrhage, by which 
the heart and the system generally are deprived of their necessary vital stimu- 
lus, and the natural play of the apparatus of respiration and circulation is 
mechanically obstructed. The hemorrhage in wounds of the chest is almost 
entirely internal. 

§ 856. 5th. Wounds of the lungs cannot receive any detailed consideration. 
The chief point of interest in this connection is the fact that they may not 
prove fatal until a considerable period after their infliction. This is especially 
the case with gunshot wounds of these organs, in which, if the larger vessels 
have escaped laceration, the foreign substances introduced into the wound may 
continue for many months and years to be a constant source of distress, and 
-be the source of an ultimately fatal disease. 

A question may sometimes arise as to the ability for motion after severe 
wounds of the chest. No general rules can be laid down upon this point, 
but in illustration of the possibility of locomotion after severe injuries to the 
chest, and the fortunate issue of some which are of apparently the most formida- 
ble character, we adduce the following case, reported by Mr. Gallway, Surgeon 
in the Royal Artillery.(Z) 

‘‘ A gunner and driver of the royal artillery had made a murderous attack 
upon his sergeant with a bayonet, whereby he inflicted two wounds, happily 
superficial only, upon one leg and arm. Foiled in his efforts of greater suc- 
cess by the seasonable arrival of some other soldiers, the culprit rushed through 
the barrack-square to escape his pursuers, when the sentry on duty at the gate 
interposed himself with his carbine, in the attitude of ‘charge bayonets’ to 
obstruct him. The consequences of this movement to the other were that as 
he was rushing through a narrow passage with an impetus which he could not 
at the time control, he threw himself (not premeditately, it will be under- 
stood), with great force upon the bayonet of the sentry, which entered his body 
an inch to the left of the ensiform cartilage, and passing through the abdomen, 
emerged by its point on the left of, and close to the spinal column, some inches 


(7) Am. Journ. of Med. Sci. Jan. 1853. 
(k) Med. Times and Gaz. May 6, 1854. 
699 


§ 856] CASES, [BOOK V. 


lower down. When I reached the scene of action, within two minutes after, I 
found the subject of this wound sitting upon a form in the guard-room, as 
insensible to any effects from the injury as he was unconcerned at his crime. 
IT could not, therefore, at first believe the statement of his comrades, who told 
me what had happened, although the bayonet was handed to me bent by the 
‘violence to which it had been exposed; but on stripping the wounded man, I 
discovered the two openings of entrance and exit of the bayonet, correspond- 
ing, in form and diameter to those which the different parts of the weapon 
would have occasioned. Added to this, the bayonet was withdrawn from his 
body by a non-commissioned officer, upon whose testimony I could rely; and 
what is more, this withdrawal was witnessed by a crowd of other soldiers 
around. Now this desperate character marched, in a quarter of an hour after- 
wards, to the hospital, three-quarters of a mile distant; and at the end of a 
fortnight was discharged from the same, to be placed upon trial for his life. 
The day after his admission his urine was a little bloody; and subsequently 
there was a general anesthesia of the walls of the thorax and abdomen, which 
lasted but for awhile. With these exceptions, the injury was not followed by 
a symptom, nor did the subject of it require a dose of medicine for his reco- 
very. To the circumstances of this affray having been enacted before dinner, 
IT am disposed to attribute much of the immunity from evil which this ruffian 
enjoyed. Had the stomach been full, it is not easy to conceive that a bayonet. 
could have travelled through such a track of vital organs, without endanger- 
ing one or more. The reader may be interested to know that the life of this 
soldier was spared, transportation for the rest of his days being the sentence 
of his court-martial.” 

One of the most extraordinary instances of recovery from a wound travers- 
ing the whole thorax, is related in the Abeille Médicale, 15 Jan. 1855, from 
the Journ. de Méd. de Bordeaux. A young soldier fell from a cherry-tree 
upon an upright stake, such as is used in the vineyards. It entered the left 
side between the seventh and eighth ribs, and the pointed extremity projected 
on the other side between the fourth and fifth ribs, at the posterior part of the 
axilla, and to the length of a foot anda half. The young man retained his 
consciousness and intelligence, did not appear to suffer much, and after one 
end of the stick had been sawn off, was conveyed to the hospital. There the 
stake was extracted without difficulty, and it was found that it had carried 
part of the shirt with it. A few bleedings, and an antiphlogistic treatment 
sufficed to remove some inflammatory symptoms which arose, and in three 
weeks the patient was entirely convalescent. 

In 1831, a sailor named John Toylor, aged twenty, was guiding the iron 
pivot of the trysail mast into the main boom, when the tackle broke, and the 
mast, which was thirty-nine feet long, and weighed 600 Ibs. descended upon 
hin, tearing off half his scalp, knocking him down, piercing his chest obliquely, 
and fixing him to the deck. While thus transfixed he felt no pain. He re- | 
covered entirely, returned to his duties as a sailor, and for twenty-seven years 
enjoyed, without interruption, the most excellent health.(/%) 


(kk) Lancet, Jan. 1859, p. 45. 
700 


BOOK V.]| WOUNDS OF THE HEART. [$ 857 


§ 857. 6th. Wounds of the heart.—When the cavities of the heart have 
been opened death is generally the immediate, as it always is, sooner or later, 
the certain result. When the cavities of the heart have not been penetrated 
but their walls alone injured, the danger is still very great, not so much from 
the loss of blood as from its compression of the organ and the subsequent 
inflammation. This is particularly to be dreaded when the coronary arteries 
have been wounded. No case has yet been recorded in which a person has 
recovered from a wound penetrating the cavities of the heart. One of the 
most singular instances of apparent recovery from a gunshot wound of the 
heart (if it can be properly so called), is contained in the ‘‘ Notes of Observa- 
tions at the Field Hospital of Rangoon.” Here a soldier survived his wound 
two and a half months, emaciating, however, rapidly, although he was able to 
walk about. On dissection, the course taken by the ball was traced through 
the pleura and lung, by a cartilaginous canal of condensed tissue, to the root 
of the lung, where all trace of it was lost. On opening the pericardium, how- 
ever, a hard body was felt in the apex of the heart, which, when the cavity 
was laid open, proved to be a musket ball lying at the apex of the left ven- 
tricle, partly covered by a thin coating of white lymph. There was no injury 
to the heart nor evidence of diseased action. The heart was preserved in 
spirits and sent to Calcutta. The only manner in which the ball could have 
found its way to the situation in which it was found, must have been through 
one of the pulmonary veins, as there was no trace of its passage through the 
substance of the heart. A case which would seem to confirm this idea is 
mentioned in Schmidt’s Jahrbuch, vol. xxii. p. 328. A man was struck in 
the back by a bullet which entered his thorax, and caused his death in twenty 
minutes. On dissection it was found that the ball had entered over the sixth 
rib behind, grazed the lung, and wounded the pulmonary artery. But it could 
not at first be discovered. It was soon found, however, in the right ventricle 
of the heart, where it had fallen by its own weight after penetrating the pul- 
monary artery.(/) 

The period at which wounds of the heart prove fatal, varies in different 
eases. The reason of this variation is found not only in the extent and loca- 
lity of the wound, but in the fact that the point of the weapon or the bullet 
may have remained in the walls of the heart, and thus the sudden loss of blood 


(1) An instance of long survivance after an injury of the heart of an extraordinary 
character may be found in the Transactions of the Provincial Med. and Surg. Associa- 
tion, vol. ii. p. 357: A boy ten years old, in discharging a wooden gun, was wounded 
in the thorax by a plug of wood about three inches long, which he had used to form 
the breech of this apparatus. It could not be found. He walked about for a fortnight 
and said he was well, but finally wasted away and died in five weeks and two days 
after the accident. On dissection the stick was found in the right ventricle, forcing 
itself between the columne carnei and the internal surface of the heart, and incrusted 
with a thick coagulum. No wound could be discovered in the heart or pericardium. 
Hence it is supposed that the stick first entered the lung, and afterwards passed into 
the vena cava and thence was carried by the stream of blood first into the right auri- 
cle, and then into the right ventricle. 

A man, whose case is related by Prof. Malle, received a gunshot wound near the 
left nipple, he fell instantly in syncope, but afterwards revived, and lived 42 days, 
when he died of erysipelas of the leg. A piece of wood, “as large as a full-sized 
writing quill, was found transfixing the left ventricle and the septum, and projecting 
into the cavity of the right ventricle.”—Brit, and For. Med. Chir. Rev. vol. x. p. 46. 


T01 


§ 857] MORTALITY OF WOUNDS OF THE HEART. [BOOK V. 


have been mechanically prevented. A coagulum of blood may, in some cases 
‘where the wound is not extensive, cause the prolongation of life for a similar 
reason. Should the patient escape the fatal results of inflammation ensuing 
upon such a wound, he is nevertheless exposed to sudden death by the removal 
of this mechanical obstacle to hemorrhage. Ollivier d’Angers found, out of 
twenty-nine cases collected by himself, that only two proved fatal within forty- 
eight hours, and the others in from four to twenty-eight days. 

Dr. Trugien, of Portsmouth, Va., observed a case in which a young negro 
man was stabbed in the chest on Monday night and continued to do well until 
Saturday morning, at which time, contrary to orders, he went out, and used 
other improper exertion, in consequence of which he died. The wound, which 
had healed externally, perforated the cartilage of the fourth rib, passed through 
a part of the anterior wall of the right ventricle; without opening it, and 
thence into the left ventricle. About a pint and a half of blood, partly fluid 
and partly coagulated, was found in the pericardium. The wound in this 
membrane had completely cicatrized, and two-thirds of that in the heart. (im) 

In a case reported by Dr. Bowen, the right ventricle was perforated a half 
an inch to the right of the septum, and through the septum the wound extended 
into the left ventricle, at the orifice of the aortic valves; the wound was lined 
with coagulable lymph. The patient had survived his injuries eleven days and 
walked about ; he died suddenly from hemorrhage into the pericardial and pleu- 
ral sacs.(n) Muschner reports a case of penetrating wound of the heart which 
proved fatal on the fourteenth day. (0) 

Stadelmayer gives a case in which not only the heart was penetrated, but 
the stomach also, and an intercostal artery wounded, when death ensued on 
the 5th day.(p) These cases might readily be multiplied, but enough has been 
said to show that wounds of the heart, even when the left ventricle has been 
penetrated, are not of necessity immediately fatal.(q) 


(m) Am. Jour. Med. Sci. July, 1850. See also Am. Jour. Med. Sci. for May, 1829, 
p- 263, in which there is a notice of a case of gunshot wound of the chest, in which 
the patient, a negro boy aged 15, lived 67 days after the accident, and on post-mortem 
examination, three shot were found lying loose in the cavity of the right ventricle, and 
two in the right auricle. 

For the case of Wm. Poole (pugilist), see N. York Med. Times, April, 1855. Inthe 
same Journal for May, 1855, will be found “ Statistical Observations on Wounds of the 
Heart and on their relations to Forensic Medicine, with a Table of Forty-two Recorded 
Cases.” By Samuel 8. Purple, M. D. 

(n) Am. Jour. Med. Sci. Uct. 1849. (o) Ver. Deutsche Zeitschrift. III. 1. 1848. 

(p) Med. Correspond. Bl. Bayer. Aertze. No. 318. 

(q) A case of some interest in reference to the power of surviving a severe wound 
of the cavities of the heart occurred at Guy’s Hospital in February, 1854. An Italian, 
et. 38, discharged a brace of pistols into his chest on the left side. The man was 
brought to the hospital, was able to converse on his ccndition, and lived one hour 
and fifteen minutes after the infliction of the wound. After death it was found that 
one bullet had perforated the pericardium, entered the right ventricle, and after tra- 
versing the septum of the ventricles, made its exit from the heart at the junction of 
the left auricle with the ventricle. It traversed the upper lobe of the left lung, and 
was found fixed in one of the dorsal vertebre. The second bullet perforated the left ven- 
tricle, and then traversed the left lung. The wound was of such a nature, that at 
every contraction of the ventricle, the opening must have been closed so as to arrest 
the flow of blood. This man, owing to severe suffering, rolled about the floor and was 
with difficulty kept quiet. It will be seen that in this case there were bullet wounds 
traversing completely the cavities of the heart, yet the man could talk and exert him- 
self, and he actually survived their infliction one hour and a quarter.”—Taylor’s 
Med. Jur. 5th ed. p. 308. 


702 


BOOK V.] RUPTURE. OF THE HEART. [$ 859 


§ 858. Death is usually sudden, but does not always follow immediately 
upon the receipt of the wound, although the first effects are exceedingly alarm- 
ing. In nearly all the cases, where the wound seriously implicates the heart, 
the individual staggers a few paces, or falls instantly in a state of syncope. 
Exceptional cases have, however, been reported in which, even where the wound 
has been found subsequently to have penetrated the cavity of the heart, the 
person has nevertheless retained his consciousness and power of locomotion 
for a short period after receiving it. Thus in the case of Mrs. Hamilton, mur- 
dered by Clough in 1833, at Bordentown, by repeated stabs with a dirk, three 
entered the left ventricle, and seven the lung. She walked some distance 
down stairs after this, and held some conversation, but soon fell, and died in 
fifteen minutes.(7) In a case related by M. Boyer, a young man who received 
a knife wound in the left ventricle, walked about for ten minutes and did not 
die until six days afterwards.(s) In another, where the right ventricle was 
wounded, the man ran up stairs, but died in half an hour.(¢) Mr. Baird 
relates a case in which a man continued fighting and ran 150 yards after 
receiving two penetrating wounds of the chest, and one of them penetrating 
the left ventricle.(w) In an instance given by Dr. Babington, a man walked 
twenty-five feet after a bayonet-wound which pierced the peritoneum, colon, 
stomach, left lobe of liver, diaphragm, pericardium, right ventricle in two 
places, and the lungs.(v) 

§ 859. Rupture of the heart.—This occasionally results from external vio- 
lence, generally of an accidental nature, as from the falling of a heavy body 
upon the chest. The cause of the occurrence is usually too obvious to 
require any explanation here. The only case in which rupture of the heart 
may become the subject of medico-legal investigation, is when a person engaged 
in a quarrel dies suddenly after receiving a blow upon the chest, and this lesion 
is found after death. The case is one which evidently admits of discussion, 
belonging to that category of cases in which death already impending is appa- 
rently anticipated by external violence. The fact of the heart being in a dis- 
eased condition favoring its rupture, such as fatty degeneration, ulceration, 
aneurismal] dilatation, must be ascertained, as well as the force of the blow 
inflicted. It must be remembered, however, that the rupture may occur spon- 
taneously in these morbid conditions, even when the person is in a tranquil 
state, but that a fit of anger greatly increases the probability of its occurrence. 
Hence a blow upon the chest may really have had nothing to do with causing 
the rupture, this having been due entirely to the strong excitation of a weak- 
ened heart. Rupture of the heart from disease usually takes place in the left 
ventricle, except where the disease is ulceration, when of course it may take 
place at any portion. The heart is also ruptured sometimes by great physi- 
cal exertion, in which case the left auricle is apt to give way. Violent emo- 
tions of any kind are enumerated among the causes of this accident, but it is 


(r) Beck’s Med. Jur. vol. ii. p. 331. 

(s) Bost. Med. and Surg. Jour. vol. ii. p. 209. 

(t) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., N. 8. vol. xxvi. p. 85. 
(u) Edinb. Month. Jour. vol. iii, 1843. 

(v) Med. Records and Researches. Lond. 1798. 


§ 861] WOUNDS OF THE ABDOMEN. [BOOK V. 


probable that they are only effective when the heart is already weakened by 
disease. The same may be said of rupture of the aorta. Wounds of this and 
the other great vessels of the chest are inevitably mortal, if the opening is 
not very slight. : 

§ 860. Tth. Wounds of the abdomen. (1.) Superficial wounds.—A severe 
blow in the epigastric region has in several instances sufficed to produce imme- 
diate death, and this may result without any external or internal mark of 
violence. Death in these cases has been generally attributed to the violent 
impression made upon the solar plexus of nerves. Blows upon other parts 
of the abdomen not accompanied by any solution of continuity in the integu- 
ments may prove serious or fatal by causing peritoneal inflammation or the 
rupture of some organ in this cavity ;(vv) but contused and lacerated wounds 
which are not attended with these effects may still give rise to serious conse- 
quences from the formation of fistulous communications. Incised wounds also 
which do not penetrate the cavity, may nevertheless prove fatal from a wound 
of the epigastric artery. 

§ 861. (2.) Penetrating wounds of the abdomen usually prove fatal by 
causing inflammation of the peritoneum, either as a direct effect of its division 
or indirectly from the effusion of blood and the entrance of air. When the 
omentum or mesentery is wounded, death usually takes place by hemorrhage 
but sometimes from inflammation and gangrene. Wounds of the stomach and 
intestines prove fatal by hemorrhage, or by inflammation resulting from the 
effusion of the contents of these organs into the peritoneal cavity. The natural 
tendency of these injuries is to death, although by timely and skilful surgical 
treatment many cures may be accomplished.(w) A most remarkable case is 
reported by Dr. Nicholls, of a man sixty-nine years old, who attempted suicide 
by thrusting a red-hot poker into his abdomen about an inch and a half above 
the navel. There was no hemorrhage, and a partial protrusion only of omen- 
tum, which sloughed off. In three weeks the wound had nearly healed, when 
the patient tore away the dressings, enlarged the wound, and cut or tore away 
a portion of the omentum, and a piece of the colon thirty-two inches long. 
He survived these horrible injuries eight days.(ww) | 

Sth. Wounds of the liver vary in importance according to their extent and 
situation. Superficial wounds of this organ have much less gravity than 
those which penetrate its substance deeply, and interest the large arterial and 
venous trunks which traverse its lower surface. If the gall-bladder is wounded, 
violent peritonitis usually results from the effusion of bile into the peritoneum. 
Incised and punctured wounds of the spleen may produce death by hemorrhage, 


(vv) Numerous examples exist of fatal rupture of the spleen from comparatively 
slight causes. The reader is referred to the following recent cases: Archives Gén. 
July, 1854, p. 85; Barth, ibid. Feb. 1855, p. 235 ; Lancet, March, 1859, p. 329; ibid. 
July, 1859, p. 8; Lopez, N. Amer. Med.-Chir. Rev. iv. 286; Adams, ibid. p. 756; and 
Charcot, Gaz. des Hopitaux, 1858, reports that a rupture of the spleen was found ina 
new- porn child produced by a fall of the mother some weeks before. 

(w) Vid. South’s Chelius’ Surgery, vol. i. p. 522, for several cases. For a case of 
speedy recovery after a penetrating wound of the stomach made by a bowie-knife, see 
The Stethoscope, June, 1855. (Richmond.) From Charleston Med. Journ. and Re- 
view. 

(ww) Dublin Med. Press, Oct. 4, 1854. 


T04 


ee — 


BOOK V.] WOUNDS OF THE DIAPHRAGM. [$ 868 


and this is the more likely to be the case when this organ is abnormally en- 
larged. Wounds of the kidneys usually prove fatal by the effusion of urine 
and consecutive inflammation. It is hardly necessary to mention that wounds 
of the great abdominal vessels are unavoidably fatal. 

§ 862. 9th. Wounds of the diaphragm.—Mr. Guthrie says that wounds of 
the diaphragm rarely if ever close, but remain open during the rest of the life 
of the sufferer, ready at all times to give rise to a hernia, which may become 
strangulated, and thus destroy life. Among other cases given by him, the fol- 
lowing is interesting. On the day preceding the battle of Fuentes d’Onor, in 
1811, Sergeant Barry was wounded in the chest. The ball entered close to the 
nipple of the left breast, and passed out at the back, between the eighth and 
ninth ribs. The anterior opening of the wound soon healed, but the posterior 
did not for a considerable period, when he became affected with such a severe 
cough, with expectoration, that his medical attendant deemed it proper to 
reopen it. .The symptoms were relieved, and portions of his shirt and jacket 
were discharged. After this his health improved so rapidly as to enable him 
soon to rejoin his corps; the wound in the back repeatedly opened and healed 
again, generally at intervals of twelve or fourteen months, but for five or six 
years it ceased to do so. He died of another disease, twenty-two years after 
the receipt of this wound. On examination, the whole of the stomach and 
the greater part of the transverse arch of the colon were found in the left 
cavity of the chest, having passed through an opening in the diaphragm about 
three inches long in a transverse direction near the centre. The wound in this 
instance was through the muscular and not through the tendinous part.(a) 
Slight penetrating wounds of the diaphragm, Dr. Taylor says, will heal, in- 
stances of the fact being upon record. 

§ 863. 10th. Wounds and ruptures of the bladder.—The consideration of 
these has considerable practical importance, from the fact that the bladder is 
occasionally ruptured spontaneously from over-distension. If a person have 
received a violent blow or kick upon the lower part of the abdomen, and the 
bladder after death is found ruptured, the defence may deny that this was 
caused by the blow. ‘To the medical mind this line of defence cannot but 
appear very precarious. Spontaneous rupture of the bladder is extremely 
rare. A case is reported of this accident to a man, which could only be attri- 
buted to his suddenly jumping from a table on which he had been sitting.(xx) 
In another case the same accident resulted from a violent fall upon the buttocks 
while the bladder was distended.(y) The well-marked symptoms of distension 
ean hardly be concealed,(yy) and the cause of it would certainly be found after 
death ; hence, if rupture has followed a blow, the dependence of one upon the 
other is, in the absence of undoubted evidence of the pre-existence of over- 


(x) Lancet, April 16,1853. Vid. also Lancet, April, 1852. 

(vz) Edinb. Med. Journ. ii. 847. (y) Ibid. iv. 811, 844. 

(yy) Nevertheless, Mr. Hird related an interesting case at the Medical Society of 
London, which is quoted by Mr. Coulson, to show that the patient may walk several 
miles after complete rupture, and for a time exhibit no symptoms which attract more 
than ordinary attention. (Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. July, 1852.) An analysis of 
seventy-eight cases of rupture of the bladder is published by Dr. 8. Smith in the New 
York Journal of Medicine, new series, vi. 336. 


45 705 


§ 864] WOUNDS AND RUPTURE OF THE BLADDER. [BOOK V. 


distension from natural causes, as satisfactory and conclusive as possible. In 
the words of Dr. Taylor, “If a man were in good health prior to being struck 
— if he suddenly felt intense pain, could not pass his urine afterwards, and died 
from an attack of peritonitis in five or six days—if after death the bladder was 
found lacerated, but this organ and the urethra were otherwise in a healthy 
condition, there can be no doubt that the blow was the sole cause of rupture 
and death. In such a ease, to attribute the rupture to spontaneous causes 
would be equal to denying all kind of causation.’’ Rupture of the bladder is 
usually a fatal injury, producing death by peritonitis; but if it occur in the 
anterior portion, which is not wholly covered by the peritoneum, recovery will 
sometimes occur. Thus, in a case reported by Mr. Syme,(z) a boy ruptured 
the bladder by falling upon two upright stakes of wood, in jumping over a 
fence. Under an appropriate and skilful treatment he finally got well. 

There is rarely any external injury to correspond with the violent internal 
disorganization. In a case where the urethra was completely torn across by 
external violence, there was no external wound—not even an abrasion of the 
skin.(@) 

§ &64. The occasional immunity from serious effects in wounds of the abdo- 
men of apparently the most dangerous character, is well illustrated by two 
cases, very similar to one another, which have occurred in this country. Dr. 
Sargent, of Worcester, Mass., reported to the Boston Society for Medical Im- 
provement, a case which occurred in his practice. A woman, about 37 years 
of age, in sliding down from a hayloft, impaled herself upon the handle of a 
pitchfork, which passed in at her vagina to the length of twenty-two inches, 
when her feet struck the ground. The handle was immediately withdrawn. 
Dr. 8. saw the handle of the fork, which was rounded a little larger at the 
end than elsewhere, perfectly smooth, two inches in diameter, and showed dis- 
tinctly the stain of blood up to an abrupt line, twenty-two inches from the end. 
It was supposed that the instrument perforated the upper end of the vagina 
on the left side, passed between the uterus and rectum, in front of the kidney, 
behind the spleen, and between the diaphragm and false ribs, peeling up the 
costal pleura till it reached the scaleni muscles. The subsequent history of the 
case, which showed a fracture of the first rib, proved this diagnosis correct. 
The woman recovered in a few weeks entirely.(b) Another case is reported 
by Dr. Bryant, of Mississippi, of a negro woman who leaped from the height 
of ten feet and alighted upon a tobacco stick, which had been driven firmly in 
the ground, and was concealed by some loose fodder. The stick was four and 
a half feet long and one inch square. It entered the vagina, penetrated its 
upper part, and traversed the abdomen to the eleventh or twelfth rib. The 
stick was smeared with bloody mucus to the extent of twelve and a half inches, 
and its termination was abrupt and distinct. <‘‘It was quite clear that the stick 
was not stained by the fluid running down upon it.”’? This woman also recd- 
vered, after losing a considerable quantity of blood.(c) 


(z) Edinb. Month. Journ. p. 332. 

(a) Neill, Hospital Cases. Med. Examiner, Aug. 1854. 

(0) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., Oct. 1853, p. 355. 

(c) Ibid. p. 399. The sequel of Dr. Sargent’s case is given in the Boston Med. and 
Surg. Journ., Dec. 1856, p. 387, and several analogous ones are there referred to by 


106 


BOOK V.]| WOUNDS OF THE GENITALS. [$ 866 


§ 865. 11th. Wounds of the genitals.—In the male these are usually self- 
inflicted, and instances of the kind most usually occur among the insane. The 
danger to life is great if the injury have been inflicted with a sharp instrument 
and is of considerable extent ; the hemorrhage being profuse, and not easily 
controlled. Impotence may be the result of an imperfect mutilation. 

Upon the female, on the contrary, wounds of the genitals are generally due 
to the violence of others. This appears to have been a favorite mode of com- 
mitting murder in Scotland, probably from the facility with which it would 
be overlooked. Several cases of the kind have been recorded, in which criminal 
trials took place. The latest are the trials of Andrew Paterson and Wm. 
Hetherton, charged with the murder of their wives by wounding them in the 
genital organs. In one case, the woman had been recently confined. A wound 
an inch and a half long was found in the vagina, supposed to have been in- 
flicted with the iron hold-fast of a sign-board. In the other, the woman was 
in the eighth month of her pregnancy. There was found a lacerated wound 
of the genitals immediately on the left side of the urethral orifice. There were 
numerous contusions on both thighs and in the neighborhood of the vulva; 
the injuries were attributed to kicks. (d) 

Occasionally, as has before been mentioned, there may occur spontaneous 
hemorrhage from a ruptured vein at the root of the labia; hence the necessity 
of establishing the presence of marks of violence, such as contusions, abra- 
sions, &c. In a case, however, related in the Lancet, a woman received a 
kick in the private parts from her husband, while she was stooping, and died 
within an hour, from hemorrhage. The left root of the clitoris was crushed, 
and there was a wound on the edge of the vulva about an inch long, but 
otherwise no contusion or marks of violence.(e) Examples of accidental 
wounds of this description have already been given (Chap. II. § 810). 
Lacerated wounds of the uterus, produced by the throes of parturition, are 
not necessarily fatal; and there are even cases of recovery after the complete 
avulsion of this organ and its appendages by an ignorant or brutal accoucheur. 


CHAPTER II. 
Pe toe Ne eC aoe LS. 


I. How CLASSIFIED, § 866. 
II, APPEARANCE OF BURNS UPON DEAD Bopy, § 867. 
III. Wounps UPON THE BURNED, § 870. 
IV. Errects UPON THE SYSTEM, § 872. 
VY. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 879. 


§ 866. I. How classified.—The effect produced upon the living person by 
a heated body, varies, according to the nature of the vehicle by which the heat 


Dr. Coale. Dr. Maynard has reported a fatal case in a woman who, in sliding down 
a hay-mow, fell upon a hay-hook. (Ibid. Aug. 1857, p. 29.) 

(d) Ed. Month. Jour. June and Sept. 1848. For other cases, see Watson on Homi- 
cide, p. 104, and Lond. Med. Gaz. xliv. p. 813. 

(e) Lancet, Oct. 1846. 


T07 


§ 867] BURNS UPON THE DEAD BODY. [BOOK V. 


is applied. Thus, boiling liquids produce scalds, which are serious in propor- 
tion to the density of the liquid; solids in a state of ignition, burns which 
are deep and extensive in proportion to the elevation of temperature and the 
duration of contact; while gases, in a state of combustion or flame, consume 
and destroy the living structure more completely than either of these other 
agents. The injuries produced by certain chemical substances of a caustic 
nature also receive the name of burns, in ordinary language, although an ele- 
vated temperature is not required for their effects. The ordinary division of 
burns, according to their gravity, is that made by Dupuytren :— 

Ist degree. Superficial inflammation of the skin, without the formation of 
blisters. 

2d. Vesication. 'The serum contained in the blisters is sometimes clear, 
sometimes opaque and of a yellowish white color, or again, sanguinolent. If 
the cuticle have been removed, the true skin is found granulated, of a vivid 
red, or secreting pus. 

3d. Destruction of the external surface of the true skin. That portion 
which has lost its vitality is seen in the form of eschars, which are soft and 
yellow if made by a liquid, but hard and brown, or black, if made by a heated 
solid or burnt with flame. The skin surrounding them presents the character 
of burns of the first or second degree, being red and blistered. This form of 
burns leaves scars, which are on a level with the skin, or nearly so, and are 
white and shining. , 

Ath. Disorganization of the whole thickness of the skin. These burns differ 
from the preceding only in the greater thickness of the sloughs. ‘The scar 
which is left is characteristic, being sunk below the level of the skin, and irre- 
gular, radiated, and puckered. 

5th. Not only the skin, but the subcutaneous cellular tissue, and a portion 
of the muscles underneath are destroyed. The injury is graver in its cha- 
racter than the last, although the external appearances are not strikingly 
different. 

6th. Complete carbonization of the burned part. 

§ 867. Il. Appearances of burns made upon the dead body.—Orfila says 
that vesication manifestly denotes that the burn was made during life. Ac- 
cording to Devergie, if boiling water or a red-hot iron be applied to the skin 
of a person, ten minutes after death, neither redness nor vesication will be 
produced, and it is not possible to mistake a burn made after death for one 
which was made before it. Dr. Christison made six experiments, with a 
view of satisfying himself as to the distinction. He says that it is evident 
from these that the application of heat, even a few minutes after death, causes 
no effects which can be mistaken for those induced by the vital reaction. In 
one case, in which a young man lay in a hopeless state of coma from poison- 
ing with laudanum, a hot iron was held on the outside of the hip-joint, and 
half an hour after death, a red-hot poker was applied to three places on the 
inside of the arm. It is stated that vesications were formed in both instances, 
those made during life contained serum, and those formed after death air. 
Dr. Taylor says that he has performed many experiments on the bodies of 
infants, eighteen and twenty hours after death, both with boiling water and 

708 


, el 
. 


BOOK V. | BURNS UPON THE DEAD BODY. [§ 868 


heated solids; but that, in no case, did he observe any kind of vesication to 
follow at that period. The skin became shrivelled, and was partly destroyed 
by the heat, but no blisters were produced. Dr. Casper made four expe- 
riments with the same result. It is stated, however, by MM. Leuret and 
Champouillon, and also by Dr. Wright, of Birmingham, that serous blisters 
may be produced after death in anasarcous subjects. In M. Leuret’s experi- 
ment, the blister contained an abundance of reddish-colored serum. In those 
of the other two observers, the serum was not tinged with blood. In one of 
Casper’s experiments, however, a flame was held close to the dropsical scrotum 
of a dead body; the skin nearest the flame shrivelled up and acquired a shining 
silver-gray surface, but no blister was raised. We think, however, it may be 
fairly objected to this and the preceding experiments of Casper, alluded to, 
that the degree of heat employed was much beyond that necessary to produce 
vesication. In two of the other three experiments, cotton wadding soaked in 
turpentine was placed in contact with the skin and lighted. In one case it 
was allowed to burn four minutes, in the other three and a half. In the 
third experiment, the flame of an oil lamp was held three minutes in contact 
with the back of the foot. In each case the skin was superficially roasted. 
The result might, perhaps, have been different had a less intense heat been 
employed. Casper also alludes to a fact of some importance in this connec- 
tion. He says that it is a common practice to drop burning sealing-wax 
upon the pit of the stomach immediately after death, with the hope of reviving 
the defunct, but that in the large number of bodies he has seen, in which this 
unintentional experiment had been performed, not one presented a trace of 
vesication in consequence. It may therefore, we think, be fairly inferred that, 
with perhaps the exception of anasarcous bodies, the presence of vesications 
upon the skin may be looked upon as a sure indication of the burn having 
been made during life, or immediately after, while the body is still possessed 
of a certain degree of organic vitality. Their absence, however, will be no 
evidence that the burns were not made upon the living person, since it is very 
possible that only the more serious results of burning may be found. There 
is, however, another sign of burning during life which cannot be simulated 
upon the dead body, viz: the congested and inflamed state of the skin around 
the blister or the burn, which is indicated by a red line which gradually merges 
into the color of the surrounding skin. This red border remains after death, 
and experiments made by Drs. Christison and Taylor prove that it cannot be 
produced by the application of heat to the dead body. The same may be 
said also of the red and granulated appearance of the true skin under the 
blisters. 

§ 868. The only experiments which appear to throw doubt upon the cor- 
rectness of these conclusions are those of Drs. Maschka(/) and Graff.(g) The 
first of these gentlemen found, in his experiments upon the dead body, that 
when the flame was brought in contact with the skin, blisters were formed of 
various sizes from that of a pea to that of an apple, within the space of one 


(f) Canstatt’s Jahresbericht, fiir 1852. Bd. vii. p. 46. 
(g) Prager Vierteljahrschrift, 1850, 4 Band. p. 123. 


T09 


§ 870] BURNS UPON THE DEAD BODY. [BOOK V. 


minute. These burst with a noise and discharged serum. No redness, how- 
ever, was observed under or around these vesications, until the denuded surface 
had been some time in contact with the air. The application of boiling water 
produced the same result. When the heat was maintained, the further changes 
could not be distinguished from such as would have been caused upon a living 
person. Dr. Griff, whose object in his experiments was to ascertain the length 
of time required to consume a head to a degree similar to that in which this 
portion of the body of the murdered Countess of Gérlitz was found, laid the 
emaciated body of a person aged about fifty years upon a table in such a man- 
ner that the head hung over one end of it. A vessel containing alcohol was 
_ placed between five and six inches below it, and the spirit set on fire. ‘The 
integuments of the head were consumed in about half an hour, and at the dis- 
tance of from ten to fifteen inches from the burning parts, white vesications 
were formed, some of which had a moist and red base, and a pale-red areola 
around them. Accident furnished Dr. Taylor with evidence of the same 
nature. ‘A man was accidentally drowned; his body was immediately taken 
from the water, and soon afterwards placed in a warm bath’’—within ten 
minutes after apparent death.—The water was so hot that portions of the 
cuticle came off when his body was removed, for it was found impossible to 
resuscitate him. On an inspection of the body, over a considerable portion of 
the skin, especially of the extremities, there were several vesicles filled with 
bloody serum. 'There was no anasarca here to account for their production ; 
and the fact of their occurrence appears to bear out the view of Dr. Wright 
that the production of a serous blister on the dead body, depends upon the 
amount of organic life remaining in the body. The man was pulseless and to 
all appearance dead when placed in the hot bath; hence the effects of hot 
liquids on the living and the recently dead body are proved by this case to be 
very similar. (/) 

§ 869. These experiments are directly in conflict with those before enume- 
rated, and although the weight of authority and of facts is opposed to the 
possibility of the production of vesications after death, which can be mistaken 
for those which result from the application of heat during life; yet as these 
experiments seem to prove the contrary, the question still remains open, except 
perhaps when the comparison lies between the effects of burns upon the living 
body and upon one in which life has been extinct for a considerable length of 
time. In such a case we do not think it would be difficult to show important 
means of distinction depending upon the absence of vital reaction. 

§ 870. IIT. Wounds upon the burned.—From the frequency with which a 
criminal, after having robbed a dwelling and murdered one or more of the 
inmates, sets fire to it with a view of destroying the traces of his crime, it is 
often the province of the physician to seek for wounds upon the dead bodies 
there discovered, and determine their mode of origin. There are certain 
mechanical effects produced by fire upon the skin which should not, be mis- 
taken for wounds. ‘Thus, in a case given by Casper, of an old man whose 
clothes caught fire as he was seated before his stove, the body was burned 


(A) Med. Jur. 5th ed. 1855. 
710 


— 


BOOK V.] WOUNDS UPON THE BURNED, [$ 871 


black, and on the right side, over the liver, was a gaping wound, through 
which the viscera could be seen. It was nothing more than a fissure caused 
by the intense heat.(¢) In another case, however, in which two old people 
were found burned in their house, the fact of their having been previously 
stunned, if not killed, by blows upon the head, was ascertained by the exist- 
ence of fractures of the skull, under which coagulated blood was found effused 
upon the dura mater. The criminal was not discovered for a long time, but 
the circumstances of the murder were betrayed by an associate. A singular 
circumstance was observed in this case, viz., that although the bodies were both 
almost destroyed by fire, the element had spared that portion of the head by 
which the murder was revealed.(7) Dr. Wyman, in his evidence in the Webster 
case, stated that “‘ some of the fragments of the bones of the skull (of Dr. Park- 
man) had the appearance of having been broken previous to calcination, or 
being burned with fire. Calcination,’’ he remarked, ‘‘removes the animal mat- 
ter which gives to bone its tenacity ; before this is removed, it breaks with sharp 
angles, and is more likely to splinter. Common surgical experience shows 
this. After calcination, the bone is more likely to crumble.” (4) 

In a highly interesting case of assassination related by Casper, the presence 
of contused wounds and extravasated blood upon the forehead and face of an 
aged woman, and vesications from burning, upon some portions of the body, 
gave indubitable evidence of violence and burning during life. Here the 
criminal confessed that he had struck his victim in the face with his fist and 
a paving stone, by which she was rendered senseless; but with a strange 
refinement would not acknowledge that he had designedly set fire to the 
apartment in which the half consumed body was found.(/) 

§ 871. A conflagration having taken place in Paris, which caused the 
death of numerous persons, M. Tardieu, to whom the examination of the 
human remains was officially intrusted, took the opportunity of minutely 
observing and recording the effects produced upon the human frame by fatal 
burning. The soft parts on the bodies examined were in various conditions ; 
completely charred to cinder, partly carbonized, or reduced to fibrinous shreds. 
The bones were dried and brittle, and in the long bones, fractures with obliquely 
splintered and charred ends were observed, differing distinctly from the character 
of ordinary fractures. In the flat bones, which were thinned by the heat, the 
fractures caused by the heat assumed the form of fissures confined to one sur- 
face, and not penetrating the substance of the bone. The intervertebral disks 
were contracted in their diameters. Teeth and cartilage seemed to resist the 
action of fire more than other hard parts. The soft parts exhibited great 
diminution of volume; this was more especially observed upon the viscera, 
which had been more or less protected from the immediate action of the fire. 
Some of these were mummified. The blood in the heart, aorta, and other large 
vessels presented an extraordinary appearance, resembling wax or fatty matter, 


(i) Gericht. Leichenéff. ii. Hundert. Fall. 99. 

(j) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1844, p. 284. 

(k) Bemis’ Report of the Webster case, Boston, 1850. 

(1) Gericht. Leichenéff. sup. Istes Hundert. Fall. 96. On this subject see a paper 
by M. Tardieu, Ann. d’Hygiéne, Jan. 1860, p. 124. 


felkil 


§ 874] SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION. [BOOK Vv. 


of a most beautiful carmine color. The cerebral substance was contracted to 
half its bulk, and in consistence resembled a half-dressed sweetbread. To the 
preceding details, M. Tardieu has added the appearances discovered on the 
body of an infant that had been lain several years behind a stove, and had 
become completely mummified. The effects of slow, long-continued heat were 
much the same as the above-described, with the absence of the destructive 
agency of fire seen in the carbonization of the external soft parts. (m) 

§ 872. IV. Hffects on the system.—Burns and scalds are well known to be 
excessively dangerous, especially in children. The greater the superficial extent 
of the burn, the more apt is it to prove fatal with rapidity, especially when 
upon the chest or abdomen. When the burn is extensive, or the subject impres- 
sionable, the general irritation produced by the excessive pain, is sufficient alone 
to cause death. This generally ensues upon a kind of stupor, characterized by 
inertness, somnolence, paleness of the face, slow and stertorous respiration, and 
small pulse. 

§ 873. V. Post-mortem appearances.—These are often by no means well 
marked; the most constant being a capillary injection of the mucous mem- 
brane of the bronchia and alimentary canal and serous effusion into the ven- 
tricles of the brain. In a child 13 days old, which was scalded to death by 
being placed in a bath of boiling water, the official examination disclosed the 
fact that the mouth, throat, and cesophagus almost as far as the stomach, were 
denuded of their epithelium, which lay upon the surface as a white and greasy 
substance. The only appearances that could be considered at all abnormal, 
were a slight injection of the meningeal vessels, rosy and apparently inflamed 
patches in the small intestine, and an unusual amount of thick dark blood in the 
lungs and liver.(7) 

Nearly the same appearances were found in two children who perished in a 
room which was set on fire. In them, however, the trachea was filled with a 
dark, frothy mucus, in which particles of soot could be easily recognized. It 
is probable, therefore, that the immediate cause of their death was suffoca- 
tion. (0) 


CEA Se el Dek ale 
Sr ONTANEOUS COMBUSTION. 


§ 874. In approaching the examination of the question, whether such a 
phenomenon as the spontaneous combustion of the human body is really pos- 
sible, we encounter the usual obstacle to discovery of truth, viz., a doubt of 
the authenticity of the facts upon which the belief reposes. From a very 
early period in the history of medical curiosities, instances of apparently 
spontaneous human combustion may be found on record; but the credulous 
superstition and love of the marvellous, which, at the period when some of 


(m) Brit. and For. Med. Rev. from Ann. d’Hyg. April, 1854. 
(n) Schmidtmiiller. Henke’s Zeitsch. 1848, p. 175. 
(o) Casper, ger. Leich. 2 Hund. 97 and 99 Fille. 


712 


BOOK V.] SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION.—CASES. [$ 875 


these observations were made, science rather encouraged than restrained, 
weaken our reliance upon their authenticity. Not having adopted a theory 
with a desire to find those facts only which might be adjusted to it, but desirous 
of discovering the real extent of our knowledge relative to the phenomena of 
what is called spontaneous combustion, we have examined the subject not 
without some care and earnestness. The result of this investigation has shown 
us that if there is not such a phenomenon as the actual spontaneous combus- 
tion of the human body, there is sufficient evidence to prove, that in some 
cases it may acquire a preternatural inflammability, and that this peculiarity 
can be recognized by the trifling source of combustion compared with the 
rapidity and extent of its progress. We do not hesitate also to affirm that a 
belief in the actual occurrence of the phenomena referred to may be enter- 
tained, without a satisfactory scientific explanation. 

§ 875. We propose to refer only to such cases of spontaneous combustion 
as have been, reported at a comparatively recent date, and by men of standing 
and authority. The first which we quote is reported by M. Devergie.(p) A 
washerwoman named Marie Jeanne Antoinette Bally, fifty years of age, and 
of intemperate habits, returned to her lodging one evening in December in a 
state of drunkenness. Her room was not more than ten feet long by six to 
seven feet wide, and was lighted by two little windows from a corridor. The 
only furniture consisted of a chair, a chest in the corner, and muslin window 
curtains. There was no bed. The next morning at eight o’clock, the neigh- 
bors, perceiving a strong smell of smoke, entered her room, and there found 
the unfortunate woman upon the floor almost completely burned, with her feet 
turned toward the chimney-place, in which, however, there was no fire. Under 
one of her arms there was still a portion of the chair upon which she had been 
seated, and underneath her an earthen pot such as is used by the poor to hold 
a few coals to warm their feet. The chair was almost entirely burned, the 
floor was covered with a black soot, and an exposed beam in the wall of the 
room was charred upon the surface. The chest was, however, untouched, as 
were also the muslin curtains, which were only three feet distant from the 
body. The body was sent to the Morgue, and examined by direction of the 
judicial authorities. The body was lean; the face and hair, the anterior por- 
tion of the neck and upper part of the shoulders were not injured. The skin 
and muscles of the back were, however, thoroughly burnt, as were also the 
sides and anterior portion of the trunk. The anus and vulva escaped. 
Nothing was left of the upper extremities but the bones; there was, however, 
a portion of the chemise in each armpit still intact. The upper portion of 
the lower limbs was also burnt. The stockings were entire. 

The following is abridged from a case reported by Dr. John Grigor :— 

The body of John Anderson, a man aged fifty, and of spare habit, a carter 
of wood from the forest of Darnaway to the pier of Nairn, was found dead by 
the road-side, and so much blackened and charred by the action of fire that it 
was identified only from the fact of his horses and cart being known. <A post- 
mortem examination was imperfectly made, the result of which was that the 


(p) Ann. @’Hyg. t. xlvi. pp. 383-431. 
713 


§ 875] SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION. [BOOK Vv. 


eyes, ears, and nose were burned away, as well as the hair and skin of the 
head; the skin and cellular tissue of the trunk were much charred, the thighs 
not to the same extent, and the burning had ceased about midway between 
the knees and feet, where there was a reddish and slightly blistered line. The 
back was not so much destroyed. ‘This man was a notorious dram-drinker, 
consuming daily at least a bottleful of ardent spirits, besides porter, beer, &e. 
Ee left Nairn on the day of his death intoxicated, and parted company with 
a brother carter within half a mile of the place where his body was found. 
“Before this, however, he wished his pipe to be lit and handed to him; but 
his friend, thinking he had no need of a smoke, merely put a little fire on the 
old tobacco ash, when he drew, and immediately said, ‘She is not in.’ The 
conversation went on for ten minutes, when the poor man turned his horses’ 
heads homewards. All this time the pipe was in his hand. His dress was a 
woollen shirt, a canvas frock, corduroy trowsers, and a ‘wide-awake.’ The 
weather was very warm and dry. When a little further on his way home- 
wards, smoke was seen rising up from the cart in which the man was, and 
which contained a good deal of hay, by a herd-boy on a neighboring rising 
ground, about one-fourth of a mile distant. The man was next seen to de- 
scend from the cart, to stand, then to stagger and fall. The horses stood still. 
In a few minutes smoke again appeared, from the ground, when the boy ran 
down and found the body lifeless, black, disfigured, and burning.”” With the 
aid of another person water was procured and the fire extinguished. The 
clothes were all consumed, except the lower part of the legs of the trowsers, 
and a small portion of the shirt, frock, and hat. The pipe was found lying 
below the body, with the cap on, apparently as it had been put into his hands. 
None of the hay was burned.(q) 

The following case was communicated to Dr. Beck by Wm. Dunlap, Esq., 
of New York :— 

“Hannah Bradshaw, aged about thirty years, had lived about a dozen years 
in the city. She was a healthy, hearty-looking woman, remarkably industrious, 
and neat in her person and manner of living, but bore a bad character with 
respect to chastity and sobriety. On account of her robust appearance and 
bold behavior she had obtained the name of Man-of-War Nance. She resided 
in an upper room, which had no connection with the rooms below, occupied 
by a family. On the evening of the 31st of December (1771) she desired a 
young woman who worked for her, and was going home, to come again early 
the next morning; and about seven o’clock the same evening another acquaint- 
ance parted from her, at which time she seemed to have drank a little too 
freely. She was neither heard of nor seen again until the next morning, when 
the young woman returned to her work. After knocking and calling, and 
having waited until past eleven o’clock, this person, by the aid of a man who 
lived below, got in through a back window and opened the door. On looking 
within a screen, which went quite across the room, and was fitted to reach the 
ceiling, she discovered the mutilated remains of Hannah. The body, or rather 
the bones, were lying near the middle of the floor, wherein a hole of about 


(q) Edinb. Monthly Journ. of Med. Sci. Dec. 1852, p. 555. 
114 


BOOK V.]| SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION. [$ 875 


four feet in diameter was burned away, and the bones were on its bottom, 
about a foot beneath that part of the floor. The flesh was entirely burnt off 
the bones of the whole body, except a small part on the skull, a little on one 
of the shoulders, the lower part of the right leg and foot, which was burnt off 
at the small, almost as even as if cut off, and left lying on the floor. The 
stocking was burnt off as far as the leg, and no further. The bones, some of 
which were black and others white, were so thoroughly burnt as to crumble to 
dust between the fingers. ‘The bowels remained unconsumed. One of the 
sleepers, which lay under the shoulders, was burnt almost through. Part of 
the head lay on the planks at the edge of the hole, and near it was a candle- 
stick, with part of a candle in it, thrown down, but it did not appear to have 
touched any part of the body, or to have set anything on fire. The tallow was 
melted off the wick, which remained unscorched by the fire, as also the screen, 
which almost touched the hole. ‘The leg of a rush-bottomed chair, and about 
half the bottom, were burnt so far as they were within the compass of the hole 
in the floor, and no further. The ceiling of the room, which was whitewashed 
plaster, was as black as if covered with lampblack, as also part of the walls 
and windows; and the heat had been so great as to extract the turpentine 
from the boards and the wainscot. After all these operations the fire went 
entirely out, so that when the body was found not a spark remained.’’(7r) 

A well-known and privileged beggar, of 60 years of age, and quite corpu- 
lent, accustomed to hard drinking, came on a Christmas evening into a tavern, 
already intoxicated. There, for a wager, he drank four bottles of brandy, and 
being entirely overcome by it, was carefully deposited on the floor behind the 
German stove, but some distance from the latter, with his head resting on his 
sack containing bread, in order that he might sleep away his debauch. The 
remaining guests soon retired. arly in the morning, the landlord was awak- 
ened by a penetrating, insupportable smell; he arose and approaching the 
public room found the smell still more powerful. The room was cold, and 
the fire had long before died out. The unfortunate beggar was found nearly 
reduced to ashes, a portion of the face and occiput remained, and the legs 
below the knee were not burnt, the shoes and stockings being also untouched. 
His pouch of bread was not consumed, but was covered with a fetid soot. 
The whole room was filled with the same, and no cleansing afterwards availed 
to destroy the odor. 

An old lady of corpulent habit, and 70 years of age, was accustomed to have 
herself bathed with cologne water and alcohol, and every night before retiring 
took a so-called sleeping potion of spirituous liquor. arly one morning, as 
in the preceding case, the neighbors and servants were awakened by a fearful 
smell, proceeding from the old lady’s room. On entering it, her body com- 
pletely carbonized, was found upon the floor by the bed; only the hands and 
feet remained. The floor was not burnt nor the furniture, but everything was 
covered with a fetid, black, and fatty soot.(s) 

A case of partial self-combustion is reported, in which it would appear that 


(rv) Beck’s Med. Jur. vol. ii. p. 99. 
(s) Beitrige zur gericht. Medicin (with two original observations), by Dr. Schneider, 


of Fulda. Henke’s Zeitsch. E. H. 32. Pp 


§ 877] SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION. [BOOK Vv. 


the burns produced upon the face were made by the vomited contents of the 
stomach. The man was an incortigible drunkard, and was left by his com- 
panions upon the floor of his room, stupid from drink. It is positively stated, 
that there was no light in the room nor means for procuring it.(¢) 

Other cases might be cited of equal authenticity with the foregoing, but 
these, we think, depict with sufficient clearness the phenomena attending this 
peculiar mode of combustion. 

§ 876. In striking contrast with them is the process of ordinary combustion, 
by the prolonged application of fire to the human body. The phenomena 
attending it are familiar to every one, and have been already described in the 
foregoing chapter. The effects are purely local, being confined in extent to that 
portion of the body exposed to the heat, and they cease with the withdrawal 
or extinction of the burning material, finding no self-sustaining combustible 
principle in the body itself. The cause is always evident, and the extent of 
- injury is in proportion to the amount of the fire. 

§ 877. If again this have been designedly kept up, the quantity of fuel re- 
quired for such a destruction of the body as is related in the foregoing instances, 
is enormous. The history of the death-scene of those who have perished at 
the stake, and the widow-burning in India, sufficiently attest this fact. We 
might add here the evidence given in the Webster case upon this point. Dr. 
Strong said: “In the pursuit of my anatomical studies, I have had consider- 
able experience in burning up or getting rid of human remains by fire. Where 
I had my office, at an early day, in Cornhill, I had poor accommodations for 
dissecting, and it was frequently necessary to burn up the remains of a subject. 
Once in particular, I had a pirate given me by the United States Marshal, for 
dissection ; and it being warm weather, I wanted to get rid of the flesh, and 
only preserve the bones. He was a muscular stout man, and I began upon it 
one night, with a wood fire, in a large old-fashioned fireplace. I built a 
rousing fire and sat up all night, piling on the wood and the flesh, and had 
not got it consumed by morning. I was afraid of a visit from the police; 
and by eleven o’clock they gave me a call, to know what made such a smell in 
the street. I finished it up, somehow, that forenoon; but I look upon it as 
no small operation to burn up a body.’’(w) 

Recently the case of Stauff, tried for the murder of the Countess of Goer- 
litz, gave rise to a discussion of the question of spontaneous combustion, in 
the course of which certain experiments were conducted by Dr. Graff, for the 
purpose of ascertaining the amount of fuel necessary to effect an equal destruc- 
tion with that observed in that case. The result of these trials was, that as 
much as one hundred pounds of wood was required to produce even a partial 
combustion of a human body. In thecase of the Countess of Goerlitz, whose 
body was found in her apartment partly consumed by fire, the heat must have 
been intense. The secretary near which the body lay was half burned ; seve- 
ral chairs further removed from it than was the body, took fire, and the floor 
underneath it was burned. A mirror on the opposite side of the room, nearly 


(t) Schmidtmiiler, Henke’s Zeitsch. 1842, p. 225. 
(u) Bemis’ Report of the Webster case, p. 69. 
716 


BOOK V. | GOERLITZ CASE. [§ 877 


twenty feet distant, was cracked by the heat, and was still so hot when the 
room was broken open that the hand could not be borne upon it. The heat 
developed by the burning of the secretary was so great, that articles of gold 
and silver, and also of iron, had been melted by it. Yet with such a degree 
of heat as this, and the body only two feet distant from the burning secretary, 
the traces of fire did not extend below the breast ; the head, neck and upper 
extremities being the parts which were chiefly destroyed.(v) 


(v) The following abstract of the trial of John Stauff, for the murder of the Coun- 
tess of Goerlitz, we have condensed from an admirable report in the Prague Quarterly 
Journal of Practical Medicine (vol. xxviii. p. 108), from several accounts in Henke’s 
Zeitschrift, and from a translation of Dr. Graff’s Memoir, in the London Medical 
Gazette (1850, vol. ii.). 

On the 13th of June, 1847, the partially burned body of the Countess of Goerlitz 
was found at 11} o’clock at night in her chamber. She was known as a person of 
active, industrious, and somewhat parsimonious habits, and enjoyed good health. She 
was frequently known to retire to her own apartments and shut herself up there for 
halfa day at atime. She lived on good terms with the Count, but their apartments 
were on different floors. On the day of her death she was last seen by her servants 
at 4 o’clock in the afternoon, in good health. Between 4 and 5 o’clock there was no 
one in the house but herself and the valet Stauff. On his return in the evening, the 
Count knocked at the door of the ante-room, but received no answer, when he went out 
again. This was about 7o’clock; at 9-P.M. he returned. During hissecond absence 
a bright light, which speedily disappeared, had been noticed at the closet window of 
her apartment, which looked to the south, and also a thick smoke from a chimney, 
which corresponded with the stove in the parlor. (These rooms adjoined each other.) 
At 9 P. M. the servants who had returned were sent in search of their mistress by the 
Count, and Stauff himself was sent after the locksmith to open the door of her apart- 
ment. He returned and said that the locksmith was sick and could not come until 
morning. In the mean time smoke was seen issuing from the rooms, and finally doors 
and windows were broken open. On this being done flames burst out simultaneously 
from the hangings, and a writing-desk and the floor underneathit. The dead body of 
the Countess was found a foot distant from the writing-desk, with the feet towards the 
middle of the room, and the head towards the window. 

After the fire had been extinguished, which was done without much difficulty, it 
was found that the writing-desk had burned from below upwards, the lower drawer 
being entirely burned, the two upper ones not so much, and the floor under it was 
burned through to the joists. Its contents of a combustible character were mostly 
destroyed, and in the ashes underneath were found keys, melted gold ornaments, 
pearls and diamonds, much injured by the fire, and papers partly burned lay scat- 
tered about the room. A mirror on the opposite wall, fiftecn feet distant from the 
desk, was cracked and covered with a brownish yellow ammoniacal soot. The bell- 
rope on the left side of the door was broken. A divan in the adjoining closet or cabi- 
net was burned ina large oval hole in the centre, and one of the slippers of the Coun- 
tess was found on the floor near it. The remaining slipper was found on one of the 
feet of the corpse. 

The dress on the upper part of the body was almost wholly consumed. The head 
exhibited the form of a nearly shapeless black mass, in which the mouth was imper- 
fectly distinguishable, with the charred tongue protruding from it. The body lay on 
its left side, the head and chest retracted, the neck everywhere blackened and char- 
red, as were the skin and muscles on the fore and upper parts of the chest, the former 
thus being affected to within an inch of the pit of the stomach. The marks of the 
action of fire did not extend quite so far along the back part of the trunk. The joints 
of both upper extremities were flexed and their surfaces charred, except at the hands. 
The left shoulder and the right elbow-joints were laid open. From the former of these 
the blackened humerus, and from the latter the heads of the radius and ulna, pro- 
truded. The skin in the vicinity of the left knee was slightly acted on. The body 
exhaled an empyreumatic odor. The further examination of it was objected to, and 
was not carried out at that time. After carefully cleansing the head, a fissure about 
half an inch long was found in the temporal bone. 

The key of the apartment could nowhere be found. It was not, until the subse- 
quent proceedings, remarked that Stauff was not present at the above examination of 
the body, while every one else gave all the assistance in their power. He was 
observed to be in an exceedingly tremulous and frightened condition until the body 
was buried, and his subsequent conduct was very suspicious. He was not, however, 


ay 


§ 879] CONCLUSIONS. [BOOK V. 


§878. Such cases as these are entirely unlike those well-authenticated cases 
of combustion, where the body has been found destroyed in a greater or less 
degree by the action of fire, without any apparent external cause, or, at most, 
with one which has been entirely disproportioned to the effect produced. 
Could the phenomena in the two sets of cases be properly designated by the 
same name, it is difficult to conceive how in one, the ashes of a pipe, a few 
smouldering coals, or the flame of a lamp, could cause a greater destruction 
of the human body, with an immunity of surrounding objects from the action 
of fire, than in the other the hottest fire was able to produce. Hvidently there 
must be in one case some self-sustaining principle of combustion, a preter- 
natural inflammability of the body, which does not exist in the other. When 
this has been said, we believe that all has been said which the present state of 
our knowledge permits. 

879. Some authors have fallen into the error of attempting to explain by 
-chemical theories the phenomena of spontaneous combustion, but they have 
hereby given their opponents the opportunity, not only of easily refuting these 
speculations, but furnished them with a plausible pretext for denying the cor- 
rectness of the facts. MM. Liebig and Bischoff have, perhaps, disproved the 
accuracy of the doctrines which attribute the origin of spontaneous combustion 
to a saturation of the body with alcohol, unusual corpulence, and the develop- 
ment of inflammable gases. They allege that as the watery element of the 
body constitutes seventy-five per cent. of its bulk, it must first be dissipated 
before the latter can burn, that aleohol cannot be present in the tissues with- 
out coagulating their albumen, and that it may burn without communicating 
its flame to the flesh; and, finally, that the evolution of inflammable gases in 
the living body is either not a fact, or if it were so, could not explain the 
alleged process of spontaneous combustion. (w) 


taken into custody until some months afterwards, when he was detected in an attempt 
to poison the Count. 

The proceedings in this case unfortunately were complicated, by the suggestion that 
this lady had possibly met her death by spontaneous combustion. Naturally enough 
the facts of the case did not support this idea, and in consequence unmerited discre- 
dit, we think, was thrown by the eminent examiners, Liebig, Bischoff, and others, 
upon the possibility of this phenomenon under any circumstances. Nevertheless this 
suggestion gave rise to protracted debates and experiments by burning dead bodies, 
which do not appear to have resulted in the development of any important facts not 
before known. The conclusion, however, to which the medical commission to whom 
the case was referred, came at last, was, that the Countess had been assaulted in her 
room, that in her effort to call for help she had broken the bell-cord, and that the mur- 
derer had then dragged her into the cabinet, and there killed her by a blow upon the 
head, and by strangulation ; and to conceal his crime set fire to the combustible mate- 
rials in the room. At the diet of the assize, on the llth of April, 1850, John Stauff 
was found guilty of the murder of the Countess of Goerlitz, and of the subsequent 
arson, and attempt to poison, and sentenced toimprisonment for life. He afterwards 
confessed his crime. He declared that he had entered the room of the Countess, to 
announce to her that he was going out, when, finding no one in the room, he was 
tempted by the articles of value he saw there to commit a robbery. When doing so 
the Countess came in, a struggle took place, and he seized her by the throat and stran- 
gled her. He afterwards placed the body on a chair, and putting round it a quantity 
of combustible articles set fire to them. 

(w) Henke’s Zeitschrift. Bd. 60, p. 162. Ann. d’Hygiéne. t. xvi. p. 383. See 
also an “Essay on the use of Alcoholic Liquors,” by John Chadwick, M. D., London, 
1849, where proof is given of the presence of alcohol in the brain of drunkards after 
death. 

718 


——- 


a af OEE ' an 


BOOK V.| HEAT AND SUNSTROKE. [$ 880 


Yet, admitting that the phenomena of spontaneous combustion, so called, 
are incongruous with the laws of combustion so far as they are known, it does 
not follow that we should, with these chemists, reject as unworthy of belief 
the many curious and authentic facts on record. These may be true, although 
incorrectly accounted for. Indeed, there are many examples of the sponta- 
neous combustion of organic and inorganic matter, which chemistry is yet . 
unable satisfactorily to explain. But the number of cases now known, 
amounting to between forty and fifty (some of them, perhaps, indeed ficti- 
tious), the uniformity in the description of the phenomena, and of the age and 
habits of the persons attacked, require us to regard them as scientific facts yet 
unexplained. The following characters. are those generally described :— 

Ist. The extent and gravity of the burns is altogether out of proportion to 
the apparent external cause. 

2d. The persons have been inordinately addicted to the use of spirituous 
liquors. 

3d. Women are more frequently attacked than men. 

4th. The great majority were aged and corpulent. 

5th. The combustion of the body has been nearly total, while the aa faeces 
objects have been only slightly or not at all injured. 

6th. The flame has been difficult to extinguish. 

The deposit of a fat and fetid soot upon surrounding objects cannot be con- 
sidered as peculiar to this form of animal combustion. 


CHAPTER IV. 


HEAT AND SUNSTROKE. 


J. Symptoms, § 880. 
Il. Posr-morrem APPEARANCES, § 882. 


§ 880. I. Symptoms.—The frequency with which, in this country, fatal 
results are observed from exposure to heat or the direct rays of the sun, ren- 
ders necessary some notice of the prominent symptoms and post-mortem ap- 
pearances characterizing sudden illness or death from these causes. The 
report of the City Inspector of the city of New York, alone, shows two hun- 
dred and sixty deaths from coup de soleil during the summer of 1853, without 
including many cases designated as ‘“‘ congestion of the brain,” and the “ effects 
of cold water.” Jn the city of Philadelphia, during the months of June, July, 
and August, of the same year, the number of deaths reported under this head 
amounted to fifty-seven ; a number which is also certainly much below the true 
mortality. 

Rapid or sudden insensibility, after exposure to the intense heat of the sun 
in summer, usually occurs in those who are engaged in some laborious out- 
door occupation, but the same condition may result after exposure to artificial 
as well as solar heat. Dr. Swift, of New York, in his ‘ Observations on Ex- 

719 


§ $82] HEAT AND SUNSTROKE. [BOOK V. 


haustion from the Effects of Heat,’’(x) states that eleven patients were admit- 
ted into his hospital from the laundry of one of the principal hotels in that 
city, and that several were brought from a sugar refinery, where, after work- 
ing several hours in a close and overheated apartment, they fell down suddenly 
_ in a state of insensibility. Upon a comparison of the symptoms and lesions 
of these with those of the patients who had become exhausted after laboring in 
the sun, no distinction could be perceived. 

§ 881. The immediate cause of the symptoms or of the death of those who 
are said to be “‘struck’’ by the sun is not always the same. In the majority 
of cases the affection is one depending upon exhaustion from heat with, most 
probably, some molecular change in the blood, the character of which is not 
now understood, but which is ascribable to intense heat and prostration from 
fatigue. In other cases, however, which are comparatively few, inflammation 
of the brain or its membranes is the result of exposure to the sun’s heat, and, 
occasionally, apoplexy is produced. The symptoms vary, therefore, but a 
neglected case of the first variety may pass into the second. For interesting 
details relative to the mode of distinction between exhaustion from heat and 
insolation, we would refer the reader to the paper already quoted, and to a 
discussion on the subject in the Philadelphia College of Physicians. (y) 

§ 882. II. Post-mortem appearances.—In four cases (those of exhaustion) 
examined by Dr. Pepper, ‘‘the brain exhibited no indications of congestion, 
and nothing, in fact, of an unusual appearance.”’? Dr. P. was, however, struck 
with the appearance of the heart. In all of the four subjects it was pallid, 
flaccid, and softened, while the other muscles of the body were florid and firm. 
The lining membrane of the heart and of the large bloodvessels was of a very 
dark, almost purple color. The cavities of the heart contained but little 
blood, and no coagulum. The examinations were made from six to eight 
hours after death. , 

The following may serve as an example of death from the direct cerebral 
disturbance. 'Two women were washing clothes in the sun. One fell down 
in a state of insensibility, and remained so for twenty-four hours, but finally 
recovered under free depletion. On recovering, she described her sensation, 
when attacked, as though she had been suddenly struck upon the head. In 
the other case the attack was precisely similar. The patient died in twelve 
hours. Upon examination after death, blood was found effused beneath the 
membranes of the brain. 


(x) N. Y. Jour. of Med. July, 1854. 

(y) Transactions Coll. Phys. vol. iii. p. 99 et seq. ; also, Trans. of Med. Soc. of 
Pennsylvania, vol. iv. p. 112. For the most recent accounts of this affection, see 
Times & Gaz., Dec. 1858, p. 638; Levick, Am. Jour. of Med. Sci., Oct. 1858, p. 404; 
ib. Jan. 1859, p. 40; Martin, Lancet, Jan. 1859, pp. 2, 28, 52; ib. Mar., p. 315; Pir- 
rie, Lancet, May, 1859, pp. 505 and 533; Merrill, Am. Jour. of Med. Sci., July, 1859, p. 
118; Gordon, Edinb. Jour. v. 985; Longhurst, Lancet, Jan. 1860, p. 7. 


720 


BOOK V.]| | DEATH BY LIGHTNING. [$ 888 


C Hy as BT BR oN: 
Tol EISEN aN Ge, 


J. Symptoms, § 883. 
II. Post-MoRTEM APPEARANCES, § 884. 


§ 883. 1. Symptoms.—Cases of sudden death from this cause are quite 
common, and there can rarely, if ever, be any doubt of the agency by which 
the person is killed. This is usually sufficiently attested by the circumstances. 
The person may be found dead either in an open place or in a building. The 
fact of a thunderstorm having occurred will, of course, be generally known, 
and the traces left by the electric fluid upon the body and surrounding objects 
can hardly be misunderstood.(z) It is remarkable that in death from this 
cause, as in other kinds of instantaneous death, the body retains the position 
in which it was performing the last act of life. M. Boudin has collected 
numerous examples of this fact. According to Carden, quoted by Riviere, 
eight reapers, taking their food under an oak, were struck by lightning, and 
died, preserving their attitude—one of a man eating, another drinking. In 
Lorraine a woman and one of her children were killed, and remained in a 
sitting posture. At Dover a man killed with four horses was found sitting 
under a bush. A man of law at Troyes was struck dead by lightning when 
on horseback. On January 22, 1849, a goat was killed near Clermont, and 
found sitting upon his haunches, with a bunch of green leaves in its mouth. 


(z) It is not impossible that the stroke of lightning should have been neither pre- 
ceded nor followed by rain and wind, as is usual in thunderstorms. On Sunday, the 
2d of July, 1843, about 3 o’clock P. M., five negroes were simultaneously prostrated 
by a single stroke of lightning, on a plantation in Georgia. ‘The sun was shining 
brilliantly at the time, and a greater portion of the visible hemisphere presented the 
usual serenity of the summer sky. A singular and rather angry-looking cloud had 
for a short time previously been observed near the verge of the southeastern horizon, 
from which occasionally proceeded the low rumblings of very distant thunder. But 
nothing in the appearance of the heavens betokened the immediate proximity of a 
thunderstorm, or prepared them for the terrible electrical explosion which followed. 
Not a drop of rain had yet fallen, and the earth was quite dry. Such was the condi- 
tion of things when suddenly the whole atmosphere in the neighborhood was moment- 
arily illuminated by what appeared to be a universal fiash, which was accompanied, 
or rather succeeded, by a single astounding report. No dust was observed to rise from 
the ground, nor any other evidence of mechanical violence. No thunder was heard 
after this explosion; the cloud quickly dispersed, precipitating only a little rain a few 
minutes after the accident; and in the course of an hour the atmosphere resumed its 
usual tranquillity. The five negroes were taken up in a state of insensibility amount- 
ing to apparent death.” Three of them had been instantaneously killed. In two no 
marks of injury were discovered ; in the third there was a burnt spot of the size of a 
dollar under the right axilla. The other two recovered. One of these was a woman 
aged seventy years, and the singular fact is stated that in her the catamenial discharge, 
which had, in the ordinary course of nature, ceased for more than twenty years, was 
completely, and thus far (about a year afterwards) permanently, re-established. For 
this and many curious cases and ingenious speculations we beg leave to refer the 
reader to Le Conte on the effects of lightning, New York Journ. of Med. vol. iii. p. 295 ; 
also Hist. Méd. de la Foudre et de ses Effets sur Homme, &c., par M. Boudin, Ann. 
d’Hygiene, 1852. 

46 T21 


* 
§ 884] POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK V. 


A woman was struck while plucking a flower, and her body was found stand- 
ing nearly erect, with the flower in her hand. A priest was killed while on 
horseback; the animal reached home, a distance of two leagues, his dead 
master still sitting erect in the saddle. The clothes are torn and burnt; me- 
tallic articles upon the person, if in the track of the fluid, are fused; and there 
will be found upon some part of the person, usually about the head or shoul- 
ders, a reddened spot, a lacerated puncture, or a discolored streak, indicating 
the point at which the electric fluid has entered the body. <A great many 
cases have been reported in which images of trees and other objects have been 
found imprinted upon the skin of persons struck by lightning or exposed to 
its vivid glare.(zz) The amount of visible injury is generally trifling, and it 
is said that occasionally no marks whatever are perceived. In the latter case 
the person is probably killed by the agency of the returning stroke or electric 
shock, his body being the conductor by which the positive electricity of the 
earth is transmitted to a cloud which has come in near proximity to it. The 
absence of any external mark of injury may indeed leave us in doubt of the 
- mode by which death has been produced, but it at the same time equally nega- 
tives the suspicion of homicidal violence. In such cases death can therefore 
be attributed only to natural causes, or to those poisons which act rapidly. A 
post-mortem examination can hardly fail to show to which of these it is due, 
and, if required, a chemical analysis may be made of the contents of the sto- 
mach. These suggestions are, however, of but little practical importance, 
since attendant circumstances will, as we have already intimated, enable us to 
dispense with any examination of the body. 

§ 884. II. Post-mortem appearances.—In the examination of the bodies of 
two women, one 32 years of age and the other 17, who were struck instantly 
dead by a flash of lightning as they were seated spinning near the fireplace, 
the following observations of the external appearances were made by Dr. 
Martin twenty hours after death. In both bodies putrefaction had begun, 
the abdomen was already distended and of a bluish color, and dissolved blood 
flowed from the mouth and nose. On one of them the whole surface of the 
neck and breast was covered with reddish-brown spots, under which, however, 
the arborescent tracks of the electric fire could be traced, until uniting into 
three larger branches, they ended in the left lumbar region, in an oblong burn, 
of a dark-red color, six inches long and three broad, and penetrating into the 
substance of the true skin, under which, however, there was no lesions discover- 
able. The skin was here and there, in the course of the marks, of a parch- 
ment-like consistence. On the other body, which was that of the young girl, 
the electric fluid appeared to have entered over the left temple, as here a toler- 
ably deep scorched spot was to be seen; the eyebrows and lashes on this side 
were burnt. The skin was striped and spotted, exactly as in the preceding 
case. The neckerchiefs worn by both these females were torn to rags, but did 
not exhibit the slightest trace of combustion, nor was any other part of their 
clothing, or of the furniture of the house, burnt in the least degree.(a@) Some- 


(zz) Poey, Med. Times and Gazette, March, 1857, p. 817; and Boudin, loc. cit. 
(a) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1844, p. 193: 


122 


“BOOK v.] COLD. [$ 886 


times, however, there is considerable external injury, the skin being contused 
and lacerated, but it does not appear that there is ever any actual burning of 
the skin, unless the clothes have been set on fire by the electric current. The 
idea that the blood remains fluid in persons struck by lightning, and that putre- 
faction occurs at a very early period, is not sustained by the observation of all 
authors upon the subject, but it is probable that such is the general rule in the 
human subject. It is also generally supposed that rigidity is very slight or is 
absent after death from this cause. But it is not uniformly so. A case is 
reported by Maerklin in which cadaveric rigidity began within three or four 
hours after death, and in the course of twenty-four hours reached a very high 
degree. (aa) 


CHA PRE RB VL. 
COLD: 


I. Symptoms, § 885. 
II. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 886. 

§ 885. I. Symptoms.—Where the body of a person is found who is supposed 
to have perished from exposure to cold, the chief inquiries which require atten- 
tion are, whether the cold was the sole cause of death, and if not, what were 
the additional causes, or whether the disease or injury, if any, was not in itself 
suddenly fatal; the cold having had nothing to do with the result. 

The effect of intense cold upon the human body is too familiar to need illus- 
tration. After prolonged exposure to its influence, the whole body becomes 
benumbed, the respiration oppressed, and the head heavy. Perception and 
sensation are obtunded, the mind wanders, an invincible lethargy steals over 
the senses, the limbs become paralyzed, and the unfortunate person, overcome 
with drowsiness and exhaustion, sinks down into apparent death. Unless 
speedy relief is afforded, this condition soon merges into real death. Accord- 
ing to Larrey, death is preceded by a general pallor, stupor, difficulty of speech, 
dimness of sight, and sometimes a total loss of these functions. In the retreat 
from Moscow, some men, he says, led by their comrades, were able to march 
for a considerable time in this condition. But their limbs soon refused to sup- 
port them, they reeled like drunken men, and fell benumbed and lethargic, and 
soon expired. Almost all the men who perished in this manner were found | 
lying with their faces to the ground. 

§ 886. IL. Post-moriem appearances.—The post-mortem examinations 
which have been made of persons dying from cold, have shown that the most 
constant appearance, is an extreme congestion of the venous system in the 
principal organs of the body, but especially in the brain. Serous effusion into 
the ventricles, or under the arachnoid, is also met with. Dr. Kellie observed 
it in two cases, and Professor Blosfeld mentions it in three of six cases of 
death by cold.(b) 


(aa) Casper’s Vierteljarhs. xvi. 332. 

(b) Beck’s Med. Jour. vol. ii. 68 ; Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1845, p. 245. One hundred 
legal autopsies made in the Institute for instruction in Forensic Medicine in the Rus- 
sian University at Kasan. “ 

723 


§ 888] DEATH FROM STARVATION, [BOOK V. 


Such are the only positive results of post-mortem investigations. Unless 
the examiner knew the circumstances in which the body was found, which 
favored the supposition of death from cold, he could not possibly assert from 
these signs, that death had resulted from this cause. Practically, therefore, 
they are of little importance except in those cases in which, from the absence 
of other injuries, and of serious disease, and from a knowledge of the circum- 
stances under which the body was found, the cause of death is already rendered 
probable. Adults, who perish in this manner, are generally either intoxicated 
or else helpless and infirm. The intemperate, the aged, or those whose nervous 
energy is exhausted by long watching, fatigue, hunger, or depressing emotions, 
succumb to this form of death much more speedily than the temperate and 
vigorous. Children, and above all, infants, can sustain only a moderate degree 
of cold. Hence intoxication, old age, and privation, as well as actual disease, 
must be enumerated as predisposing causes of death from cold. 

-§ 887. If marks of violence be found upon the body, they must be judged 
according to the rules already laid down in the chapter on wounds. If neces- 
sarily mortal, the influence of cold need not be considered, but in all other 
cases, it is obvious that cold must have greatly accelerated the fatal result. 
The same remarks are applicable when the subject is very young. It 
must be remembered, however, that cold itself may here be more readily em- 
ployed as a homicidal agent, and that possibly the other marks of ill-treatment 
may be few or none. An atrocious case of murder by cold has been frequently 
quoted, on account of the rarity of examples of the kind. A man and his 
wife, at Lyons, were tried for the murder of their daughter, a girl aged eleven, 
under the following circumstances. On the 28th of December, at a time when 
there was a severe degree of cold, the female prisoner compelled the deceased 
to get out of her bed, and place herself in a vessel of ice-cold water. The 
deceased complained of exhaustion and dimness of sight; the prisoner then 
threw a pail of iced-water upon her head, soon after which the child expired.(c) 


CHAPTER VII. 
STARVATION. 


I. Mopg, § 888. 
II. Perron, § 889. 
III. Symptoms, § 890. 
IV. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 891. 


§ 888. I. Mode.—A person may starve himself to death; he may perish 
from the want of food, being unable to procure, to swallow, or to digest it, or 
he may purposely be deprived of it. Medical evidence can only attempt to 
establish the fact of death by starvation, and can, in many cases, indicate the 
physical cause of it, but cannot, of course, determine whether the act was 
voluntary or homicidal. In the case of young children, however, homicidal 
intentions may be inferred, while in adults, on the contrary, starvation is 


(c) Ann. d’Hyg. 1831, p. 207. 


BOOK V.| DEATH FROM STARVATION. [$ 889 


mostly a suicidal act.(cc) The mode of starvation is not always the same. 
In some cases the privation of suitable nourishment is gradual, and death ensues 
only after a considerable period; in others, although no solid food is.swallowed, 
life is prolonged by the use of a little water, and in others, again, after a 
variable period of total abstinence from food or drink, the imperative demands 
of nature are gratified, perhaps too freely and too late to save life. 

§ 889. II. Period.—The period at which death ensues after starvation, is 
therefore dependent not only upon the age and constitutional powers of the 
individual, but also upon the foregoing varieties in the manner in which it is 
effected. It cannot be determined with precision. Wonderful examples of 
prolonged abstinence may be found in abundance in the older works, and are 
not wanting in our own day. But the numerous instances in which trickery 
has been detected, should make us wholly incredulous of their genuineness. 
Instances of abstinence for months, and even years, are gravely related; but it 
is probable that there is no well-authenticated case of entire abstinence from 
food and drink for more than thirty days, while on the other hand it is highly 
probable, that in the majority of cases, death takes place within a week or ten 
days. Dr. Gadermann reports a case, however, in which for twenty-three days 
all liquid or solid nourishment was refused, the person being bent upon self- 
destruction. At the end of this time he ate and drank greedily, which did not 
however avail him; he died shortly afterwards. The body was almost a skele- 
ton. In this case the author says, there could not be the slightest suspicion 
of deception.(d) Professor M’Naughten has published a case where a man 
lived fifty-four days on water alone.(e) In another case, of a prisoner at 
Toulouse, who resorted to starvation to avoid punishment, life was prolonged 
to the fifty-eighth day. He drank water occasionally. Valentin refers to the 
case of a woman who lived seventy-eight days on water and lemon-juice.(/) 
In miciee case a man lived sixty days on a little water and syrup of orgeat.(g) 
A man aged 65 years was accidentally shut up in a coal mine. He remained 
there twenty-three days before he was discovered, almost completely exhausted. 
He had been able to procure a small quantity of dirty water during the first 
ten days of his confinement. Notwithstanding every effort was made to save 
him, he died three days after he was found.(h) 

Two very interesting cases of prolonged abstinence in persons afflicted with 
slight mental derangement, or melancholy, are related by Ir. Taylor, of Ohio. 
In one, after two periods of fasting, of ten and fourteen days respectively, 
during the last of which he took neither food nor water, this gentleman, on 
the fifteenth day, took a little water, and then at intervals a small quantity 
of milk in it. He died about one hundred days afterwards, having lived in 
‘an almost constant state of abstinence.’? In the other, a little water was 
taken on the twelfth day after complete abstinence from food and drink, and 
a gill every twenty-four hours afterwards for thirty-nine successive days, when 


(cc) A case is related in Henke’s Zeitschrift, lxxix. 147, in which a man seventy- 
seven years old was killed by ill treatment and starvation. His assassins were his 
own daughter and his son-in-law. 

(d) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1848, 3 H. (e) Am. Journ. Med. Sci. vi. 543. 

(f) Lehrb. der Physiol. vol. i. p. 218. (g) Archiv. gén. xxvii. p. 180. 

(h) Lond. Med. Gaz. xvii. 389. 

T25 


§ 891] POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. [BOOK V. 


he died. For the last seventy-two days prior to his death, he had no fecal 
evacuation, but passed urine in small quantities every three or four days.(?) 

Under the subsequent topic of ‘Priority of Death,” or “Survivorship,” a 
case will be found of a party of miners who survived over fourteen days with- 
out food, without any permanent serious consequences. 

§ 890. III. Symptoms.—“ Dr. Donovan gives the following description of 
those who suffered from the Irish famine in 1847. They described the pain 
of hunger as at first very acute, but said, that after twenty-four hours had 
been passed without food, the pain subsided, and was succeeded by a feeling of 
weakness and sinking, experienced principally in the epigastric region, accom- 
panied with insatiable thirst, a strong desire for cold water, and a distressing 
feeling of coldness over the whole body. In a short time, the face and limbs 
became frightfully emaciated, the eyes acquired a most peculiar stare, the skin 
exhaled a peculiar and offensive fetor, and was covered with a brownish, 
filthy-looking coating, almost as indelible as varnish. The sufferer tottered 

in walking, like a drunken man; his voice became weak, like that of a person 
in cholera; he whined like a child, and burst into tears on the slightest occa- 
sion. In respect to the mental faculties, their prostration kept pace with the 
general wreck of bodily power; in many there was a state of imbecility ; in 
some, almost complete idiotism; but in no instance was there delirium or 


mania, which is often described as a consequence of protracted abstinence . 


among shipwrecked mariners.’’(j) 

§ 891. IV. Post-mortem appearances.-—In a child, six months old, which 
was starved to death by its mother, the following conditions were observed. 
Excessive emaciation ; the body weighed only six pounds and a half, and the 
thickest part of the thigh measured only an inch and a quarter in diameter. 
There was no fat anywhere to be found, not even in the omentum, and only a 
small amount of blood in the body. There was no food in the stomach or 
intestines. A trifling quantity of old and hardened feces remained in the 
rectum. Extreme contraction of the stomach and all the intestines existed. (/) 
Wildberg examined the body of a man 50 years of age, who died of hunger, 
seven days after being buried in the ruins of a falling house; he was known 
to have been healthy before the accident. The body was extremely emaciated, 
being reduced almost to a skeleton ; the eyes stood open, and were highly in- 
jected; the mouth and tongue exceedingly dry; and the abdomen so flat, that 
the anterior wall lay almost in contact with the spine. Although the body 
was still fresh, it exhaled a peculiar penetrating fetor, different from that of 
putrefaction. The lungs were shrivelled and of a yellowish white color, the 
heart small and flaccid, and a small quantity of loosely coagulated and highly 
offensive blood was found in it and in the great vessels. In the abdomen 
there was not a trace of adipose tissue remaining; the stomach was very much 
shrunken, and contained a little dark and viscid liquid. The mucous surface 
was corroded in several places. The intestines were pale and contracted, and 


(7) Am. Journ. Med. Sci., Jan. 1851. In the same place will be found some refer- 
ences to remarkable cases of abstinence by the editor, Dr. Hays. 

(7) Taylor, Med. Jur., from Donovan, Dub. Med. Press, Feb. 1848. 

(k) Rothamel, Henke’s Zeitsch., 1845, 3 H. 


726 


BOOK V.] SUFFOCATION, [$ 893 


entirely empty, with the exception of a little greenish fluid in the small intes- 
tine, and in the large a very small quantity of dry excrement. 

The liver was pale, the gall-bladder very much distended, with thick, dark- 
brown bile, which, exuding through its coats, had tinged all the neighboring 
viscera. All the other abdominal organs were small, flaccid, and contained 
but little blood ; in the bladder, the internal coat of which had an inflamed 
appearance, there was found a little dark and fetid urine. The brain and its 
membranes were extremely anemic, and the former firm anddry. In addition 
to this description, it may be stated that Dr. Donovan found, in some cases 
inspected by him, during the Irish famine, a peculiarly thin condition of the 
small intestines, ‘‘ which, in such cases, were so transparent, that if the de- 
ceased had taken any food immediately before death, the contents would be. 
seen through the coats of the bowel; on one occasion (at an inquest) he was 
able to recognize a portion of raw green cabbage in the duodenum of a man 
who had died of inanition.” The above description, from Wildberg, coincides 
very closely with the statements of other observers, and may probably be as- 
sumed as correct when there is no other cause of death present. It is further 
substantiated by the observation of Casper, in a case where, from occlusion of 
the mouth by disease, death took place from hunger.(/) 

§ 892. In estimating the value of the post-mortem appearances, as evidence 
of death from starvation, it should be remembered, that unless there is absence 
of disease sufficient to have induced the emaciation and anemic condition 
described, death cannot be attributed to starvation as its cause. ‘There are 
many diseases which would produce a similar condition of the body—some by 
mechanical obstruction to the ingestion or chylification of the food, and others 
by their baleful effect upon the system generally. Hence, the medical witness 
should be extremely cautious in attributing, upon the grounds of a post- 
mortem inspection alone, the death of the individual to starvation, especially 
if the person have been the subject of any chronic disease. 


CHARTER iV LIL. 
SURE OCA ULON: 


I. Post-MORTEM APPEARANCES, § 894. 
II. AcciDENTAL, § 895. 
III. Svicrpat, § 896. 
IV. Homicipat, § 897. 


€ 893. Although the general definition of this word may not improperly 
include all those modes of death in which the respiration is mechanically pre- 
vented, yet, as hanging, strangulation, and drowning require a separate con- 
sideration, it remains for us here to speak only of those modes of suffocation 
not elsewhere discussed. ‘These are exceedingly numerous, and comprise all 
those cases in which by any means air is excluded from the larynx, or the 
chest prevented from expanding to receive it. 


(1) Casper, Gericht. Leichendff, 2tes Hundert. Fall. 99. 
T27 


§ 894] SUFFOCATION. [BOOK Vv. 


§ 894. I. Post-mortem appearances.—These, as Casper has pointed. out, 
will be found to differ more or less according to whether death has been sudden 
or prolonged, whether it was produced by syncope or by congestion of the in- 
ternal organs, and whether the person was scantily or abundantly furnished with 
blood. Lividity and turgescence of the face, fluidity of the blood, and san- 
guineous engorgement of the thoracic and abdominal viscera are the general 
and most constant features. Casper pronounces erroneous the opinion that 
cadaveric rigidity is absent after death by suffocation, and declares that it 
exists neither more nor less than in other cases. The heat of the body, and 
particularly of the internal organs, is of longer duration than usual; the 
blood is uniformly more liquid, and of a darker color, than is usual except 
after death from putrid fevers, septic poisons, &c., and hence it flows more 
abundantly when sections of the vascular organs, as the brain, are made. 
Bloody infiltration of the eyes and eyelids, and minute ecchymosis of the neck 
and chest, are common.(m) The lungs, according to Casper, are generally 
engorged, as well as the right side of the heart and the pulmonary arteries, 
while the left cavities of this organ contain little or no blood. M. Tardieu, 
on the other hand, declares that in general the lungs do not present the 
characters usually attributable to asphyxia, being in the majority of cases 
of moderate volume, rosy or even pale, and sometimes engorged about the 
base and posterior portion.(n) Underneath the scalp and the pulmonary 
pleura, on the lining membrane of the heart and aorta, and in the mucous 
membrane of the larynx and trachea, within and upon the thymus gland, 
bloody points, spots, and stripes, resembling ecchymoses, but more strictly 
circumscribed, may be found, which are probably due to the efforts of in- 
spiration made when no air can enter the lungs, and when of course the 
struggle to breathe forces the blood through the walls of the vessels. The 
permanence of these spots renders them valuable signs. M. Tardieu found 
them under the pleura of a foetus which had been for ten months in a privy 
well. Frequently, but not in every case, a pale-reddish foam is found in 
the trachea and bronchia, the lining membrane of which is pale or dusky, 
according to the condition of the lungs. Congestion of the kidneys is 
another and peculiar indication of this mode of death. On the other hand, 
projection of the tongue between the teeth is far from peculiar to death by 
suffocation, and the same remark is true of foam upon the lips. It is evident 
that the greater number of these signs are valuable only in proportion to the 


(m) The following case proves the necessity of caution in regard to the significance 
of such spots. A watchmaker, aged fifty years, was found dead upon the floor of his 
chamber, at nine o’clock in the evening. He had-not been seen since the previous 
evening. During the day several persons had knocked at his door in vain, and it 
was at last perceived that a forcible entrance had been made. This circumstance 
suggested that the man had been assassinated. On examining the body, no trace of 
violence was discovered, but upon the neck and chest were many spots resembling those 
of purpura; no similar spots were found in the pleura. The brain and lungs were 
strongly congested, and the tongue and lips were wounded by the teeth. It was clear 
that death had occurred in an epileptiform attack, and the man was found to have 
formerly been subject to this disease. Robbers, supposing the occupant of the room 
absent, had effected an entrance, but probably alarmed at the sight of the corpse, had 
fled.—Annales d’ Hygiene, 2eme sér., iv. 389. 

(nr) Annales d’Hygiéne, 2éme sér., iv. 378. 


728 


BOOK V.] ACCIDENTAL SUFFOCATION. [$ 895 


freshness of the body; when once decomposition has set in, they gradually 
lose their distinctness and their significance. It will be observed, also, that 
the above signs are those merely of asphyxia in general. In hanging, strangu- 
lation, and drowning, there are one or more signs characteristic of the agent 
by which life is extinguished, the presence of which, together with the general 
signs of this kind of death, is almost if not quite conclusive. But in other 
modes of suffocation, if any trace of the instrumentality by which death was 
produced is found, it will be most probably due, in homicidal cases, to haste 
on the part of the assassin, and yet cannot afford any addition to the medical 
evidence. Thus, if a person have been smothered with the bedclothes, or 
suffocated by a hand held before the mouth, or by compression of the chest, a 
distinct and satisfactory indication of the fact will seldom be had. For this 
reason the medical examiner will often be at a loss whether to ascribe the 
death to natural or to violent causes. The case may be one of apoplexy, of 
faucial disease, or of pulmonary congestion, or may be due to a variety of 
accidental causes, not apparent without a careful inspection of the body. This 
must, therefore, in all cases where it is important to remove doubt, be con- 
ducted in the most careful und searching manner. The absence of any cha- 
racteristic mark to indicate the mode of death gives a latitude to conjecture, 
and to the proposition of general questions, which, in case of trial, will 
seriously embarass the physician. If no accidental cause, such as a foreign 
body in the larynx, nor any evidence of disease fatal by the production of 
asphyxia be discovered, the physician should still be guarded in his opinion, 
and leave the explanation of the manner of the death to those whose duty it 
is to investigate the collateral evidence. This is of greater weight than the 
medical testimony, for while the physician has merely to declare the proba- 
bility of the person having died suddenly by suffocation, the collateral evidence 
must establish the instrumentality by which the act was done. In cases where 
marks of other violence are found upon the body, or the hands and feet are 
tied, these facts will, of course, require an interpretation from the medical 
witness. When a dead body is discovered in sand, earth, ashes, or similar’ 
substance, the question whether the person was alive or dead when placed 
there, must arise. From experiment and observation, M. Tardieu concludes 
that if the substance has reached the esophagus or stomach, it must have been 
during life; and that if the body was buried after death the substance will 
seldom penetrate beyond the entrance of the mouth and nostrils; some traces 
of it may occasionally be found in the fauces, and quite exceptionally in the 
air-passages, but in the cesophagus and stomach, never. 

§ 895. IL. Accidental suffocation.—M. Tardieu distributes cases of suffo- 
cation into four groups: J. When the mouth and nostrils are obstructed by 
the hands or other foreign body ; 2. When death is produced by pressure upon 
the chest or the abdomen; 3. Burial in earth, sand, ashes, snow, &c.; 4. In- 
closure in a narrow space, as a box, or closet, &c. The modes in which acci- 
dental suffocation occurs. are very numerous. They bear, however, only upon 
the question of survivance. In those cases in which persons are buried alive 
under banks of earth, covered up in the ruins of falling houses, or in any way 

129 


§ 896] SUICIDAL SUFFOCATION. [BOOK Vv. 


confined in a narrow space in which the air becomes unfit for the sustenance of 
life, they perish by suffocation. 

Those, however, in which a foreign body becoming impacted in the air 
passages causes death by suffocation, are more important, because often the 
cause of death is not at all suspected. This accident happens usually from 
over-haste in eating, but an instance has been reported in which it occurred 
probably during the act of vomiting. The case was an unusual one, from 
the fact that the man who fell a victim to the accident was entirely alone 
at the time of his death. Hence, a suspicion of violence might have been 
entertained, had not the evident cause of death, the vomited food, been found 
in the larynx.(o) A case of fatal asphyxia has occurred from the detachment 
of a diseased bronchial gland which became impacted in the larynx,(p) and 
another, in which a lumbricus ascended from the stomach and entered the 
larynx.(qg) A case is recorded of a child,(r) three years of age, who while 
eating her dinner was suddenly seized with symptoms of suffocation, the face 
becoming turgid, the lips livid, and the respiration seemingly arrested. <A 
_ probang was passed to the stomach, and tracheotomy performed, but no 
reaction took place. On examination after death, a constriction of the lower 
part of the esophagus, reducing its calibre to that of a quill, was found, but 
the stomach was filled with food. The vertebre from the fifth to the ninth 
dorsal were softened or broken down, and the corresponding portion of the 
spinal ‘marrow was surrounded with scrofulous matter. In this disease the 
cause of the suffocation probably originated, but its mode of action cannot be 
explained. The case, however, supposing it to be accurately reported, presents 
a mode of suffocation hitherto without example. Children are peculiarly liable 
to suffocation from the introduction of peas, marbles, &c., into their mouths. 
In the great majority of these cases, however, as well as in those of sudden 
death from diseases which leave the aspect of suffocation upon the body, 
the cause of death will be known, and no examination required. Cases also 
sometimes occur in which persons, helpless from age, infirmity, or intoxica- 
tion, are found with their face buried in dust, snow, and other such sub- 
stances. 'The cause of death is here self-evident, since the slightest effort. 
would have enabled the person to escape. Still another form of accidental 
suffocation may be mentioned as occurring to young children, in being overlaid 
by persons with whom they sleep.(s) 

§ 896. Ill. Suicidal suffocation.—The possibility of suffocation being 
made a voluntary act, is undoubted ; but this mode of suicide must be extremely 


(0) Henke’s Zeitsch. 1853,4H. A similar case may be found in the Hd. Med. and 
Surg. Journ. April, 1844, p. 390, and a more recent one, in the Lond. Times and Gaz. 
April, 1859, p. 419. Ina case related in the Lancet (March, 1850, p. 313), a person 
having died’suddenly after eating, previous to which he had been engaged in a scufile, 
the man with whom he had been fighting was arrested on a charge of manslaughter. A 
post-mortem examination disclosed the cause of death to be a piece of meat he in 
the throat. The prisoner was therefore discharged. 

(p) Edwardes, Med.-Chir. Trans. xxxvii. 151. 

(q) Aronsohn, Arch. Gén. Oct. 1855, p. 475. 

(r) Times and Gaz. July, 1855, p. 88. 

(s) The Prussian penal code provides punishment by imprisonment for mothers and 
nurses who take children under two years of age to bed with them.—Casper. 


730 


BOOK V.] SUICIDAL SUFFOCATION. [$ 896 


uncommon. The only manner in which, without the aid of others, it has 
been accomplished, is either by an alleged retroversion of the tongue (a power 
which few if any possess), or by a mechanical obstruction of the mouth and 
fauces, with various articles. In the latter case, the presumption will, of 
course, be in favor of homicide. Several instances of the sort referred to are 
related by Dr. Taylor, who also quotes the remarkable case of a woman who 
placed herself in bed under the bedclothes, and desired her young child to 
pile several articles of furniture upon her. When found, some hours afterwards, 
she was dead. 

One of the most remarkable cases of suicidal suffocation occurred in Ger- 
many. It is related by Dr. Roth, and the following is an abridgment, in the 
Lond. Med. Gazette, from the original, in Henke’s Zeitschrift :— 

The deceased was well formed, about the middle height, and about 25 years 
of age. She had been seen to retire to her sleeping-room, at nine o’clock one 
evening, in her usual state of health and spirits. The apartment was only 
separated by a partition from the one in which her master and mistress slept, 
and was over a room occupied by others of the household. At half-past five 
o’clock on the following morning, the master knocked against the partition to 
awaken H., but receiving no answer, supposed she had risen and gone out to 
her work. On getting up, however, he found all the doors and windows of 
the house closed, when he went into the servants’ room, but did not find her 
there. On the bed was an axe of a peculiar shape, employed in that part of 
the country for clipping off branches from the trees, and which used to hang 
behind the door. The blade of the axe rested against the back of the bed, and 
the handle on the bed. Beside it lay the best bonnet, which she used to keep 
in her chest. The bed appeared to have been slept on. After searching the 
well, lest she had drowned herself, H.’s father was sent for, from a neighbor- 
ing village. On his arrival, he suggested that the chest should be opened to 
learn in what trim his daughter had left the place. Finding the chest locked, 
and the key missing, a blacksmith was got to force it open, when the body of 
the servant was discovered in the chest, lying in a prone position, on the left 
side, with its knees drawn up, the upper extremities flexed, and the missing 
key grasped in the right hand. The chest was about four and a half feet 
in length, and of proportionate depth. It locked itself on the fall of the 
lid, and could not be opened from the inside. The corpse was nearly 
dressed, and the vest (camisole) was put on with its inner side out. On the 
following day, the body, which had been removed and laid on a bed, was viewed 
by the reporter. The cuticle was abraded and reddish-brown at seven or eight 
points, about the centre and upper part of the forehead. The largest of these 
abrasions corresponded with the thick part of the axe, and underneath them, 
the integuments were slightly swollen and bluish. The face and upper part 
of the chest were mottled with cadaveric lividity, the ears were blue, the eye- 
lids closed, the conjunctive injected, and the pupils dilated. There was bloody 
froth about the lips and nostrils, partly dry, partly fresh, and giving this part 
of the face a blood-stained appearance. Bloody froth was issuing at the time 
from the right nostril. The mouth readily opened, showing the tongue in 
its natural position. The key was still grasped in the right hand. With the 

| 731 


§ 897] HOMICIDAL SUFFOCATION, [BOOK V. 


‘exception of the abrasions on the forehead, no traces of injury were detected 
on the body. The clothes were entire. 

From the foregoing circumstances, the reporter was of opinion that the 
deceased had employed the axe which hung in her room, to kill herself, in the 
way she had seen others slaughter oxen, and that, failing in the attempt, and, 
perhaps, ashamed of the injuries on her forehead, she had then shut herself up 
in her chest, and perished by smothering. This conclusion satisfied the law 
authorities so completely, that they decided that there was no necessity for 
making a post-mortem inspection. 

§ 897. IV. Homicidal suffocation.—Those who are usually the victims of 
this form of murder, are infants and the aged, or those who are otherwise 
helpless. So slight a degree of resistance is necessary to defeat the purpose 
of the assassin, that a great disproportion of strength must exist for the at- 
tempt to be successful. Nevertheless, those miserable wretches, Burke and his 
accomplices, reduced murder by suffocation to a system, choosing it as the - 
mode of death most likely to leave no marks of crime behind it. The mur- 
derer bore with his whole weight upon the breast of his victim, and with his 
hands covered forcibly the mouth and nostrils till death came on. The body 
of one of the victims presented, according to Dr. Christison, so few traces of 
injury, that without the assistance of proof from other sources, it would have 
been impossible to have declared that the death was not a natural one. In 
a case related by Dr. Casper, the body of a rich old lady, who lived in one 
of the most frequented streets of Berlin, was found one morning, in her bed, 
her head buried among the pillows, and heaped over with bedclothes. Her 
hands were tied fast behind her back, and her legs bound together by a band, 
including also her under clothing. The room being warm, the body was 
rapidly decomposing, the head was blackish green, and the epidermis was 
loose. Atthe same time the eyes were prominent and injected, and the tongue 
swollen and protruding. Some marks were found upon the neck, which, being 
hard and distinct in color from the surrounding skin, were thought to indicate 
an attempt at strangulation. Everything was in the greatest disorder in the 
chamber, the drawers and cabinets being rifled of their contents. The opinion 
of the examiners was that death resulted from asphyxia, produced both by 
strangulation and suffocation. (¢) 


(t) The following is an extremely interesting case in this connection; it is reported 
by Dr. Charles A. Lee, in the N. Y. Journal of Medicine, July, 1844:— 

A case of trial for murder, by suffocation, lately came before the Court of Oyer and 
Terminer of the City of New York, Judge William Kent presiding, in which William 
Leitga, the prisoner, was accused of thus destroying his wife, and afterwards setting 
fire to her bed, by which the body was considerably burned before the fire was disco- 
vered and arrested. It appeared in evidence that they had lived very unhappily to- 
gether, both being addicted to habits of intemperance, and had been quarrelling at one 
or two o’clock in the morning on which the fire took place (it being discovered about 
six o’clock), the deceased was found lying on a cot, a little on her right side, with a 
large pillow over her feet, but not covering the whole head: the arms bent up and 
lying across the breast under the pillow, which was partly burnt—her limbs were burnt 
to the knees, and also her right arm, the rest of the body not much burnt—the coun- 
tenance was distorted, the eyes open, and the tongue protruded from the mouth nearly 
aninch. The cot on which she lay was about four feet from the stove; there was no 
appearance of fire between the cot and the stove; but everything showed that the fire 
had commenced at the foot of the cot and worked up: an empty lamp lay on the floor 


732 


BOOK V.| SUFFOCATION, [$ 898 


§ 898. Still another circumstance under which death may be accomplished 
by suffocation, will be found in some cases of rape. An instructive example 


about three feet from the foot of the cot—bedclothes were lying about the room, and 
everything indicating that there had been a violent quarrel. As the testimony of Dr. 
Rogers contains the principal facts in the case, we present it in detail :-— 

Dr. James L. Rogers testified, that “he saw the body about 8 o’clock in the morning 
of October 29th, 1843; the body was slightly inclined to the right; the arms were up, 
inclining to the breast, but not on it; the lower part of the right arm and hand were 
burnt to a crisp; the hair was burnt off the top of her head; the left cheek was burnt 
on a place about as large as half a dollar; the transparent part of the left eye was 
scorched; the body was burnt across the stomach down ; below the knee the flesh was 
burnt almost entirely off—above the knee to the abdomen, it had the appearance of a 
ham being smoked ; there was no burn on any other portion of the body except the 
left ear; the mouth was not burnt; the tongue protruded ; the countenance perfectly 
calm; no mark was perceptible about the neck or any other place, except a small 
flesh wound in the right side of the eye. On dissection, the brain was found perfectly 
natural—stomach also healthy, containing about two spoonfuls of liquid matter; the 
bowels were perfectly healthy, as were the kidneys, except that they all appeared 
somewhat congested ; the lungs and heart were healthy, but the vessels of the lungs 
were deluged with dark venous blood, as was the right side of the heart; the left side 
of the heart was nearly free of blood.” . 

The District Attorney asked, What was his opinion of the cause of death? 

Witness. —“ In the absence of all natural causes, of which there were none, I should 
say she died from stoppage or prevention of air from the lungs; it may be called suf- 
focation: the same appearances would be produced, either by the breath being stopped 
by something placed over the nose and mouth, or by drowning. I observed no ap- 
pearance of intoxication; I think I never examined a body where there was a more 
healthy appearance than that presented. Where there is a dense smoke of carbonic 
acid gas from the burning of charcoal, the same appearances of the lungs and heart 
would exist in some measure, but not so fully, as the air in such cases continues par- 
tially to have effect. The fact that one eye was burnt, the placid state of the counte- 
nance (this was denied by other witnesses who first saw the body, and can hardly be 
presumed from the protruding of the tongue, &c.), and the position in which she lay, 
led to the conclusion that she must have died before the fire. The probability is, that 
if the person had been alive when the fire reached her, she would have shut her eyes, 
and one of them would not have been burnt. There was no blister in the eye, as 
there would have been, had it been burned during life. There was also no red line 
on the body to where the fire came, which is also a very certain sign of burning before 
death.” 

Cross-examined.—“ In the case of a person who dies of suffocation there is a conges- 
tion of the brain; the eyeballs are distended, and there is at all times” (in drunkards 
dying thus) “‘a smell of alcohol in the stomach and brain.” 

Mr. Brady asked the witness, if a person got intoxicated and in a position to pre- 
vent respiration, whether the same appearances would not be presented, as in the pre- 
sent case? 

Witness. —“ It would depend upon this position. If the head was down and respi- 
ration stopped there might be a paralysis; it is very difficult for persons to suffocate 
themselves. If paralysis did occur from intoxication, the brain would show it; but 
there was no appearance of the kind in the present case at all. There was hardly the 
usual quantity of water in the brain.” 

Brady.—*“ Could not this woman have got so beastly drunk, that she might have 
got in a position to suffocate ?” 

Witness. —“ Such might have been the case, but it would show itself in the brain.” 

Brady.—‘ Would you say, that she did not go to bed drunk that night ?” 

Witness. —‘‘ In the absence of all appearance or symptom to that effect, we were in- 
duced to believe that there was nothing to justify a supposition of the kind. Ifa per- 
son died of intoxication, the brain would show it, and in persons habituated to intoxi- 
cation, there would be a morbid appearance about the stomach and lungs—a bloated 
countenance, and other marks which would distinguish it. Suffocation and apoplexy 
present different appearances after death; in the first case the lungs cease their fanc- 
tions for want of air, yet the blood passes to the brain and returns, as there is nothing 
in the neck to prevent it; but in apoplexy or strangulation, as in the case of a cord 
round the neck, the blood stops and the brain exhibits the effect. In suffocation, the 
breath may be stopped in a minute or half a minute, so that a person would cease to 
struggle, andin ten minutes bedead. There was an indentation of a key on the left 
breast of the deceased, which might have been made by a heavy arm pressing on it.” 


133 


§ 898] SUFFOCATION. [BOOK V. 


_of this kind will be found in the following German case. In it, the subsequent 
confession of the criminal confirmed the accuracy of the opinion given by the 


Dr. Putnam testified to nearly the same effect. He said: “That none of the viscera 
exhibited any marks of intemperance; that if death had been so caused, the brain, 
stomach, and countenance would show it; the brain particularly would be congested. 
In death by strangulation, there would probably be proof of violence perceptible about 
the neck, and the tongue would ordinarily protrude ; it generally produces apoplexy. 
Suffocation may be produced by stopping the respiratory organs, or by inhaling gases. 
To distinguish which of these causes, one must know the attending circumstances. A 
person dying of suffocation by inhaling carbonic acid gas, would exhibit some change 
of countenance. I saw nothing in the body externally or internally, that could account 
fordeath. Taking everything into consideration, I conclude the death to have happened 
from suffocation. <A pillow laid over the nose and mouth, produces such death in two 
or three minutes, without external marks. I believe the fire to have been communi- 
cated to the body after death.”’ 

Cross-examined.—* My opinions have been formed from reading; never attended 
but four post-mortem examinations ; never of one who died from suffocation from any 
eause. Congestion of the brain would certainly be found after death from intoxica- 
tion ; so would also inflammation of the stomach. Post-mortem examination was made 
at 11 o’clock A.M. Stomach appeared as if she had not eaten for six or eight hours ; 
had she gone to bed drunk at one or two o’clock the night before, should expect to 
find evidence of the fact. I should not expect to find a morbid state of the stomach 
in the case of a person who drank moderately, that is habitually, but not to intoxica- 
tion; never read of a case of strangulation without marks of external force; whether 
the tongue protrudes or not, depends upon the peculiar way in which the exterior 
force is applied. Suffocation may happen accidentally, by getting into a position in which 
it is impossible to breathe; this is the case often with infants; it is not impossible 
that this might occur in the case of an adult, in a case as helpless as a child, but the 
probability is against such an occurrence. In the case of a person in a room where 
there was smoke, or gas, or corrupt air of any kind, a drunken person’s death might be 
much expedited. In cases of death by noxious gases, the tongue is usually more or 
less protruded, and there is more or less frothy appearance about the mouth. In ordi- 
nary suffocation, not by gases, &c., it is rare that the tongue protrudes; in cases of 
violent suffocation it is not common; difficult to say, on a post-mortem. examination, 
whether the person died from violent or accidental suffocation.” 

Physicians, as usual, were called on behalf of the prisoner, and some conflicting if 
not opposing opinions were advanced. 

Dr. Archer (Coroner).—‘‘ Thought that the burns had been inflicted after death ; 
saw the stomach, thought it did not look entirely healthy, as there was a turgid ap- 
pearance of the vessels, showing that it had been a good deal stimulated. There was 
no pink margin around the burns ; never found an exception of death from burning 
that there was an absence of the pink margin; did not consider it a sign of suffocation 
that the tongue protruded; thought the eye was burnt after death. In death from 
carbonic acid the countenance is generally placid, and it is not common for the tongue 
to be protruded ; the brain and lungs are more or less congested; if there are no ex- 
ternal marks, no person can say positively whether the persons died from natural 
causes or from violence.. If a person dies after a debauch, I should expect to find 
evidence of it in the brain or stomach. It is impossible to say how long after a per- 
son has been drinking, its traces would be lost from the system; when the effect is 
gone, however, the liquor is gone.” 

Dr. Ramson testified that “he had attended post-mortem examinations in cases of 
death from suffocation, and lately, where two persons were suffocated by charcoal ; 
their countenances were swollen, and the eyes somewhat protruded: there was a dis- 
tortion of features (one more than the other, as the patient lay on his face) ; in cases 
of suffocation, the brain is generally congested and the blood blacker in the different 
vessels than in ordinary cases, and the lungs more or less congested ; countenance 
more or less distorted ; in such cases should judge more from the blood in the arterial 

system, than from the brain ; there is no particular condition of the heart, except 
there is black blood.” 

The testimony of Dr. Middleton Goldsmith was to the same effect. 

In summing up the case, Mr. Warner, the counsel for the accused, among other re- 
marks, said, that the medical testimony did not agree, and that it was filled with 
doubts and uncertainty. “ The positiveness,” he observed, “ with which medical men 
give their testimony, is to be ascribed to the care they have of their own reputation in 
their profession, and to the fear they have of seeming ignorant of their profession. 
These witnesses disagree as to the indications of intemperance presented by the sto- 


T34 


BOOK V.] SUFFOCATION. [$ 898 


medical officer, which was, that after a struggle the woman had been over- 
powered and forcibly compelled to submit to the desires of her ravisher ; who 
at the same time held his hand over her face to prevent her crying for help. 
In doing so, however, he had, according to his own story, unintentionally suf- 
focated her. The body of the deceased, in this case, presented the signs of 
asphyxia in a marked degree, the face being purple and turgid, the eyes in- 
jected, the lips and tongue swollen and livid, and the fingers convulsively 
clenched. The lungs were perfectly black with blood, and so distended that, 
upon incision, the blood escaped in profusion; the vena cava and right side 
of the heart were also gorged with dark, but coagulated blood. The cerebral 
veins and sinuses were not remarkably full. If the crime had in this instance 
been unconnected with rape, it is probable that some marks of violence would 
have been found, but the weight of the man’s body, no doubt, as well as other 
causes, contributed to the ease with which the suffocation was accomplished. 

A curious case of suffocation, unintentionally produced, is given in the 
London Lancet. A lad, eighteen years of age, was, by way of joke, forced 
head downwards into a sack containing about a bushel of bran, by two of 
his fellow-laborers on the farm. According to the testimony of one of the 
parties, who were at the same time the perpetrators, and the only witnesses of 
the outrage, the mouth of the sack was tied with rope-yarn round the lees of 
the lad. This was almost immediately cut, and the boy released from the 
sack. Hewas reported to be black in the face and frothing at the mouth, but 
became sufficiently sensible to drink a small quantity of water. He breathed, 
however, with great difficulty, remained insensible, and lived only twenty 
minutes after being extricated from the sack. Upon post-mortem examina- 
tion, it was found that sixteen hours after death the thorax and abdomen re- 
tained a considerable degree of warmth. At the bifurcation of the trachea a 
large quantity of bran was found; the left bronchus was entirely filled with it, 
and the right nearly so, and their subdivisions, as far as they could be traced 
into the substance of the lungs, were full of the same material. (w) 

The following interesting and curious case occurred at Edinburgh in 1855: 
Janet Stewart, between 60 and 70 years of age, lived in the family of her niece, 
consisting of three adults and a child besides herself. All were grossly addicted 
to intemperance. Janet was found dead with a contused and lacerated wound of 
the scalp, extensive emphysema beneath the skin of the trunk and in the chest, 


mach of the deceased. Dr. Archer alone said any. The fact will appear abundantly 
that she was very intemperate,” &. Mr. Brady quoted from Beck’s “ Medical Ju- 
risprudence,” where it is stated that most physicians are not competent to make post- 
mortem examinations, and hence argued that those who made the dissection in the 
present case, were probably incompetent! Judge Kent,in his charge, came to the 
conclusion, after a full recapitulation of the testimony, that, first, nothing positively 
certain was shown as to the cause of death; and, second, nothing positively excluded the 
idea that it was occasioned by suffocation—the probability being in favor of the latter. 
The judge also instructed the jury that unless they found the death was occasioned 
by smothering, no matter in what way effected, they could not find the prisoner guilty ; 
although they might come to the conclusion that the deceased perished from burning, 
or in some other manner, not stated in the indictment, and by the hands of the pris- 
oner. Verdict—Not Guilty. 

(u) Another case in many respects similar to this one is reported by Raymond and 
Devergie. Ann. d’Hyg. July, 1852. 


739 


§ 899] STRANGULATION. [BOOK V. 


and seven ribs of the left side fractured. The face was pale and slightly swol- 
len, the features composed, the eyelids shut, the lips nearly closed, and the 
tongue slightly protruding. On examining the neck a hard mass was felt at 
the back part of the throat, which proved to be the cork of a quart, bottle, 
tightly inserted into the upper part of the larynx, the sealed end being upper- 
most. It was covered with a frothy brown mucus. The epiglottis, larynx, 
and trachea, were considerably injected. The last with the bronchia presented 
a bright florid appearance, and their whole surface was coated with mucus. 
By experiments on the dead body it was ascertained that when a cork, such as 
had here been found, was pushed along the mouth against the cervical verte- 
bree, the upper end was forced backwards, while the lower end was tilted for- 
wards, and by continuing the pressure made to enter the larynx. It was hence 
concluded that the attempt to kill indicated by the wound of the scalp, and the 
fractured ribs, had been successfully completed by suffocation by means of 
the cork, the frothy mucus around this body and the redness of the mucous 
membrane proving that death had not immediately followed its introduction. 
One of the party who was indicted on the testimony of the rest as the author 
of these outrages, was tried. The jury returned a verdict of ‘“ Not proven ;” 
but a few weeks afterwards a body believed to be that of the prisoner was 
found floating in the Clyde.(v) 

In infants, murder by suffocation is undoubtedly very common, it being very 
rapidly effected, and leaving no characteristic traces behind it. Death, thus 
criminally produced, has often been attributed to convulsions. 


CHAPTER IX. 
STRANGULATION. 


I. Cause, § 899. 
II. Marks, § 900. 
III. Perron, § 901. 
IV. ACCIDENTAL, SUICIDAL, OR HOMICIDAL. 


§ 899. I. The causes of death in simple strangulation, as in that which is 
complicated with suspension, are an interruption of the access of air to the lungs, 
by pressure upon the windpipe, and congestion of the brain from the impeded 
return of the blood to the heart through the jugular veins. The first of 
these causes, is in hanging, the efficient and principal one, but in stran-— 
gulation, owing to the more complete constriction of the neck, especially 
where a cord is used, the cause last mentioned certainly greatly accelerates 
the fatal result. The constriction varies with the band and its adjustment. 
Sometimes a rope is used, sometimes a handkerchief, a strap, a ribbon, 
or a strip from the bedding or some article of clothing. Sometimes it is 
wound several times around the neck, in others twisted like a tourniquet 
with a spoon, knife-handle, or some similar body. But throttling by the hand 


(v) Edinb. Med. Journ. i. 511. 
736 


BOOK V.]| STRANGULATION, [$ 900 


is by far the most frequent mode in which the violence is employed, especially 
in cases of homicidal strangulation. The aspect of a person who has 
been strangled resembles, therefore, more closely that which was formerly de- 
scribed as characteristic of hanging, viz., a livid and swollen condition of the 
face, staring eyes with dilated pupils, and protruded tongue. The swollen 
features, the neck, chest, and eyes, are studded with minute ecchymoses which 
are very characteristic of death by strangulation, when they exist, and they do 
so whenever the violence applied has been great and the struggle protracted. 
The other and internal post-mortem appearances are sometimes incorrectly said 
to be those of death by asphyxia. The lungs and right cavities of the heart are 
not usually filled with dark fluid blood, the abdominal organs and especially 
the liver and kidneys are not congested, and the mesenteric veins, and the ves- 
sels of the head are not always engorged. M. Tardieu states that an inter- 
vesicular emphysema resulting from a rupture of the pulmonary vessels is an 
almost constant phenomenon. It gives the surface of the organs the appear- 
ance of being studded with very white pseudo-membranous spots of variable 
dimensions. Sub-pleural ecchymosis which is characteristic of suffocation is 
not met with, but in its stead apoplectic nodules in the tissue of the lung mea- 
suring from half an inch to an inch and a half in diameter. If death have 
been caused by suffocation combined with strangulation, punctated ecchymoses 
under the pulmonary pleura will be found in addition.(w) In young children 
much reliance is placed by Dr. Casper upon the existence of petechial ecchy- 
moses upon the pulmonary pleura, the heart and aorta. Actual extravasation 
of blood upon the brain is, however, of very rare occurrence, if, indeed, it ever 
appears as a direct result of the strangulation. This fact is of considerable 
importance in many cases, since in death by apoplexy, the turgor and dis- 
coloration of the countenance may occasionally lead to a suspicion of homicidal 
strangulation, especially if any questionable traces of constriction be discovered 
upon the neck. 

§ 900. II. Marks of violence upon the neck.—These are far more evident 
and important than in hanging, because in homicidal strangulation more force 
usually is employed than is necessary to accomplish the object of the murderer. 
If the strangulation have been effected with the hand, the marks of the fingers 
will be found upon the front of the neck; and sometimes by the form, number, 
and arrangement of the marks it is easy to determine which hand was used to 
make the constriction. If by a cord or other ligature, the mark will be nearly 
horizontal, more or less distinct, and generally ecchymosed. The differences 
between the slight marks produced by strangulation as compared with those 
caused by hanging, depend upon the continuity of action of the compressing 
cause in the latter case, and also in some cases, as in those of infants and aged 
persons, upon the small degree of force required to arrest the breathing. Sub- 
cutaneous extravasation is not always found. In a case of suicidal strangula- 
tion examined by Dr. Casper, in which the ligature consisted of a pack-thread 
wound thrice around the neck and tied fast over the larynx, the mark was but 
slightly depressed, and only consisted of a single line broad, white, and here and 


(w) Annales d’Hygiéne, 2éme ser. xi. 133. 
47 137 


§ 901] BEFORE OR AFTER DEATH ? [BOOK v. 


there tinged with blue.(#) The subjacent parts will present traces of injury 
corresponding to the violence which has been used. The condition of the more 
deeply seated organs of the neck cannot be at all inferred from the state of the 
skin which covers them. M. Tardieu has shown that even when no external 
bruise exists, effusion of blood may be discovered beneath the skin, among the 
more deeply seated muscles, and even upon the larynx and trachea, or, if the 
hand has been used to effect the compression, the effusion may extend to the 
upper part of the neck and the chest. T'wo cases are referred to below in which 
the ossified thyroid cartilage was fractured, but these lesions are unusual. The 
interior surface of the larynx and trachea is usually congested and of a uniformly 
red or violet color, and bathed with frothy and bloody mucus which extends 
also to the smaller air-tubes. Weare not acquainted with any case in which 
laceration of the carotid artery has been found after death by homicidal stran- 
‘gulation. But as this lesion can be produced by imitating strangulation on 
the dead body,(y) it is also probably one of the occasional effects of the homi- 
cidal act. 

The distinction of the signs of apoplexy from those of strangulation consists 
essentially in this, that in the former none of the derangements which have 
been described of the parts beneath the skin can be detected. The proofs of 
strangulation are also different from those of hanging. This distinction is 
important chiefly when a dead body is found suspended; for it must be remem- 
bered that this position generally denotes suicide, while strangulation as ordi- 
narily indicates death by homicidal violence. The cases most apt to he 
confounded are those in which strangulation has been effected by a cord or 
similar constricting band. The obliquity of the mark has been generally 
insisted upon as proving death by suspension. But when the whole weight of 
the body has not exercised its traction this sign may fail, and on the other 
hand the complete circular mark is often wanting even where strangling has 
been the cause of death. In the latter case, also, the constricting band or cord 
leaves a comparatively slight impression, while in the former a deep furrow is 
produced. But in strangulation the injuries to the soft parts beneath the skin 
are very marked, while in hanging they are comparatively slight as a general 
rule. ‘The discharge of feeces, urine, and semen, which has been regarded as 
peculiarly the effect of death by hanging, may result from almost any form of 
violent death, and occurs in many forms of natural death when the bodily 
vigor is not greatly impaired. 

The signs of death by strangulation differ from those of death by suffoca- 
tion, in this, that the latter are observed about the nostrils and the mouth, 
and not upon the neck; but in many cases the evidences of both forms of 
violence will be found combined. (z) 

§ 901. III. Was the strangulation effected before or after death ?—This 
question is one of inferior practical importance. The object of any one in 
applying a ligature around the neck after death, would be, of course, to con- 
vey the idea that the person had committed suicide. As, however, this mode 


(x) Gericht. Leich. 2tes Hund. 1854, Fall. 59. 
(y) Simon, Virchow’s Archiv. xi. 297. 
(z) Tardieu, loc. cit. 


738 


BOOK V.] BEFORE OR AFTER DEATH? [§ 902 


of self-destruction is extremely uncommon and usually attended with circum- 
stances which betray it, the presumption in the case of a person found stran- 
eled, is that the deed was committed by another. Hence the probability of 
suicide, which obtains in hanging, from the frequency with which this mode of 
self-destruction is chosen, is, in cases of strangulation not to be entertained, 
unless direct or circumstantial evidence supports it. Moreover, the cases in 
which it may be possible to admit the suspicion of suicide, are not those in 
which any doubt can be entertained, because, if the cord have been placed upon 
the neck merely for the purpose of concealing the fact of murder, the means by 
which life really has been taken will not fail to be revealed. Thus, marks of 
fatal violence will be found upon some part of the body, or traces of poison in 
the stomach. Yet, if any doubt should still remain of the truth of these con- 
siderations, it only remains that the signs of death by strangulation cannot be 
closely imitated after death. We have seen above, that when death has resulted 
from this cause, not only will the marks of the fingers or of the constricting 
band be found of various depths and of different degrees of discoloration, but 
also that the aspect of the countenance taken in connection therewith as well 
as the internal signs of death by asphyxia will indicate the mode of death. 
Although the experiments made upon dead bodies by Dr. Casper show that if 
the attempt to imitate the mark of strangulation were made six hours after 
death, it would be unsuccessful, yet, as the attempt would most probably be 
made ¢mmediately after death, and even before life was quite extinct, it is evi- 
dent that any satisfactory conclusion can be drawn only from an examination 
of the mark, en connection with the other signs of asphyxia. These cannot 
be produced after death, and we may, therefore, be certain where we find a 
mark indicating strangulation, and, at the same time, the face purple and con- 
gested, the tongue protruded, the eyes prominent and the other indications of 
death by apnea, that the individual has been strangled during life. This will 
lead us to the question, 

§ 902. IV. Was the strangulation accidental, homicidal, or suicidal?—A 
few cases of accidental strangulation are upon record. Dr. Taylor relates that 
a girl was accidentally strangled in the following way: ‘‘She was employed in 
carrying fish in a basket at her back, supported by a leathern strap passing 
round the fore part of her neck, above her shoulders in front. She was found 
dead, sitting on a stone wall; the basket had slipped off, probably, while she 
was resting, and had thus raised.the strap, which firmly compressed the trachea. 
A similar case is recorded by Watson (Homicide).”’ Should the body not have 
been removed from the position it occupied at the time of death, and if the 
evidence of veracious and disinterested witnesses relative to this fact can be 
obtained, there will seldom be any hesitation in admitting the possibility of 
the accident. 

The allegation may, however, be made for the purpose of concealing crime. 
A person who, in a state of helplessness from intoxication or other cause, has 
fallen into a position in which his throat becomes compressed by a tight 
cravat, may possibly thus die accidentally of strangulation. But if marks of 
constriction be found upon the neck, it is much more probable that they were 

739 


§ 903] SUICIDAL STRANGULATION. [BOOK V. 


caused by criminal violence than that they were due to accident. As in courts 
of law undue stress, medically speaking, may be laid upon the possibility of 
strangulation marks being accidentally produced, the medical witness will do 
well to compare closely the impressions upon the neck with the ligature sup- 
posed to have produced it, as in many cases an important and conclusive 
discrepancy will be found. 

§ 903. Surcidal strangulation.—Were there not a sufficient number of well- 
attested cases of suicide by strangulation upon record, it might fairly be doubted 
whether it were possible for persons voluntarily to destroy themselves in this 
manner. But the annals of legal medicine abound with examples of the most 
determined tenacity of purpose, and the most singular choice of modes of 
death upon the part of suicides. Without dwelling upon this fact, it may be 
stated that in this mode of death an infirmity of purpose is less likely than in 
many others to frustrate the intentions of the suicide. Unconsciousness steals 
in such an insidious but rapid manner over the senses, that the will and power 
to escape are speedily lost. 

The ligature used by those who thus destroy themselves is generally 
chosen from those articles of dress which lie nearest at hand, as cravats, gar- 
ters, and the like. The knot will most probably be found in front, or a little 
to the side, and the mark left will convey the idea of less violence than will 
that made in homicidal cases, where no other injury has been inflicted. The 
question often arises, says Casper, whether the mark upon the neck has been 
caused by a certain instrument which is supposed to have been used. ‘This 
question it is not always easy to answer. It is true that hard, rough sub- 
stances, cords, &c., usually produce excoriations, which is seldom the case with 
softer ones. It is also true, as a general rule, that the breadth or diameter of 
the mark upon the neck corresponds to that of the instrument used. But many 
exceptions occur to these rules. The instrument may be of a soft texture, and 
yet have rough edges; it may be twisted, aud the sides press against the neck, 
&e. Some light may often be thrown upon cases of murder or suicide by 
hanging, by observing what kind of a knot is tied in the ligature, as it is 
known that different classes of tradesmen are in the habit of tying knots in a 
way peculiar to themselves. 

A remarkable instance, showing the rapidity and ease with which self- 
strangulation may be effected, is the following. A gentleman was placed in a 
private insane asylum. His relatives desired the superintending physician to 
use every endeavor to prevent him from committing suicide, as he had repeat-. 
edly attempted it. In consequence of this request, two attendants were placed 
near him. Fatigued with the long journey he had made, the patient desired 
permission to retire to bed; the two attendants remained at his bedside. A 
short time after, at his pressing solicitation, these men were directed to leave 
his bedside, but still remained in the room, keeping a close watch upon him. 
In two hours afterwards the physician paid a visit to his patient. The attend- 
ants remarked that he had been and was still sleeping quietly, and had not 
stirred. Upon approaching the bed, however, and proposing a question to 
the gentleman, no answer was received, and, to their horror and surprise, he 

740 


BOOK V. | SUICIDAL STRANGULATION, [§$ 904 


was found to be dead. He had torn a strip from the bottom of his shirt, 
rolled it into a cord, and simply tied it around his neck.(a) 

Mr. Pollock, in his evidence in the case of Drory, gave the following case: 
“Pizzala, an Italian, about fifty years of age, employed as a porter, was found 
dead in the forenoon of the 3d of January, 1851, in an attic of the house of 
his employer. He had been missing from his employment thirty hours. When 
found, he was lying on his back, rather inclining to the left side, with a piece 
of ordinary sash-line coiled four times around his neck, two of the coils so 
tight and imbedded therein that there was some difficulty in undoing it. The 
right hand held one end of the line, and the left hand the other, with a turn of 
line around each, to hold it the more securely. The right arm was extended, 
the left flexed. I made a post-mortem examination of the body on the fourth 
day after it was found. Externally, the face was swollen and purple, the ves- 
sels of the conjunctivee were injected, the tongue protruded towards the left 
side, bloody froth issued from the mouth, and the lower jaw was slightly 
twisted to the left side. The skin of the neck was abraded in a nearly con- 
tinuous line around it, about five-eighths of an inch in width, and presenting 
the appearance of being produced by two coils of the line. There was consi- 
derable ecchymosis above and below the line of abrasion. Each hand retained 
the impression of the line being coiled around it. Internally, the vessels of 
the brain and its membranes were greatly congested. The evidence before the 
coroner left no doubt of this having been a suicidal act. This case proves 
that a person may strangle himself, and that he may accomplish strangulation 
by pulling the two ends of a cord coiled several times round the neck; and 
that some degree of local violence to the neck may thus be produced by the 
ligature used.’’(b) 

-§ 904. We should not expect to find the mark of fingers upon the neck in 
suicidal strangulation. It has, indeed, been supposed that a person might en- 
deavor to strangle himself with his hand, and, failing in it, afterwards resort 
to other more effectual means. We have not, however, met with any case 
which would bear out this view, and must consider such an attempt as highly 
improbable. In case an intoxicated person should fall into such a position 
that his cravat or the collar of his shirt impedes his respiration, he may in- 
stinctively carry his hand to his throat to remove the constriction, but it is 
more reasonable to suppose that his effort would be to draw aside and away 
from the larynx the collar which was pressing upon it, or unfasten it in any 
way than that he should imprint his fingers so deeply in the skin as to leave 
a visible mark. 

An interesting case of suicidal strangulation is related by Dr. Simeons,(c) 
in which a sabre was used to tighten the ligature. The latter consisted of a 
cotton handkerchief tied in a hard knot on the side of the neck. The’sabre 
had been inserted into a loop in front and evidently twisted several times upon — 
its axis, so that the neck became very firmly constricted. The constriction 
indeed was so great that the sabre could not be extricated from the loop, until 


: ~ 
(a) Ann. Méd.-Psycholog. tome iv. p. 113. 


(b) Taylor, Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Rev. April, 1852. 
(c) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1843, H. i. p. 335. 


T41 


§ 905] HOMICIDAL STRANGULATION. [BOOK V. 


it had been drawn out of the sheath, which was compressible. When the 
handkerchief was removed, it was found that a broad, deep, and ecchymosed 
impression had been left, which was still more marked and attended with ex- 
coriation in the point corresponding to the knot. The borders of the mark 
had a parchment-like appearance. The individual was a corporal, remarkably 
robust in constitution, and destroyed himself in consequence of having been 
put under arrest for neglect of duty. Collateral evidence rendered the fact of 
suicide unquestionable. A man about sixty years of age was found in a wood, 
a napkin around his neck, tightened by a walking stick twisted through a loop 
in it. When found, the corpse was lying on us back, the lower limbs ex- 
tended, and the arms straight and close by the sides, the whole as if the body 
had been laid out artificially after death. There was, however, sufficient evi- 
dence that the man had strangled himself. (d) 

Mr. Thorpe, in his evidence in the case of Drory already referred to, men- 
tioned the case of a man who effected self-destruction in the following manner: 
‘‘He passed a noose of cord over his head and then inserted a stick, about 
- fourteen inches long, between the cord and his neck. Having done so, he, 
with the assistance of the stick, twisted the end sufficiently tight to cause 
almost immediate suffocation. Still, it appeared that there was time for him 
to insert the lower end of the stick in the inner side of the waistcoat, and the 
upper end was accurately adapted to the internal jugular vein and carotid 
artery.’’ Other cases in which a stick was employed are on record. In this 
way General Pichegru died in prison, and was supposed to have been strangled 
by the orders of Napoleon. But the case was most probably one of suicide. 
The question of suicide will, however, seldom rest upon an estimate of the 
evidence from such circumstances as these alone, but rather upon the absence 
of marks of violence and other signs of homicidal interference. 

§ 905. Homicidal strangulation.—The characteristics of homicidal stran- 
gulation will be found in the great amount of violence, the marks of which 
will be seen either upon the neck or elsewhere. The marks upon the neck will 
be either simply broader, deeper, and more ecchymosed than those which are 
met with in the rare cases of suicide, or will be attended with other local 
injury which could result only from the application of a rude and sudden force. 
A case is related by Casper(e) in which there was not only a brownish-yellow 
groove with reddened edges upon the neck, but also three ecchymosed spots, 
two at the angle of the jaw on the left side, and one on the right side of the 
jaw. ‘These could only have resulted from outward compression, and they were 
supposed to indicate a grasp of the throat by the hand, the thumb leaving its 
impression on the one side and two of the fingers on the other. Without 
doubt, the murdered woman had been first seized by the throat, and then, after 
having been rendered senseless, was strangled by the ligature, the mark of 
which we have described. In a case communicated to Dr. Taylor by Dr. 
Campbell, of Lisburn, there was a mark on either side of the larynx, under 
which, also, in the substance of the muscles, coagulated blood was found. 


(d) Br. and For. Med. Chir. Rev. xix. 301. 
(e) Gericht, Leichenéffuungen, lstes Hundert. 1853, Fall. 49. 


742 


BOOK V.] HOMICIDAL STRANGULATION. [$ 905 


> 


‘The thyroid cartilage, which was partly ossified, was fractured through the 
ossified portion. The case was clearly one of homicidal strangulation with 
the hand. 

An equally clear case is reported by Dr. Wilson.(/) The body of a woman, 
two days after death, presented the following appearances. The right cheek, 
and the lower part of the neck over the collar bones were deeply livid; the eyes 
were suffused and red; there was a circular contusion on the forehead; a hard 
and parchment-like yellowish-brown mark, about an inch and a half in length 
by half an inch in breadth, on the left side of the chin, running along the 
lower margin of the jaw; and another similar mark of nearly equal dimen- 
sions passed transversely across the throat immediately over the larynx. There 
were traces of blood which had flowed from the right nostril. There was an 
extravasation of blood among the muscles of the neck, and the thyroid gland was 
largely infiltrated. The trachea contained frothy mucus; blood was effused 
beneath the lining membrane of the larynx, there was a fracture of the right 
wing of the os hyoides, and the cricoid cartilage was broken in two places. 
Extravasated blood was found below the left mamma and greater pectoral 
muscle. The brain was congested. No other lesions existed. The probable 
interpretation of these facts was that the woman had been felled by a blow 
upon the forehead, that the murderer had then knelt at her right side, with his 
face towards hers, and his right knee across her chest, causing the effusion 
under the pectoralis major muscle; and then, pressing her head to the floor 
by his left hand on the left side of her chin, producing here another mark, 
he had grasped her throat with his right hand, and.strangled her with violent 
pressure, either with the hand alone, or aided by a ligature. The husband of 
the woman, who was indicted for her murder, admitted that he was alone with 
her at the time of her death, which he explained by her falling while intoxi- 
cated. The judge objected to the medical evidence that it was ‘“ merely infer- 
ential,”’ and the prisoner was acquitted! Upon which, Dr. Wilson quotes 
from Archbishop Whateley, ‘‘ He who infers proves, and he who proves infers.’’ 

MM. Briand and Chaudé quote the case of a woman who was found dead 
in her bed. Some discoloration of the neck suggested the suspicion that she 
had hung herself, and that her family, to avoid scandal, had laid her body in 
bed. But a more attentive examination showed that the bruises were confined 
to one side of the neck, that the two horns of the hyoid bone were unusually 
movable, and that the thyroid cartilage was flattened; the cricoid cartilage 
was also broken across its middle. The brother-in-law of the woman after- 
wards confessed that he had attempted to violate her, and in order to stifle her 
cries, had grasped her by the neck until she ceased to live. He was found 
guilty of murder. (q) 

A very interesting case is related by Dr. Graff, (h) in which a woman was 
murdered by strangulation, and the assassin had taken great pains to convey 
the impression that the act was one of suicide by hanging. The body was 
found lying close to a door, with a string passed twice around the neck and 


(f) Edinb. Med. Journ. i. 299. 
(g) Manuel de Méd. Lég. 6éme éd. p. 393. 
(A) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1846, p. 145. 
143 


§ 905] HOMICIDAL STRANGULATION. [BOOK ¥. 


fastened in a slip-knot behind. The impression made by it upon the neck was 
deep, and, for the most part, of a dark brown color, particularly on the sides. 
It was perfectly horizontal. The free end of the string looked as if it had 
been broken. There was a peg in the door over the body, on which a towel 
was hanging, not in the least disarranged ; the peg itself was slight and inca- 
pable of bearing the weight of the woman’s body. Furthermore, there was 
no portion of the string attached to it. An overturned chair lay near the 
body; and on a writing-table in the room, a paper was found declaring the 
intention of suicide, and purporting to have been written and signed by the 
deceased. It was clearly proved, however, that this document was not in her 
handwriting, nor correctly signed, and the fact of her having been murdered 
was abundantly shown by these attempts at deception, other marks of violence 
upon the body, and the subsequent discovery that robbery had been committed. 

One of the most interesting cases of homicidal strangulation is that given 
by Dr. Taylor, in Guy’s Hospital Reports for 1851. The prisoner was found 
euilty, and before his execution made a confession, in which he stated that he 
met the deceased by appointment, that they talked and walked about, after 
which, at her suggestion, they sat down on a bank. She had come to urge 
him to marry her. Hepassedarope, which he had previously secreted, gently 
around her neck as they were sitting, and had got the end of it in a loop 
before she perceived it. She jumped up at once, and put up her hands to 
save her throat, but he pulled hard and she fell without a struggle. Wehave 
thought this case of sufficient interest to present a tolerably full abstract of it 
in the note, since it offers many incidental suggestions worthy of considera- 
tion. (2) 


(7) “ At the Chelmsford Lent Assizes for 1851, Thomas Drory was tried for the mur- 
der, by strangulation, of a female named Jaél Denny. He was the son of a farmer of 
great respectability, and resided within a short distance of the cottage where the 
deceased lived. Both were about twenty years of age, and the girl, who was preg- 
nant by the prisoner, had reached the ninth month of her pregnancy. On the after- 
noon of Saturday, October 12th, 1850, the prisoner and deceased were seen conversing 
together for about twenty minutes, in the neighborhood of the prisoner’s cottage. 
This was about half-past five P.M. The evidence respecting the deceased showed, 
that about six o’clock on this day, she had tea with her parents as usual, appearing to 
be in good health and in high spirits. She told her mother that she had made an ap- 
pointment with the prisoner to meet him at a stile very near their cottage, at half-past 
six o’clock, and the prisoner, it was supposed, had led her to expect that at this inter- 
view he would make some arrangement regarding his marriage with her. At, or 
about this time, the deceased left her tea half-finished, dressed herself hastily in some 
of her mother’s clothing, left the house, and was not again seen alive. She was found 
next morning, at or about ezght o’clock, lying dead in a field at a short distance from 
the stile, at which she said she had made an appointment to meet the prisoner on the 
previous evening. 

“When her body was found, the head was cold, and the arms and legs cold and 
stiff; but the body (the abdomen) was perceptibly warm to the hand. It will be 
remarked, that from the time the deceased was last seen alive, thirteen and a half 
hours had elapsed. , 

“The attitude of the body when found is thus described by the different witnesses : 
The deceased was lying on her face, a little inclined on one side, owing probably to 
the prominence of the abdomen. Her lower clothes were arranged in a straight and 
orderly manner, and her fur-tippet was lying on the ground, two or three yards from 
the body. Her bonnet was on her head, but much crushed and broken. It was 
flattened in front as if from pressure from behind, while the deceased was on her face. 
Her face was flat on the ground, and her nose pressed down tightly. The nose is 
described as being quite flattened, and turned a little to the left side by pressure; it 
was impossible, in the opinion of one witness, that the mere weight of the head could 


744 


= 


BOOK V.] HOMICIDAL STRANGULATION, [§ 905 


M. Tardieu reminds us that strangulation may be simulated by persons who 
have an interest in pretending to be the victims of violence. When this mode 


have produced either this degree of pressure, or the indentation observed in the 
ground. The features were so altered, that although this witness had known the 
deceased fer four or five years, he could not recognize her. When the body was turned 
over, blood escaped or bubbled from the mouth, nose, and eyes; and the face was 
observed to be black, and much swollen. There was half a teacupful of blood on the 
spot where the face lay—under the mouth ; and more blood in another spot about a 
foot from the head ; the hair was matted together with blood and dirt. The right 
arm was lying bent at.a right angle underneath the body, and pressed down by its 
weight; the left was raised, with the hand directed towards the left shoulder, but 
partly covered by the body. There was a cord on the neck, which was twisted round 
it three times. One of the witnesses took the third turn from off the neck, and observed 
that this turn was a little loose ; but on putting his finger to the throat, he found a 
knot of cord lying in front of the neck. ‘The remainder of the cord was very tight, a 
portion being actually imbedded in the neck, and the cord was drawn so tightly, that 
the skin of the neck had swollen up between the coils. From other evidence it 
appeared that the knot which formed the loop of the rope was pressing on the front 
part of the neck, while the bite of the noose was at the back part, a little behind 
left ear. There were three coils and a half of rope round the neck, and with the 
exception of the last half coil, all were tight ; the two innermost coils being so tight 
as to indent and cut the skin. The end of the cord went over the back of the left 
shoulder, and about an inch of its extremity was lying loosely (without being grasped) 
between the thumb and finger of the left hand of the deceased, which was raised 
towards it. One witness described this hand as being stretched out a little, so that 
the end of the cord could be seen lying in the hand, before the body was moved or 
turned over. The deceased was right-handed ; there was no mark of grasping, lacera- 
tion, or indentation on either hand; and from the position of the bite of the noose 
and the direction of the coils, the cord could have been tightened only by pulling to 
the /eft of the deceased. The cord was stout, and of the thickness of a window sash- 
line. At the part where the noose had been tightened, the pressure had been so great 
that the cord was condensed to about half its thickness, and some of the fibres had 
been cut through by the force used. There was no blood upon it, except just at the 
end, where there was a small spot. The second coil had, at the back part, tightly 
locked in a portion of the apron of the bonnet and handkerchief of the deceased. 

“ A woman who undressed the deceased, six hours after the body was found, stated 
that she examined her face and found the mouth bubbling with blood ; her tongue pro- 
truded out of her mouth, and was clenched very tightly with her teeth. Blood oozed 
from her eyes, mouth, and ears. Her body, from her head to the shoulders, was very 
black (livid). There were two marks where the cord went round the neck, quite 
lacerated through the skin. Upon the back of her left wrist were marks apparently 
of a bite from both rows of teeth—the impressions were quite distinct before they were 
washed, and blood was oozing from them. On the right elbow a piece of skin had been 
taken off, about the size of a shilling, and the patch was very black. The elbow had 
a bruised appearance. 

“ A post-mortem examination of the body of the deceased was made by Mr. Williams, 
surgeon, of Brentwood, on the second day after it was found. The eyes were much 
distended and suffused with blood, and the pupils were dilated. There was a general 
lividity and swelling of the face; and the tongue, which protruded from the mouth, 
had been bitten by the teeth. There was a superficial laceration of the skin, covering 
the lower part of the throat on both sides ; and there were two deep marks, as if from 
two cords, or from two impressions of one cord, tied tightly round the neck. The two 
impressions were both situated over the trachea, and the skin had swollen up between 
them. The trachea had been flattened by strong pressure, but had regained its shape ; 
it had a bruised appearance in the parts corresponding to the two marks on the neck, 
and its structure there was softer than natural. There was extreme ecchymosis on 
the upper part of the chest, such as might have been produced by a heavy blow, or by 
the pressure of a person kneeling uponit. There was a contraction of the fingers, 
which were drawn into the palms of the hands. There was an abrasion of skin at the 
back of the right elbow. There were marks, apparently of teeth, on the back of the 
right wrist, and there were also scratches on the back of the left arm and hand. On 
opening the head, there was great congestion of the whole of the brain. The heart 
was healthy, but much distended on the right side with blood in a coagulated state. 
The lungs were congested to an unnatural degree; the right pleura was adherent—a 
result of previous inflammation. The stomach contained ordinary food, and the coats 
were in a healthy condition. The intestines were healthy. On opening the uterus it 


745 


$ 905] HOMICIDAL STRANGULATION. [BOOK V. 


of violence has really been attempted without a fatal result, the signs of it are 
evident in the discoloration and swelling of the neck, along with a marked 


was found to contain a male foetus in the ninth month; and this was probably alive 
at the time of the deceased’s death.” 

For the defence, two surgeons, Mr. Thorpe and Mr. Pollock, deposed—the first that 
he thought there was a doubt as to whether the deceased committed suicide or not ; 
the second, that he would feel considerable difficulty in forming an opinion as to the 
cause of death, whether suicide or homicide. Both of these opinions were founded 
upon cases which they had met with, but which, as they had no similarity with the 
present case, may here be omitted. Dr. Taylor, however, gave a decided opinion that 
the case was one of homicide, and his observations, which are remarkable for their 
minuteness and logical accuracy, we here subjoin. 

“1. The deceased was right handed, and on the hypothesis of suicide, she must have 
made the tension with her /eft arm and hand. From the position of the loop or noose, 
any traction to the right would not have tightened, but have loosened the cord. 

“2. That, supposing her to have exerted such a traction at all, she must have been 
in the erect or sitting posture. The force used, indicated by the great local violence 
to the neck, could not have been exerted by a person attempting to tighten a cord by 
drawing it to the left while in a recumbent posture, whether prone or supine. This 
hypothesis would, besides, leave wholly unexplained the flattening of the nose (obvi- 
ously from direct pressure, not from a fall), and the fact that the deceased had bled in 
two places, one spot being a foot from the other. 

“3, That the cord must have been pulled with excessive violence in a horizontal 
direction by one end only, as the mark was circular around the neck. The other end of 
the cord formed a noose or loop, and was tightly fixed at the back of the neck. Thus, 
then, all the force of traction must have been exerted to the left, in which direction the 
right hand of a right handed person could not act horizontally, so as to produce the 
amount of violence found on the soft parts of the neck. 

“4, That the fact of there being three coils and a half of rope round the neck, 
formed an obstacle to the tightening of the cord, by pulling one end to the left so as 
to imbed the two inner coils in the skin, and to leave the outer or third coil loose. 
On the supposition that the deceased produced the constriction by her own act, it 
follows that the three coils must have been round the neck at one time, and the two 
inner coils sufficiently loose to allow of respiration before traction was commenced. 

“5. The double indentation found on the trachea could not have been produced by 
the two inner coils (on the supposition of suicide), except by the great tightening of 
the outer coil. : 

“6, As insensibility and loss of power must have immediately followed the com- 
plete compression and obliteration of the trachea by the two inner coils, the outer coil 
ought not to have been found loose or unconnected with the object by which the force 
of contraction had been produced. 

“To suppose that the deceased could have produced the intense constriction by the 
first coil, and afterwards retained sufficient power to pass a second coil from right to 
left around her neck, indenting the skin and flattening the tracha as much by the 
second as by the first coil, involves, in my judgment, a physiological impossibility. 
There was, therefore, on the suicidal hypothesis, no explanation to resort to—but that 
all three had been placed at once round the neck /oosely—that one end only of the cord 
had then been so pulled to the /eft as to produce the great amount of violence found, 
and to tighten equally the two inner coils; while the outer coil and extremity of the 
cord, by which this immense force must have been applied to the two inner coils was 
found lying loosely, without any attachment either to the hand of the deceased or to 
any other fixed point. 

“7, To have indented the neck, compressed and bruised the trachea in two distinct 
places, to have caused effusion of blood to the amount of a cupful from mouth, nose, 
and ears—this effusion being found in two distinct places, a foot distant from each 
other—would have required a very considerable tension of the outer coil, and, at the 
same time, a continued tension, lasting sufficiently long for the head to move a foot 
after a cupful of blood had been lost as a mechanical result of the first constriction. 

“8, Admitting such conditions of the body and cord to be compatible with suicide, 
the act could only be conceived to be possible in this case, by the fact of the end of 
the cord being found tightly wound round the left hand of the deceased. 

“9. On the suicidal hypothesis, it would undoubtedly have required a very firm 
grasp of a rope to produce such effects as were here observed ; and from the rapid pro- 
duction of unconsciousness by the compression of the trachea and the arrest of respi- 
ration, it would have been impossible, on the part of the deceased to relax the grasp. 
Hence the cord should have been found, either firmly held in the hand in the rigidity 


746 


BOOK V.] HOMICIDAL STRANGULATION, ———-T$ 906 


difficulty in swallowing, and often a very great alteration of the voice. An 
intelligent and respectable young woman who desired to excite an interest in 
her behalf, gave out that she was the victim of political conspirators, whose 
secrets she had discovered. One evening she was found at the door of her 
chamber in a state of great excitement and apparently alarm. She did not 
speak, but at first made signs, and after a time wrote that she had been 
attacked by a man who attempted to strangle her with his hand, and at the 
same time stabbed her twice in the breast. These blows had only injured her 
clothing, and her corset was not pierced at the same place as her dress, and 
the alleged throttling had not altered the character of the voice but suppressed 
it entirely!) No external sign of violence could be found upon her, and ulti- 
mately she confessed her trick. 

§ 906. In conclusion, the fact should not be overlooked that, even where 
the body has lain a considerable time in the ground, and is advanced in putre- 
faction, the marks of strangulation, if this have been forcible, will occasionally 
be recognized. An instructive case is upon record, in which, after a lapse of 
thirty-eight days from the interment, a corpse was, by order of the authori- 
ties, disinterred. The body was already greatly decomposed, but the evidence 
of strangulation was obtained chiefly from the fact of the striking contrast of 
the integuments of the neck with those of the rest of the body. There was 
observed a white and shrivelled space over the larynx, half an inch in breadth, 
and extending back on each side of the sterno-cleido-mastoid muscles, from 
which, also, to the nape of the neck over the second vertebra, there ran a groove 


of death, or wound round it in a state of tension. Unless we adopt this view, we must 
suppose that after having used an enormous amount of violence by a rope in the left 
hand, the dead body had the power of relaxing the grasp, of loosening the outer coil 
of cord, and so moving the hand that the end of the cord should be found lying between 
the finger and thumb, and barely touching the palm. Such a condition is not only 
physiologically, but in this case, as it will be presently shown from the length of the 
cord, physically impossible.” 

10. (This refers to the absence of any marks of the cord upon the hands, such as 
would have been there, if forcible traction had been made by them.) 

11. “The length of the cord renders it impossible to suppose that such a force could 
have been exerted by the deceased herself. The length of the cord was fifty-nine and 
a half inches. The three coils and a half must have consumed at least fifty-two and 
a half inches, leaving only seven inches for the traction. ‘This,’ says Dr. Taylor, 
‘was barely enough to reach the finger and thumb of the raised left hand, and not 
enough to allow of such a firm grasp by the hand as would be necessary to the pro- 
duction of so much violence to the soft parts of the neck. I find, by measurement, 
that the circumference of a small female hand in the adult is rather more than seven 
inches. This measurement includes only the palm of the hand without the thumb, 
and embraces the part of the hand around which a coil would be placed, when the 
object of a person was to produce firm traction. Hence, then, the hypothesis of sui- 
cide involves one of these physical conditions. Without a firm hold of the cord, which 
could not have been had with less than one coil round the hand, it is impossible to 
‘conceive that such violence to the neck could have been produced by the act of the 
deceased; and if one coil had been thus spontaneously wound round the hand, it 
would have consumed the whole length of the cord up to the last half coil, and left 
no portion whatever to give a purchase for pulling with so much violence. Hither 
condition is a physical impossibility ; and no theory will suit the facts, or explain 
them, excepting that which admits that the act was not the result of suicide, but of 
manual violence applied by another person.’ 

“The evidence by which the crime was fixed upon the prisoner Drory, it is not 
necessary here to relate. The chain of evidence was complete and irresistible, 
and, as has been stated in the text, the criminal made a confession previous to his 
execution.” 

TAT 


$ 908] DEATH BY HANGING. [BOOK V. 


of a blackish-brown color, and parchment-like appearance. It was very diffi- 
cult to cut through this condensed skin, which, upon incision, gave the sensa- 
tion of old dry leather, and its section was yellowish-white, and perfectly dry. 
Another remarkable case occurred in Paris, where, after the body of a female 
had lain several years in the ground, and was reduced to an almost perfect 
skeleton, an examination made by M. Boys de Loury, Orfila, and other medi- 
cal jurists, proved that the woman had perished by strangulation. The third, 
fourth, fifth, and sixth cervical vertebra, as well as the right clavicle were held 
together by a blackish mass, in the composition of which there could not be 
recognized any tissue. This mass was surrounded at its lower point by 
several twists of a cord, two lines in diameter ; the cord was in a very decayed 
condition, and no knot could be found upon it; its direction was exactly 
horizontal. 


CHAPTER X. 
HANGING. 


I, GENERAL symptoms, § 907. 
II. Marks OF THE corD, § 910. 
III. Ruprure oF ARTERY, § 913. 
IV. TUMEFACTION OF GENITAL ORGANS, § 914. 
Y. SvicipAL OR HOMICIDAL, § 915. 
1st. Position and condition of body, § 916. 
2d. Marks of violence, § 921. 


§ 907. I. General symptoms.—In hanging, death is caused mainly by the 
pressure of the cord upon the windpipe, by which the access of air to the 
lungs is cut off. The individual is therefore strangled; he dies more rapidly, 
but in the same manner, physiologically speaking, as do those who are suffo- 
cated by drowning, or who are placed in any irrespirable medium. If, how- 
ever, the air be not completely cut off from the lungs, as in those instances in 
which the cord presses upon a portion of the larynx which is ossified, as in 
some public executions, it tears the os hyoides loose from its connections with 
the larynx, or the noose slips from its proper position and catches against the 
lower jaw, death does not ensue with the same rapidity. In these cases other 
secondary causes aid in the extinction of life, the veins of the neck being com- 
pressed or the cervical vertebrae injured. 

§ 908. The signs of hanging are therefore, in general terms, the same as 
those of asphyxia from other causes, but will vary in intensity according to 
the position of the body and the suddenness of death. While, in some cases, 
the face is swollen and livid, the eyes prominent, and the tongue protruded 
between the contorted lips; in others, these striking signs of struggling are 
absent, and the features remain placid or unchanged. ‘The latter condition is 
more frequently observed in persons whose death has been voluntary, but a 
greater or less congestion of the face is found in the majority of cases of hang- 
ing. Dr. Burrows(w) explains the difference observed in executed criminals 


(w) “ Diseases of the Cerebral Circulation,” 1846. 
748 


BOOK V.]| SIGNS OF DEATH BY HANGING. [$ 910 


by the unequal pressure of the cord in different cases. He says, ‘the knot of 
the rope is usually adjusted on one side of the neck, and it is found, after 
death, beneath the ear resting on the mastoid process. It has been often 
observed, in the dissection of such criminals, that the cheek and integuments 
on this same side of the head are not nearly so livid and congested as on the 
other side. ‘The pressure of the rope has not completely obstructed the return 
of blood through the external jugular vein on the one side, though it has 
effectually stopped the current on the other. In such cases, it is also probable 
that the deep-seated internal jugular vein on the one side has been only par- 
tially compressed, and has permitted, to a certain extent, the return of blood 
from the internal parts of the cranium. Another efficient cause is the subsi- 
dence of fluid blood after death, while the body is yet suspended, through the 
cervical vessels, which are not completely obliterated by the pressure of the 
cord. Other channels not at all affected by the pressure of the rope, are the 
vertebral sinuses and the spinal plexus of veins.’”? In addition to the marks 
of congestion in the head and face, the shoulders and upper part of the trunk 
are often livid. 'The hands and lower parts of the arms are also frequently of 
a purple color; the arms are usually straight and rigid, and the fingers clenched. 
A bloody froth is sometimes seen issuing from the mouth, and there are various 
marks of violence upon the neck, dependent, however, upon the nature of the 
ligature and the force employed. To these we shall presently refer, in detail. 
The urine and feces are not unfrequently passed involuntarily, the genital 
organs become turgid, and the semen in the male is said to be discharged. It 
would appear that the circumscribed bloody spots in the lungs, pericardium, 
and pericranium, which are met with in all the other forms of suffocation, are 
absent in this. 

§ 909. When a person is found dead, suspended by a cord or other ligature, 
the first question which arises is, whether the act was his own or that of 
another. Before, however, this question can be satisfactorily answered, we 
must endeavor to determine whether the person was living at the time he was 
hung. Now, the fallacy of relying upon any one medical sign as indicative of 
death from a given cause, is nowhere more apparent than in death by hanging. 
A partial consideration of the signs of death from this cause, or a too confident 
reliance upon one or more. of the phenomena usually observed in authenticated 
criminal cases or in public executions, will often lead the physician to an erro- 
neous judgment. However strong the presumption may be that life was 
destroyed in this manner, rarely, if ever, can a perfect conviction be acquired 
by medical evidence alone. On the other hand, the moral and circumstantial 
evidence is, in a large majority of cases, so significant that medical testimony 
is superfluous. This will at once be evident, when it is remembered that 
hanging is usually a suicidal act. As, however, cases occur where life is first 
destroyed by other means and the body afterwards hung, in order to suggest, 
a belief that suicide has been committed, it becomes necessary to consider 
what assistance can be rendered by medical facts to corroborate the evidence 
derived from other sources. 

§ 910. II. Mark of the cord.—In persons who are hung, the cord always 

T49 


§ 912] MARK OF THE CORD. [BOOK V. 


leaves some impression.(w) This may be deep or superficial, according to 
the strain upon it and its thickness and firmness. The skin under this mark 
acquires a peculiarly dense and tough character, and has been aptly compared, 
for this reason and from its color, to old parchment. It resembles exactly 
the desiccated skin, from which the epidermis has been detached, and which 
has been exposed to the air. This appearance is more marked a few hours 
after death, if the cord has been removed; its color is yellowish brown, and 
the cellular tissue underneath is likewise condensed and presents a silvery ap- 
pearance. 

§ 911. This color must not be confounded with that resulting from an ex- 
travasation of blood under the skin, the latter being livid or purple. In cases 
which present the parchment-like appearance, there is often no ecchymosis, or 
this is confined to a slight line of lividity upon the margins of the depression. 
~ In cases, however, where much violence has been used, as in the execution of 
criminals, a livid mark is frequently observed. The two conditions are some- 
times united, an ecchymosis existing upon the fore part of the neck, and the 
burnt appearance at the sides. Late writers agree that ecchymosis is of much 
rarer occurrence than was formerly supposed. Devergie collected fifty-two cases 
of hanging, of which three only presented traces of ecchymosis. The cases 
are taken from Klein, Esquirol, and from his own observation. These results 
are confirmed by Orfila, Dr. Taylor, and Dr. Casper. | 

§ 912. The impression of the cord, whether ecchymosed or not, is, however, 


(x) The following is certainly an anomalous case. The facts were observed at a 
public execution. The rope used was ten lines in diameter; the knot was large, 
formed of three turns of the rope, and on the noose being tightened by the executioner, 
corresponded to the occipital protuberance. The bolt being withdrawn, the man fell 
through a space of seven feet and a half. “The body fell with a tremendous jerk, 
and oscillated for a few minutes; the arms and legs became rigid; the forearms 
flexed on the arms, the fingers upon the palms, and the thighs abducted and slightly 
drawn up towards the abdomen; the sterno-mastoid muscles were affected with 
spasms, and the hands became livid. After a short time the limbs relaxed; the legs 
approached each other, the toes pointing downwards; the hands became pale, fell 
down by the side, and the fingers became relaxed. The body, having been suspended 
for forty-five minutes, was cut down, and the cord removed from the neck. There 
was not any protrusion or unnatural suffusion of the eyes; the upper and lower teeth 
were half an inch apart, and the tongue was indented by them: the lips were rather 
livid, and the face pale; a slight depression marked the position of the rope; there 
was not any discoloration of the integuments of the neck, breast, or shoulders ; the 
thumbs and fingers were flaccid; the cap in which the head had been enveloped was 
slightly stained by bloody mucus, which had flowed from the mouth and nose; the 
bladder was empty, the criminal having made water a few minutes before his execu- 
tion; the penis appeared as if it had been recently erect; it lay upwards against the 
abdomen, and a thin transparent fluid had stained the shirt ;”” numerous spermatozoa 
in it were detected under the microscope. Highteen hours afterwards, the body having 
in the mean time lain upon its back, it was found to be rigid, the face, lips, and ears 
were purple, the shoulders, and upper and front part of the chest also; the mark of 
the rope was scarcely perceptible, there being only in one place, for about the extent 
of a quarter of an inch, a slight parchment-like discoloration of the skin. The portion 
of the skin covered by the rope having been removed, there was not found the slightest 
extravasation of blood, nor any peculiar silvery-white appearance of the areolar tissue, 
and none of the bloodvessels or muscles were at all injured; the thyroid cartilage was 
slightly flattened but not broken, and there was no dislocation or fracture of the ver- 
tebral column or injury of the ligaments or spinal cord. The brain, lungs, and right 
side of the heart were congested with blood, and the mucous membrane of the larynx 
was of a bright red color. (On Death by Hanging, §c. By Charles Croker King, M. D., 
M. B. I. A. Professor of Anatomy and Physiology, &. Dublin Quarterly Journal, 
Aug. 1854.) 


750 


BOOK V.] MARK OF THE CORD. [$ 912 


not positive evidence that the person was hung when alive, since it has been 
shown beyond dispute that the same marks may be designedly made by hang- 
ing after death, while the body is yet warm. Orfila(y) suspended the bodies 
of persons, of different ages, at various periods after death, from the moment 
life was extinct up to twenty-four hours afterwards. In every one he found 
the same brown and parchment-like furrow which has been described as pro- 
duced in the living. Devergie made similar experiments, with a like result. 
Those performed by Dr. Casper,(z) in addition, prove that when the bodies of 
persons have been hung within two hours after death, the mark upon the skin 
may be also slightly ecchymosed. In one case, the first of his series, a man 
was suspended by a double cord passed above the larynx, an hour after death 
from typhus. In about twenty-four hours the body was cut down and exa- 
mined. ‘Around the neck, between the larynx and os hyoides, was a double 
parallel mark, about three lines deep, of a brown color, with a slight tinge of 
blue. There were traces of cadaveric ecchymosis about the body. The whole 
appearance was such that any individual not acquainted with the circumstances 
would have supposed that the deceased had been hanged while living. Some 
spots on the right side of the neck were strongly colored. The skin of this 
part was hard, like leather, and in patches slightly excoriated. There was no 
extravasation of blood in the cellular texture, but the muscles of the neck 
beneath were of a deep violet color. In the two next cases, the body of a 
young man, aged twenty-three, suspended an hour after death from phthisis, 
and that of a man, aged seventy, two hours after death from dropsy, each by 
a double cord, and the bodies examined on the following day, the appearances 
were similar; there was a double depression around the neck, of a yellowish- 
brown color, without ecchymosis. The cutis looked as if burnt, and was like 
parchment, both when felt and cut. There was no blood extravasated in the 
cellular tissue beneath.’’? In other cases, in which the body was hung at later 
periods after death, there was neither ecchymosis nor the parchment-like appear- 
ance, the mark of the cord being merely a slight depression in the skin. In the 
case, however, of a child, a year and a half old, on whose neck, the day after 
death, a small cord was tightly drawn, a small bluish-colored mark was pro- 
duced. ‘There was no blood, however, extravasated beneath it. The nature 
of the ligature, as whether it be a cord or some soft material, such as a hand- 
kerchief, does not make much difference in the character of the mark, except, 
of course, that where a cord is used it is better defined in every respect. The 
yellow and parchment-like appearance may, however, be produced by either 
kind of ligature. 

The unavoidable inference from the experiments above referred to is, that 
the mark left by the cord is not a reliable sign of the hanging having taken 
place while the person was alive, since it may present the same characters if 
the body have been suspended shortly after death. If this mark, which, at 
first sight, would appear to afford the most palpable evidence of death by hang- 
ing, is open to this objection, much more so are those inconstant signs derived 


(y) Annales d’Hygieéne, tome xxvii. 
(z) Brit. and For. Med. Rev. vol. v. p. 615. 
T51 


§ 914] MARK OF THE CORD. [BOOK V. 


from the state of the countenance, position of the tongue, and discoloration 
of the skin. Turgescence and lividity of the face, ecchymosis upon the trunk, 
and protrusion of the tongue may render probable death by hanging ; but, as 
they may all occur in any other mode of death by suffocation, are not indu- 
bitable proof that the body was suspended during life. Besides, these signs 
may be altogether wanting in persons who have evidently perished by hanging. 
Protrusion of the tongue is far from being invariable in hanging, and depends 
probably upon the position of the cord, and in some cases of the execution of 
criminals the face has been observed to remain quite pale. 

In those cases where much injury has been done to the neck, as where the 
muscles are found lacerated, the cartilages broken, and the ligaments torn, 
while blood is extensively effused in the soft parts and in the spinal canal, there 
can remain, of course, no probability of these injuries having been produced 
after death. Such cases are, however, exceptional, being rarely met with ex- 
cept among executed criminals. 

§ 913. III. A rupture of the internal and middle coats of the common 
carotid artery is occasionally found. Amussat was the first who observed it. 
Devergie examined the bodies of thirteen persons who had died by hanging, 
and found it only in one case. Dr. Mildner(a) has reported an instance in 
which he discovered it, and refers to another published by a German physi- 
cian. At the same time, he states the important fact that in his case the 
internal coats of the artery gave way very easily by stretching, as was proved 
by experiment upon the corresponding vessel on the other side. The experi- 
ment, moreover, was tried upon the carotids of persons of various ages, and 
the result obtained was that the rupture occurred only in those taken from old 
persons, where the artery had already lost its natural elasticity. In six cases 
of death by hanging, Simon found laceration of the internal coat of the carotid 
only twice. In one of these cases the vessel was sound, and in the other not. 
From these observations, and from experiments upon the dead body, he further 
concluded that the occurrence of this rupture depends upon the thinness of the 
cord, and its position between the larynx and the hyoid bone, and that the 
weight of the body and the force of its fall favor its occurrence. It also follows 
from these data that the existence of such a laceration, even in the absence of 
external signs, renders probable the occurrence of death by hanging or by 
strangulation.(a@) Malle found this lesion only twice in eighty-two bodies in 
which he imitated the act of hanging or strangling. The best mode of de- 
termining whether the rupture occurred before or after death would be by 
noting the signs of effusion in the adjacent cellular tissue. This has been 
clearly shown by Kussmaul,(d) who adds, as still more important signs, injec- 
tion and swelling of the surrounding cellular tissue in those cases in which all 
of the coats of the artery have been divided. The amount of probability in 
favor of death from hanging will depend upon the degree in which these two 
signs exist. . , 

§ 914. IV. Zumefaction of the genital organs, and a discharge of semen 


(a) Vierteljahrschrift f. prakt. Heilkunde; 1850, Prag. 
(aa) Virchow’s Archiv, xi. 297. (6) Ibid. xiii. 60. 


T52 


BOOK V.] SIGNS FROM THE GENITAL ORGANS. [S$ 915 


in the male, are regarded by some authors, but principally by Devergie, as 
characteristic of death by hanging. There are many manifest objections to 
this sign, were it even constant in its appearance, or even if it were peculiar 
to this mode of death, neither of which it is. It will suffice, however, to 
refer to the testimony of Orfila(bb) upon this point. According to this emi- 
nent observer :— 

Ist. Spermatic animalcules may be found in the urine, for twelve hours 
after emission. 

2d. They may be found in the urethra of persons dying of various diseases. (c) 

3d. Congestion of the organs of generation may be produced by hanging 
persons after death. One of the cases was that of a man 50 years of age. 
Three hours after death, the penis was found to measure three inches and a 
line in circumference, and neither it nor the scrotum was discolored. The ori- 
fice of the urethra was full of a viscid liquid, containing seminal animalcules. 
The body was then hung, and eight hours afterwards the scrotum and penis 
had acquired a violet color, the circumference of the latter had increased by 
seven lines, and the meatus still contained spermatozoa. In another case, the 
body of a man aged 49 was hung five hours after death, and left suspended 
three hours and a half. The penis, which, before, was slightly turgid, was 
now erect and formed almost a right angle with the abdomen ; it had increased 
nine lines in circumference, was of a violet color, and all the veins about it 
were very much distended. The vesiculee seminales were very full, and at the 
orifice of the urethra, there was a drop of viscid fluid, containing a great num- 
ber of spermatozoa, of which many were alive. Congestion of the genital 
organs and an ejaculation or discharge of the seminal fluid, having thus been 
observed in those dying from other causes, and in those who have been hung 
after death, cannot be looked upon as a sign of death by hanging, unless these 
two objections are first satisfactorily answered. Casper emphatically states 
that he never saw erection of the penis in a person who had died by hanging, 
and in a very small proportion of cases only a slight degree of turgescence. 
In seventy-seven cases collected by Casper,(d) the seminal discharge was ob- 
served in nineteen only, and in thirty-five cases reported by Remer, congestion 
or ejaculation was found only in fifteen. In some observations upon suicide 
by strangulation, Dr. Brierre de Boismont states that he has found the fact 
of ejaculation mentioned in one seventh of the cases (the whole number being 
114), and of erection in one tenth. In one case, in which the traces of the 
emission were very abundant, there was a dislocation of the second vertebra 
upon the first. (e) 

§ 915. V. Was the hanging suicidal or homicidal?—The probability is 
always in favor of the former, not only from the known frequency with which 


(bb) Bulletin de l’Acad. Roy. de Méd. 1839. 

(c) Klein observed the penis in a state of erection in a man who had committed sui- 
cide by shooting ; Schlegel observed freshly effused semen in a youth who had thrown 
himself from a church tower and fallen upon his head; and a case of poisoning with 
prussic acid is related by Merzdorf, in which the penis was found in a state of semi- 
erection, with the spermatic fluid effused. Vid. Siebold, Handbuch der Ger. Med. 
§ 343. 

(d) Brit. For. Med. Rev. vol. v. p. 615. (e) Ann d’Hyg. Juillet, 1848. 


48 793 


§ 917] POSITION OF THE BODY. ) [BOOK VY. 


_ this method of self-destruction is chosen, but also from the evident difficulty 
of accomplishing murder in this way. The distinction between them seldom 
rests entirely upon medical grounds. Taken alone, the medical signs will rarely 
be sufficient to determine the question. They can afford often only a proba- 
bility which must be confirmed by moral and circumstantial evidence. ‘The 
latter, indeed, is not always beyond the cognizance of the physician, for he 
may be called upon to state the verisimilitude of the inferences drawn from 
it. Thus, if the body of a person found hung, exhibit traces of violence exter- 
nally, or some poisonous substance be discovered in the stomach, the opinion 
of the medical expert may be required not only in reference to the possibility 
of death having resulted from these causes, but also whether they were imme- 
diately fatal, or whether there did not remain sufficient time and strength 
for subsequent self-destruction by hanging. Questions of this nature can be 
answered only upon general principles, it being impossible to lay down any 
positive rules which would be applicable to all cases that may arise. We can, 
therefore, in the ensuing remarks, allude to them in only a cursory manner. 

The chief facts upon which the physician will base his decision, are the posi- 
tion of the body, the marks of violence, both external and internal, and finally, 
both of these elements in connection with the ordinary signs of hanging here- 
tofore enumerated. 

§ 916. Ist. Position and condition of the body.—Experience has fully de- 
monstrated the fact, that a complete suspension of the body is not necessary 
to produce death. The tenacity with which those who are bent upon suicide 
await the catastrophe, from which they could, with ease, escape, will afford a 
key to the explanation of the cases of death by incomplete suspension. It is, 
moreover, not improbable, from what is known of the sensations produced by 
a constriction of the throat in those who have experimented upon themselves, 
or who have been restored after apparent death by hanging, that consciousness 
and sensation are very speedily lost, or first give way to an indescribable feel- 
ing of pleasure. Dr. Schneider, who succeeded in restoring a man, who had 
attempted suicide by this means, states that his patient was quite angry at 
being awakened from the delicious slumber into which he had fallen.(/) 
Wepfer and Morgagni relate, that having interrogated certain criminals 
as to their sensations, who had been hung, but afterwards restored to life, 
they answered, that they had not suffered at all, but had simply remained 
without sensation and plunged, as it were, in a profound sleep. Mr. Fleisch- 
mann, in experimenting upon himself, found that when the cord pressed upon 
the trachea, or between the principal cartilages of the windpipe, consciousness 
was almost immediately lost, but that if the obstruction to the entrance of 
air into the lungs was not so great, by constriction, for example, upon the 
thyroid cartilage, the effect was less rapid. We may, therefore, explain the 
fact of death in cases of incomplete suspension by a want both of the will and 
the power in the person to escape. 

§ 917. Dr. Duchesne,(g) from an examination of fifty-eight cases, arrived 


(f) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1851, 43 Erg. H. 
(g) Ann. d’Hyg. tom. xxxiy. pp. 141 and 346. 


154 


BOOK V.| POSITION OF THE BODY. [$ 919 


at the conclusion that suicide by strangulation may be admitted, whatever the 
position in which the body may be found, and even if resting upon the feet. 
Devergie also, from a review of a very large number of cases, states that sus- 
pension followed by death may take place with the feet or knees resting upon 
the ground, or with the body in an almost horizontal posture, and that the 
weight of the shoulders and chest is sufficient to exercise a fatal constriction 
upon the neck. Dr. Taylor(h) says, “I have now before me the reports of 
eleven cases of suicidal hanging or strangulation, which have occurred within 
the last few years. In three, the deceased were found nearly recumbent ; 
in four, in a kneeling posture—the body being more or less supported by 
the legs; and in four, the persons were found sitting.’”? A case has been 
reported, in which the body was entirely supported by the bedstead, while the 
neck rested in a loop of leather, depending from the bedpost. The case was 
evidently one of suicide.(z) Many other similar cases are on record, which 
it would be tedious to enumerate. The facts here stated derive their import- 
ance chiefly from the prevalent notion, that if the body were not completely 
suspended, the suspicion of homicide would be strengthened. This opinion 
was held and urged by some medical jurists in the case of the Prince de Condé, 
who was found hanging in his room from the curtain rod, with his toes touch- 
ing the floor. The attitude in which the body was found raised some suspi- 
cion of foul play, and a most accurate investigation of all the circumstances 
connected with the event was instituted, from which it appeared to have been 
a case of suicide. In the journal where this case is reported will be found 
also several instances of self-destruction by hanging, where the bodies were 
found in the most extraordinary situations and attitudes, accompanied with 
plates of the same.(/) 

§ 918. The inference to be drawn from the position of the body is, there- 
fore, that, in ttself, it proves neither homicide nor suicide. A person may 
hang himself from a high beam or the branch of a tree, or may choose to 
strangle himself by simply placing his neck in a noose or loop, and lean for- 
ward against it until he loses his consciousness. On the other hand, a mur- 
derer may find it more convenient to hang his victim imperfectly than to sus- 
pend him from an elevated position. In either case, the position in which the 
body is found is neither a safe criterion of its position at the moment of death, 
nor an index of the voluntary or involuntary character of the act. The cord, 
in many cases, slips or stretches by the weight of the body or the momentum 
of the fall, so that the latter will come to occupy a lower position than at the 
moment when unconsciousness was produced by constriction of the neck. 
And, even were this not the case, the more or less imperfect suspension of the 
body cannot, as we have already seen, enlighten us with respect to the ques- 
tion of homicide. 

§ 919. It is hardly necessary to state that, if the hands or feet are found 
tied, the inference is not necessarily warranted that the act was homicidal. In 
such cases, the opinion of the physician will be guided, in a measure, by the 


(h) Med. Jur., Am. ed. p. 505. (i) Med. Times, Aug. 7, 1852. 
(j) Ann. d’Hyg. tom. v. p. 165. 


155 


§ 920] LIGATURES UPON THE HANDS AND FEET. [BOOK V. 


Temaining indicatory evidence. Thus, if an individual is found suspended 

from a position which he could not. easily have reached, or to attain which 
there were no obvious means, the fact of the hands or feet being tied will 
afford certainly a strong presumption of homicide. But if, on the other hand, 
chairs or tables or any other means of support are found near the deceased, 
this presumption will no longer hold, since it is evident that the person may 
have, himself, applied these ligatures, and then hung himself by thrusting his 
head through the noose and overturning or pushing away these means of 
support. 

§ 920. It is, however, of importance to observe whether ligatures upon the 
wrists are tied in such a manner as could have been done by the person himself. 
The following remarkable case(#) may be cited in illustration: ‘John Robin-- 
son, a married man, aged thirty-four, was admitted into the asylum of the 
workhouse on the 24th of November last, having been in a desponding, melan- 
choly state some time, caused by religious delusions. He had attempted to 
destroy himself several times, by throwing himself out of the window, and 
rushing into the fire, and said he had a desire to hang himself. On admission, 
his hands were found much burnt. He refused his food for some days, but 
continued gradually to improve for the ensuing six weeks, and went to bed in 
a tranquil state on the evening of the 5th inst., about nine P. M. He was 
found next morning at half-past six suspended to a bar of the window of his 
cell, by means of the bandage which he had taken from his hands and folded 
double. His wrists were fastened together behind his back, by a piece of band- 
age, in which two running nooses had been made and slipped over his hands, 
and then pulled tight. His ankles were tightly fastened together, and his 
night-cap was pulled down over his face, below his nose. The toes almost, if 
not quite, touched the ground ; the body hanging between the bed and a night- 
chair, with the face towards the wall. On cutting him down, it was apparent, 
from the coldness and rigidity of the body, that he had been dead some time. 
The features were quite composed. No discoloration of the face; eyes in the 
natural position, if anything, a little depressed ; no froth at the mouth or pro- 
trusion of the tongue, or lividity of the neck, but, on the right side, extending 
nearly from the angle of the jaw to the commencement of the thyroid cartilage, 
* the skin was cut through, as if with a blunt knife, to the depth of nearly a 
quarter of an inch. The hands and feet were extended and pointed downwards. 
No erection of the penis, or emission of semen, urine, or feces. The body, in 
fact, presented the appearance of that of a person dying from other causes, 
and being afterwards suspended. It was only the absence of suspicion of any 
kind that made the cause of death appear satisfactory. He must have first 
taken the bandages from his hands and cut them into suitable pieces, then 
stood on the night-chair, then tied his legs, then fastened the noose around 
his neck and pulled the cap over his face, and, lastly, slipped his hands behind 
his back, put the nooses over his wrists, and then jumped off. His friends 
would not permit a post-mortem examination, and the coroner did not consider 
any medical evidence requisite.’ 


(k) Lond. Med. Gaz. vol. xiv. p. 388, by Mr. J. H. Taylor. 
756 


BOOK V.] MARKS OF VIOLENCE, [$ 928 


§ 921, 2d. Marks of violence.—Under this denomination may be included 
all those injuries which affect the question of homicide. or the sake of prac- 
tical convenience, the various injuries to the neck, consisting of those which 
affect the windpipe as well as those of the cervical vertebrae may be classed 
together. Under the former are embraced, fracture of the os hyoides, of the 
cartilages of the larynx, and laceration of their intervening membranes and 
ligaments; under the latter, fracture and displacement of the vertebrae, and 
rupture of their ligamentous bands and intervertebral substance. The conse- 
quences in both cases are extensive laceration of and effusion of blood into the 
structure of the neck ; and in the injury to the spine, compression of the spinal 
marrow, either by the displaced vertebre, or by effused blood. It is at once 
apparent that a great degree of violence will be required to produce such ex- 
tensive and serious injuries, and will, therefore, in almost every case exclude 
the idea of suicide. 

§ 922. The injuries above enumerated are sometimes made in criminal exe- 
cutions, where the fall is great, and the body at the moment of the execution 
is violently rotated by the hangman, but even in these cases luxation and frac- 
ture of the vertebre are of rare occurrence. Orfila states that, in the bodies 
of fifty persons who had been hung, he met with a fracture of the os hyoides 
in only one case, while he had never met with fracture and luxation of the 
vertebra. In the bodies of persons which were hung after death, for the sake 
of experiment, he succeeded, in some cases, in producing a rupture of the yellow 
ligaments of the spine, and the intervertebral substance. In one case the odon- 
toid process was broken but not displaced, and in another the second vertebra 
was broken horizontally. In all of these experiments, however, both the ex- 
tending and rotating force was extremely great, such, indeed, as can hardly be 
conceived in a case of suicide. 

Dr. Houston, of Dublin, in an account of the appearance found in two exe- 
cuted criminals, says: ‘The cervical vertebre were unbroken, and the spinal 
marrow and brain presented no trace of injury. In both, the sterno-mastoid 
muscle on the right side (the opposite to that on which the rope was applied) 
was ecchymosed, contused, and broken; that of the left side was only slightly 
bruised. The os hyoides and thyroid cartilage were completely severed from 
each other.’? A few shreds of the small muscles of these parts alone remained, 
and nothing, in fact, but the skin interposed between the rope and the cavity 
of the pharynx. (/) 

§ 923. There are only two well-authenticated cases of suicide by hanging in 
which injury to the cervical vertebre has been met with, and in these it was 
far less important than in any of the experiments referred to, or in cases of 
judicial or homicidal hanging. One is reported by M. Ansiaux, of Liege. 
He found in the body of a woman who had hung herself, that the posterior 
ligaments of the spine between the first two cervical vertebrae were ruptured, 
and the transverse ligament of the atlas so stretched that the odontoid process 
of the second vertebra was locked against the articular surface. The perpen- 
dicular and oblique ligaments were not injured. The first two cervical vertebrae 


(1) Dublin Hosp. Reports, vol. v. p. 317. 
T57 


§ 923] INJURY TO THE NECK. [BOOK V. 


‘were considerably separated behind, the spinal marrow was injured, and extra- 
vasated blood found at the place of separation. The deceased was a stout 
woman; when discovered, she was hanging from a beam of the ceiling, and 
her feet were about a foot and a half above the ground. Near her there was 
a chair overturned. 

Another case is reported in the Lancet by Mr. Campbell de Morgan.(m) 
‘‘ A married woman, aged fifty, worn out and exhausted by disease, was found 
hanging quite lifeless from the rail of a bed, which was not more than five 
feet eight inches from the ground. The front of her body was turned round 
towards the bed, the head thrown forcibly back—the knot of the ligature, an 
old silk handkerchief, being placed in the middle of the under side of the chin. 
Her heels were about three inches from the ground, the knees being on a level 
with the bed-frame, and resting against it. The body was seen by a medical 
man, about an hour after it was cut down—the features were perfectly calm, 
and there was no trace of congestion about the face; it was pale and in all 
respects natural. There was no lividity ; the eyes were neither injected nor 
prominent ; the tongue pale, lying far back in the mouth, and without any 
mark of indentation. The cord-mark well defined, and, like parchment, dry, 
brown, and hard, without any ecchymosis, but with a thin line of congestion 
at the upper edge of the groove—it was very deep at the back of the neck, 
just over the atlas, probably owing to the head hanging backwards. The 
mucous membrane of the stomach was pale; the lungs natural ; no congestion 
of the large veins, or of the cavities of the heart; the two ventricles con- 
tained about an equal quantity of blood. These appearances seemed to show 
that death was not caused either by asphyxia or by cerebral congestion. Nei- 
ther the trachea nor the great vessels of the neck could have sustained any 
pressure or constriction. The deep muscles over the second and third cervical 
vertebrae were ecchymosed ; this ecchymosis extended to the sheath of the 
spinal marrow ; and on the left side, and exterior to the sheath, there was an 
extensive effusion of blood firmly coagulated. There was no displacement of 
the second or other vertebre, and the ligaments were sound ; but between the 
third and fourth vertebre, there was unusual mobility, as if they had been 
stretched. In this case, the body was not heavy, and the fall, if any, could 
have been but trifling. The effusion on the spinal marrow was the cause of 
death ; and its origin was sufficiently explained, by the falling back of the 
head and sudden bending of the cervical vertebrae. Her husband and family 
were in an adjoining room, but heard no noise; it was only by accident that 
the deceased was discovered.” 

In a case of suicide, reported by Dr. Mildner,(n) the left corner of the 
os hyoides was broken and the adjacent soft parts infiltrated with dark and 
fluid blood. The person was a robust and heavy woman of forty-eight years 
of age. The indentation, which was of a yellowish-brown color, and of a 
parchment-like and desiccated appearance, was also excoriated and deeper on 
the side corresponding to the fracture. 


(m) Lancet, Aug. 10, 1844, quoted by Taylor, Med. Jur. p. 503. 
(n) Prag. Vierteljahrsch. f. d. praktische Heilkunde, 1850. Bd. iii. p. 157. 


758 


BOOK V.] MARKS UPON THE NECK, [$ 925 


§ 924. It is well known that manual strangulation is one of the most fre- 
quent complications of homicidal hanging, and hence the injuries to the neck 
here referred to will throw much doubt upon the idea of the act having been 
voluntary. A murderer who strangles his victim, will commonly use more 
violence than is necessary for his purpose, and thus produce some of the 
Serious injuries to the neck which have been described. But in such cases we 
are seldom left without a guide to the nature of the deed. The thumb and 
finger will have left their traces upon the throat, differing widely from the uni- 
form discolored furrow left by the cord. Or if the act of strangulation has 
been accomplished with anything in the nature of a cord, the direction of the 
mark will be, if not horizontal, at least not oblique in the same manner as 
that produced by suspension. ‘This distinction manifestly applies only to those 
cases in which the person is fairly hung, and in which the cord has formed but 
one noose around the neck, because if it has been twisted twice around it, the 
lower mark will generally be circular and horizontal. Hence if the marks of 
fingers upon the throat, or a horizontal discolored impression upon it be found, 
there will be good reason to believe, even if the person be found hung appa- 
rently with a single noose, that it was an act of violence committed by another 
upon him. ‘The probability of this will be much increased by the existence of 
serious injury to the subjacent parts of the neck. A full confirmation of the 
fact can, however, only be obtained from other moral and collateral evidence, 
into which it is rather the province of the jury than of the physician to 
inquire. In the following case, the evidence of homicide was derived from 
various sources. ‘The deceased was found sitting in a corner of her room, 
with a narrow tape around her neck, hung loosely and singly over a small 
brass hook, about three feet above her head. Her clothes were placed smoothly 
under her, and her hands stretched out by her side. There was a severe bruise 
on the right eye, and there were marks of blood on the tape, as well as on the 
floor and wall of the room at a distance from the body. There was a stain of 
blood on the knot of the tape where it passed over the hook; and there was 
no blood on the hands of the deceased. The windpipe for about an inch and 
a half was lacerated longitudinally in its rings, and there was a deep mark 
round the neck in the course of the doubled tape, as if from great pressure 
applied by some person, or from the weight of the suspended body. The lat- 
ter hypothesis was untenable. The body of the deceased did not weigh less 
than 126 pounds, while the tape found round her neck broke with a weight of 
49 pounds; hence the deceased never could have been suspended by it.”? The 
prisoner confessed the crime. (0) 

§ 925. Other marks of violence are found in every variety upon the person 
of the hanged. We subjoin three cases, one of homicide and two of suicide by 
hanging, to illustrate the nature of the evidence required for the settlement of 
doubtful cases. 

A gamekeeper, thirty-two years of age, robust and hardy in his constitution, 
was found hanging upon a tree in the forest, three days after he had left home, 
in pursuit of poachers. The deceased was suspended by his cravat to the 


(0) Taylor, Med. Jur. 5th ed. 754. 
T59 


§ 925] ILLUSTRATIVE CASES. [BOOK y. 


‘+ branch of a young oak-tree, and so near to the branch that the right side of 
his face was in contact with it. His feet were rather more than three feet from 
the ground, which bore no traces of a struggle. The tobacco-pipe of the de- 
ceased was found about forty paces distant from the tree, but his hunting-knife 
and rifle were nowhere to be found. The cravat had left the following mark 
upon the neck: a groove from a half to three-quarters of an inch wide, the 
skin in it brown and parchment-like, and over the thyroid cartilage three- 
quarters of an inch deep. The indentation was more superficial upon the left 
side. The direction of the mark was horizontal to the back of the neck, and 
thence upwards on the right side to the angle of the jaw. At this point, 
corresponding exactly to the knot of the noose, the skin was very deeply 
ecchymosed, and also excoriated. The right ear was greatly discolored, as 
well as the integuments around it. The skin of the face and head was exco- 
riated in many places, and bruised and lacerated also. There were, moreover, 
a great number of small lacerated wounds upon the hands and arms, and 
bruises on the knees. No other external injuries of serious character were 
found. The os hyoides was broken, and the muscles and soft parts of the neck 
infiltrated with blood. The horizontal direction of the mark upon the neck, 
the extreme tightness with which the cravat was fastened upon it, the fracture 
of the hyoid bone, together with the large number of trifling wounds, led the 
examiners to give as their opinion that the deceased had been overpowered by 
numbers, thrown down, strangled, and afterwards hung.(y) Another remark- 
able case, in which the suzcedal nature of the act was clearly determined, is 
reported by Dr. Heyfelder; it occurred at the prison at Sigmaringen, in Ger- 
many.(qg) One of the prisoners, who a few hours before had been left by the 
turnkey in his cell, of which the latter alone had the key, was found hanging 
from the jamb of the door. The ligature used was his own silk cravat, twisted 
into a cord, three and a half feet long, two inches broad, and four lines thick. 
His head was sunk upon his breast, his face pale and without expression, the 
lips blue, eyes, tongue, and mouth unchanged in position and appearance. 
The arms were brought forward over the stomach, and were rigid; the fingers 
were bent, and the feet extended and touching the ground. The mouth of the 
deceased was stopped with his own handkerchief. The mark of the cord was 
oblique, commencing between the os hyoides and thyroid cartilage, and ran 
upwards and backwards to the occiput. The skin was brown, and in some 
places shrivelled, but there was no ecchymosis. Five contused and lacerated 
wounds were found upon the sides of the head; the right ear also was lace- 
rated, and a portion of the head and face covered with blood. On the sharp 
edge of the window-sill, which was only two feet from the floor, traces of dried 
blood and hair were found, and on the wall below the window there were seve- 
ral lines of dried blood running towards the ground. Had this case occurred 
in any other place than in a locked prison-cell with a single occupant, the 
wounds upon the head and the handkerchief thrust into his mouth would have 
raised a very strong presumption of homicide, and perhaps involved the life of 
an innocent person. 


(p) Henke’s Zeitsch. 1835, H. 3. (q) Ibid. 1849, H. 1. 
760 


BOOK YV.] INFERENCE FROM MARKS OF VIOLENCE. [$ 926 


We would here refer the reader to another case of hanging, singular and 
important from the fact of the woman having previously inflicted upon her 
own head, with a hatchet, no less than fifty-five wounds, some of which pene- 
trated to and fractured the bone. Besides these, there were twenty-six super- 
ficial incised wounds upon the breast and stomach, made from three to four 
days previously, as they were in a state of suppuration. The loss of blood 
must have been very great, being estimated at three pounds. Yet this woman 
had been able to leave the room where she had committed this violence upon 
her own person, and proceed to a stable at the back of the house, and there, 
mounting upon a milking-stool, attach the cord to a beam, and consummate 
the act of self-destruction. In this case the indentation of the cord left no 
discoloration of the skin, probably owing to the loss of blood. The deceased 
had long been melancholy, and this, together with other facts and circumstan- 
tial evidence which came out upon investigation, left no doubt that the act was 
suicidal. (7) 

§ 926. The influence which the discovery of wounds and marks of violence 
upon the body of a person found hung, will exert in the determination of the 
voluntary or passive character of the act, must be decided, in each: case, by the 
light obtained from an inquiry into the possible motives for suicide, into all 
the circumstances connected with the act, and into those general principles 
elsewhere referred to for the discrimination between self-inflicted and homicidal 
wounds. In some cases the injury may have been of accidental origin, as 
indeed may the hanging itself, but the case is hardly conceivable, in which the 
true nature of the latter could not be ascertained, or the former not rendered 
probable. In conclusion, we would repeat the statement, that hanging is pre- 
eminently a suicidal mode of death, and strong evidenee, both medical and 
other, will be required in any given case to overthrow this presumption, it 
being far more likely that a person should inflict barbarous injuries upon his 
own person, and then hang himself, than that a murderer should resort to so 
difficult and unusual mode of assassination. This form of homicide can hardly 
be regarded as practicable, unless there be an exceeding disproportion between 
the strength of the murderer and that of his victim. It can only be taken into 
consideration, when the body found hung is that of a very young or feeble 
person, or one whom infirmity or temporary intoxication may have rendered 
helpless. . 


(r) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1840, H. 1 (Kriigelstein). 
761 


§ 927] DROWNING. [BOOK Y. 


BPN SPF, Wel od HG EID, 
DROWNING. 


T. How PRopucine DEATH, § 927. 
II. Timez WHEN BODY WILL FLOAT, &c., § 929. 
III. Signs oF DEATH BY DROWNING, § 930. 


1st. Paleness and coldness. of skin, &c., § 931. 
2d. Abrasion of the hands, &c., § 932. : 
3d. Water and froth in the lungs, § 933. 

4th. Water in the stomach, § 935. 

5th. Signs of asphyxia, § 937. 

6th. Marks of violence, § 938. 

7th. Putrefaction, &c., § 939. 


IV. AccIDENTAL OR OTHERWISE, § 241. 


§ 927. I. How producing death.—The immediate cause of death in drown- 
ing has been the theme of considerable discussion. At present, however, from 
the numerous experiments made to determine this point, there can be but little 
doubt that the true cause of death in drowning is, suffocation. By this 
word is meant, the prevention of the ingress of air into the lungs. The truth 
of this statement will be apparent, by a consideration of the external and 
internal condition of the body after death from this cause. 

Before, however, proceeding to describe the post-mortem appearances in the 
drowned, the act of drowning demands our attention. A person who falls 
alive into the water, and is unable to swim, sinks at once below the surface. 
Presently the impossibility of respiring forces him to struggle to reach the air, 
and the effort to respire is instinctively repressed until this is accomplished, 
when he gasps convulsively, and takes in with the air a certain quantity of 
water also, which is unavoidably swallowed. Sinking once more, the air in 
the lungs is partially expelled by an act of expiration, and bubbles are seen to 
rise to the surface. New and probably involuntary efforts to breathe are made, 
and water being thus drawn into the lungs, instead of air, brings on an act of 
coughing, by which water and air are both expelled. These efforts alternate 
for a few moments. If again successful in reaching the surface, the death- 
struggle is a little prolonged; but the privation of air soon benumbs both the 
mental and physical faculties, and with gradually lessening effort the uncon- 
scious and exhausted body sinks lifeless to the bottom.(77) 

The physiological explanation of this manner of death is found in the fact 
that, in consequence of the privation of air, the blood ceases to undergo in 
the lungs those changes indispensable for the maintenance of life. Hence the 
functions of the brain and nervous system are paralyzed, and presently the 
muscular and respiratory movements also. The heart continues to pulsate 
feebly for a short time after the stoppage of the voluntary functions of the 


(rr) M. Beau concludes, from numerous experiments upon animals, that death by 
drowning is always a suffocation produced by the arrest of breathing from spasm of 
the muscles of the larynx. Archives Gén. Juill. 1860, p. 64. 

762 


BOOK V.]| DROWNING. [§ 929 


body; but the blood having become completely venous, is not long capable of 
affording the necessary stimulus to this organ. 

§ 928. The rapidity with which life is Evens by drowning depends 
upon the frequency and completeness of the renewal of the air in the lungs. 
If the individual have come several times to the surface of the water and 
breathed, he will, of course, not die so quickly as one who has not had this 
opportunity ; but it is probable that in cases of drowning, where the person 
has not been able to support himself above the water by any extraneous aid, 
life is extinct within five minutes. Where the submersion has been complete 
from the beginning, life can scarcely be prolonged more than two minutes. 
“Mr. Woolley, the surgical attendant at the Receiving House of the Royal 
Humane Society in Hyde Park, believes that very few lives are preserved after 
four minutes of complete submersion. In the year 1840, however, he met 
with a case in which a person recovered, although there was reason to believe 
that he had been five minutes under water, and a similar instance has since 
come under his observation.’’(s) In an account of the pearl-fishery, by the 
Rey. Mr. Corder, who resided several years at Columbo, he says “that he 
observed with attention the time during which many of the divers remained 
under water at the depth of seven fathoms. Some of them performed the dip 
within the space of one minute; others came up in one minute and twenty 
seconds. Some persons, who have frequently attended the fisheries and accom- 
panied the divers to the banks, consider one minute and a half to be the longest 
period during which any diver remains under water. Other gentlemen, who 
are willing to allow the greatest latitude, say that they certainly never knew a 
diver to exceed two minutes.’’(¢) The same observation was made by Dr. 
Lefevre, of Rochefort, relative to the Navarino sponge-divers; he says that 
there was not one who could remain entirely submerged for two consecutive 
minutes.(w) Nevertheless, some cases, said to be authentic, have been reported, 
in which recovery has taken place after a much longer period of submersion.(v) 
The only exception to this rapid death in complete submersion is when the 
person falling into the water is in a state of syncope. As it is known that one 
may remain without respiration and circulation, in a state of apparent death, 
for a few minutes, or even longer, it may be admitted that occasionally a 
person falling or thrown into the water may suddenly faint from terror, and be 
rescued before respiration has returned. In illustration of this fact, a case 
related by Plater is often cited. A woman, condemned to be drowned for 
infanticide, fainted away at the moment she was thrown into the water. She 
was left in it a quarter of an hour, and upon then being drawn out recovered 
her senses. 

§ 929. II. The tume at which a eee: body will float, or rise again to 
the surface after having been once sunk, appears to be subject to considerable 
variation. It depends upon the rapidity of the access of decomposition, and 
the body therefore rises sooner in summer than in winter; upon the density of 


(s) Brodie’s Lectures on Pathology and Surgery. 

(t) Ibid. (u) Med. Gaz. xvi. 608. 

(v) Vid. Assoc. Med. Journ. April 22,1853; Med. Gaz. vol. xxi. p. 448; Ibid. xxix. 
p. 78; and Med. Times, Dec. 2, 1848, p. 125. 


163 


§ 929] TIME AT WHICH A DROWNED BODY WILL FLOAT. [BOOK V. 


the water itself (whether salt or fresh) ; upon the age and sex of the individual, 
children, females, and fat persons being comparatively buoyant; and also upon 
whether or not the body is clothed. The question is one not merely of scientific 
interest, but, as will be seen in the following case, may have important legal 
bearings. 

“Voltan and Adams v. The National Loan Fund Life Assurance Company. 

“The action was brought by the plaintiffs, as assignees of this policy, to 
recover on a policy of insurance issued by the defendants upon the life of one 
Conrad Shoemaker. The insurance was for $10,000, and the policy was issued 
on the 15th of May, 1850. The premium on the policy was payable quarterly 
in advance. 

“On the 23d of August, 1850, Shoemaker paid the premium for the quarter 
ending on the 15th of November, 1850. On the 4th of September, 1850, the 
plaintiffs alleged that Shoemaker was drowned, while on a fishing excursion 
with one Ottman, a German, in the waters of the bay of New York, about 
opposite to Hoboken, and nearest to the New Jersey shore. The theory of 
the defence substantially was, that Voltan, Martin, and Shoemaker (Germans) 
had entered into a conspiracy to defraud the insurance company, by causing 
an insurance to be effected for a large amount on the life of Shoemaker, and 
subsequently secreting and disposing of him. 

“To obtain a recovery, it was, of course, necessary that the plaintiffs should 
satisfy the jury of the death of Shoemaker. This they attempted to do—Ist, 
by the testimony of Ottman, who swore to the circumstances of his drowning, 
and of the time and place, which was on the 4th of September, 1850, about 
dusk, in the Hudson River, opposite Hoboken, and near midway of the river; 
2d, by showing that a body found floating on the river near Jersey City, on 
the 7th of September, 1850, was the body of Shoemaker. 

‘This body was examined by the coroner of Jersey City, soon after being 
discovered. The skin was somewhat bleached, and the face disfigured ; a part 
of the lips being eaten off by crabs, lobsters, or fish of some kind. After exa- 
mination, it was interred by direction of the coroner. 

“It was not attempted to identify this as the body of Shoemaker, except 
from some of the clothes found on it, and particularly the handkerchief on the 
neck. The handkerchief on the body was the half of a black silk one, with 
stripes, and cut from its mate diagonally. It was shown by a witness that 
Voltan, a short period before the alleged drowning, had purchased a handker- 
chief for his son, and, at the suggestion of Voltan’s daughter, it was cut in 
two, and half of it given to Shoemaker, after being hemmed by her; the other 
half to the son. The part retained by the son, and the part found on the neck 
of the body were exhibited in court and found to match in color and stripes, 
and when laid together, formed a square, and although cut across the stripes, 
matched in the run and character of the stripes. The pantaloons were also 
shown to be of the same general character worn by Shoemaker, about the 
time of his alleged death. 

“To rebut the presumption that this was the body of Shoemaker, a number 
of witnesses were sworn on the part of the defence, with the view of showing 
that, as a general rule, bodies will not rise and float, even when the water is 

764 


eee ~ 


EE 


BOOK Y.] TESTIMONY OF CORONERS. [$ 929 


of the temperature that it is in the month of September, under from six to ten 
days. As Shoemaker was alleged to have been drowned on the 4th of Sep- 
tember, the body was found floating on the 7th of September, three days after- 
wards; if it were universally true that bodies do not float until decomposition 
takes place, in the waters of the Hudson, under from six to ten days, then this 
could not be the body of Shoemaker. 

‘‘The first witness sworn on the subject was Dr. Barent P. Staats. He 
testified that he had had occasion, in the course of his professional reading, to 
examine the subject as to how long a body will remain in the water before 
rising and floating. That it depends on the time of year, and the temperature 
of the water, and the size and make of the man. When the temperature is 
65°, he did not think any body would rise in from less than seven to ten days. 
On his cross-examination, he said he did not know that he could point out any 
book that he had consulted. 

“Dr. Benj. Budd was the next witness called. He testified that he was 
assistant-coroner in New York—has had occasion to see many drowned bodies 
—some one hundred and fifty. Never knew a body to rise in less than six 
days, unless some mechanical means were used to raise it. Should judge the 
body found at Jersey City to have been in the water from ten to twenty days. 
Has never known a body to be in the water less than seven days that was 
mutilated by fishes. Bodies that have been hooked up in three, four, or five days, 
have not that peculiar bleached appearance as those present that come up from 
seven to ten days. The body will not rise until decomposition has commenced. 
He is twenty-five years of age, and has only studied the book of experience. 

“ Dr. Seth Geer was then called. He testified that he was coroner in New 
York for eighteen months, during which time he had examined between three 
and four hundred drowned bodies. ‘The general rule as to the rising of 
drowned bodies in the harbor of New York, is from eight to ten days. In 
his judgment, from the description given, the body found at Jersey City, had 
been in the water two or three weeks. Never knew a body that had been in 
the water but three days, mutilated by fishes. The hotter the water, the sooner 
the body would bleach. 

“ Andrew Blakeley was then called. He testified that he was deputy coroner 
in New York a little over two years, during which time he examined rising 
two hundred and fifty drowned bodies. Drowned bodies would rise in the 
summer months on an average of from six to ten days, as he found out by 
experience. He did not remember any case of rising when the body had been 
in the water but three days. He never saw a drowned body that had laid in 
the water but three days eaten by fishes. On his cross-examination, he stated 
that he had never read any medical book on the subject, nor did he know, 
except from testimony taken as coroner, of a body lying under water seven 
days. It takes a body from six to eight or ten days to get bleached. He 
means by bleaching, a soaking of the body—a general softening and whitening 
of the body. 

“ Henry CO. Van Wie was called on the part of the plaintiffs. He testified 
that he was coroner of the county of Albany for four years. Has held a good 
many inquests on drowned bodies. Has known two or three instances where 

165 


§ 929] SIGNS OF DEATH BY DROWNING. [BOOK V. 


-. the bodies have risen in three or four days. In warm or sultry weather they 

will rise in from three to four days. They will bleach out directly in warm 
weather. They will be mutilated by fishes directly after decomposition takes 
place. Remembers an instance of holding an inquest on a body that drifted 
ashore, and had been drowned four, five, or six days. (This witness related 
the startling fact of holding, in one season, inquests on fifteen infants under 
three months old, found floating in cigar-boxes near the city of Albany—cases, 
doubtless, of infanticide. ) 

“Henry C. Allen, called for the plaintiffs. He testified that he had been 
coroner of Albany County for twelve or fourteen years. He never could make 
up his mind as to any definite time that a body would remain under water. 
He knew an instance of a girl of fourteen years of age, who was drowned on 
Friday at 12 o’clock, and floated on Sunday at 12 o’clock. She was drowned 
at Greenbush Ferry. Has known instances of bodies rising in five or six days ; 
sometimes sooner. . Knew of one man, by the name of Moreton, who floated 

on the fourth or fifth day. The girl spoken of had turned a dark livid color. 
Females float sooner than males. 

“George HE. Cutler called by plaintiffs. He testified that he was coroner of 
Jersey City. He knew of the case of a young man who was drowned on Sun- 
day, about T or 8 o’clock in the morning, and on Tuesday or Wednesday suc- 
ceeding, about 11 o’clock, he was found floating about two miles from the 
place where he was drowned. He knew of a female by the name of Smith, 
was seen alive on Wednesday evening, about seven o’clock; on Wednesday, 
about 4 o’clock P. M., he was called to view the body floating. A person of 
temperate habits will bleach very quick; those who have been inveterate 
drinkers never will bleach. 

‘* John Osborn called by plaintiffs. He testified that he was coroner of Al- 
bany County three years. Had occasion frequently to reclaim drowned bodies. 
Had known bodies to come up in two days, others not in several months, 
Had a case of an Irish girl. She had been drowned some two or three days ; 
it might have been four. Had another case of a man, McCarregan, an Irish 
auctioneer, who rose in four or five days. 

‘ Silas M. Benton called for plaintiffs. He testified that he was acting 
coroner in 1847, 1848, and 1849, in New Haven (Conn.). He knew a case of 
a person, whom he saw on Friday, was missed on Saturday, and found floating 
in the water on Sunday. The man was a German, and a baker by trade. 

‘The verdict of the jury was in favor of the plaintiffs.” (w) 

The same question was largely discussed on the trial of Spencer Cowper, 
for the murder of Sarah Stout. (x) 

In two cases mentioned by Dr..Taylor, bodies floated in a much shorter 
time. In one, a woman who was seen on the banks of a river at half-past 
eleven in the evening, was found drowned at eight o’clock in the morning. The 
body was floating on the water with the face downwards. In another, in the 
month of December, a factory girl fell into a river while walking along the 


(w) Am. Jour. Med. Sci., July, 1853, p. 263. 
(x) Burke’s Trials of the Aristocracy, 284. 


766 


pS —- 


BOOK V.]| SIGNS OF DEATH BY DROWNING. [$ 932 


bank in the evening. The body was found floating on the surface of the water 
the following morning. The bodies in these cases were clothed, and this, it is 
supposed, may have rendered them more buoyant. (xx) 

§ 930. III. Szgns of death by drowning.—In the enumeration of the evi- 
dences of this mode of death, it is assumed that the inspection is made shortly 
after the act has occurred and before putrefaction has commenced. 

The countenance of the drowned is usually described as being natural and 
composed ; the face is pale, but very soon becomes livid and swollen on 
exposure to the air, and especially in warm weather ; the eyes are half open, 
and the pupils dilated; a light froth is observable about the mouth and nostrils, 
and the swollen and livid tongue reaches to the margin of the lips. These 
signs are not exclusively characteristic of death by drowning—they merely 
fender the cause of death by suffocation probable. 

§ 931. Ist. Paleness and coidness of the skin and cutis anserina.—The 
first are ascribable merely to the presence of the body in a colder medium 
than the air, and are altogether destitute of significance as to the cause of 
death. The projection of the papille of the skin, commonly called goose- 
flesh, is deserving of more attention, for although it may have been caused 
by the coldness of the air, yet it cannot be produced upon a body already 
dead, by the chill of the water, unless, possibly, the body be thrown in 
while yet warm. Léffler very justly remarks, upon this sign(y)—‘“‘If we 
should find a body drawn out of the water in the summer time, and the 
cutis anserina, on certain parts of the body not covered with the clothing, we 
should be fully warranted in the conclusion that it was due to the sensation 
- of cold, and consequently that the individual was living on entering the 
water.” A singular case is reported in the second series of Casper’s obser- | 
vations, in which the opinion that a child two and a half years old was living 
when thrown into the water, rested partly upon this circumstance. The cutis 
anserina was very evident upon the right side of the body and upon one of 
the thighs. The head having been enveloped in a cloth, neither froth was 
found in the lungs nor water in the stomach. ‘The fluidity of the blood 
and the cutis anserina were, therefore, the only medical signs present. 

§ 932. 2d. Abrasion of the hands, mud and sand under the nails, and 
substances grasped in the hands.—In the struggles made by a drowning per- 
son to save himself, he clutches wildly at every object in the water ; hence, if 
it is not very deep, and the drowning person is near the bank, the fingers will 
most probably bear the marks of the sand or gravel, and weeds, sticks, Xc., 
will remain firmly grasped in the hands. Unless the substances found in the 
hands be such as are peculiar to the water, the other marks of injury upon 
them may have been received in a struggle upon the shore, or ina fall down a 
precipitous bank. Or, indeed, they may be produced after death by the hands 
striking against substances at the bottom of the stream. Again, in many 
instances, these signs are not found at all—a fact which may be explained by 
the absence of struggling when the person enters the water in a state of uncon- 
sciousness from intoxication or other causes. _ Likewise, if the water be very 


(xx) Med. Jur., 5th ed. p. 696. 
(y) Henk. Zeitsch., 1844, 3 H. p. 6. Der Tod durch Ertrinken. 


T67 


§ 934] SIGNS OF DEATH BY DROWNING. [BOOK V. 


deep, the body will not have reached the bottom until all its energies are lost 
and life is extinct. 

§ 933. 8d. Water and froth in the lungs.—The fact that water is drawn 
into the lungs by persons who die by drowning, is, as a general fact, perfectly 
well established. It is found, either in substance, or mixed with air and mucus 
constituting froth. When found in substance, it may have been imbibed dur- 
ing life or have penetrated after death. If it have entered during life, it must 
be identical with the medium in which it is presumed the person was drowned, 
and sometimes it will contain mud, sand or gravel, which has been dissolved or 
suspended in the water. Devergie relates a case in which sand and gravel 
were found in the trachea, and another is reported by Blumhardt,(z) of an 
epileptic who, having fallen into a shallow brook, was drowned, and on post, 
mortem examination, his trachea was found to contain from three to four 
drachms of sand and gravel. Metzger(a) examined the body of a new-born 
child that was drowned in the drain of a slaughter-house. The whole of the 
trachea to its bifurcation was filled with the liquid refuse. The presence of 
water in the lungs is not, however, a proof that it was taken in while the 
person was living. The fact that water will penetrate the lungs of a dead 
body, which is submerged, rests mainly upon the authority of Orfila, who made 
experiments which fully demonstrate its possibility. It is, indeed, true that 
most other experimenters have not succeeded, but they have made their trials, 
either with dead animals or with still-born children. Léffler, however, in his 
experiments upon puppies, found that if the head were kept in a more or less 
elevated position, and the jaws separated by a piece of cork, the water readily 
penetrated after death into the lungs. The observations of Orfila being upon 
the dead human body, are more to the purpose. He found that, by placing 
the body in a bath-tub and coloring the water with lamp black or indigo, the 
colored water could afterwards be found in the subdivisions of the bronchial 
tubes. In one case even, in which the body, thirty hours after death, was 
placed upon vis stomach in the colored water, the water had penetrated as far 
as the middle of the trachea. Perhaps, as a general rule, water will not 
be found in the lungs, if the person did not perish by drowning but was 
thrown in after death, because the head by its weight falls back, and an obsta- 
cle is thus placed to the entrance of the water. But where a body has been 
thrown into a well, or is otherwise found in a posture favorable to the ingress 
of the water, the discovery of this fluid in the respiratory passages may with 
plausibility be assumed to be of post-mortem occurrence. 

The absence of water from the lungs, is certainly not sufficient evidence 
that the person was not drowned, because it is not invariably present in cases 
where the person has undoubtedly perished in this way. Moreover, it may 
have drained away, especially if such manceuvres have been used to resuscitate 
the person as by rolling him on the ground or suspending him by the heels. 
It may also disappear by transudation, when the body remains a long time in 
the water. 

§ 934. roth in the lungs has, on the other hand, greater significance as to 


(z) Wurtemb. Med. Correspond. Bl. iv. No.1. (a) Pyl’s Aufsiitze, St. 6, Fall. 5. 
768 


BOOK V. | SIGNS OF DEATH BY DROWNING. [$ 935 


the cause of death. Although found to a certain extent in other modes of 
suffocation, such as hanging and in epilepsy and extensive bronchitis, it does 
not present in these cases the same distinctive characters by which it may be 
recognized in death by drowning. In the cases referred to, it is very small in 
quantity, often bloody, and being composed entirely of the mucous secretion 
of the trachea mixed with air, is viscid, in larger bubbles and closely adherent 
to the sides of the tube. The watery froth of the drowned is on the contrary 
abundant, foamy, made up of an infinite number of small bubbles which are 
easily separable, and which soon dissolve on exposure to the air. It often 
extends from the mouth to the smaller bronchial tubes, but is generally more 
limited in extent. 

The absence of froth from the lungs cannot, however, be assigned as a proof 
that the person did not die from drowning. Experiments have shown that in 
certain cases of drowning it is not formed. These are cases in which, from 
any cause, the person has not risen to the surface to breathe. Piorry, Orfila 
and others, have shown that when animals are completely immersed in water 
and forcibly held there until dead, no froth is found in their lungs; but if, on 
the contrary, they are allowed to struggle and come to the surface, itis formed 
abundantly. Again, from its very nature, this sign is evanescent. If the 
body have lain for several days in the water, if it have been removed from the 
water with the head depending, or finally, if the inspection be not made soon 
after its removal, especially if the weather be warm, the froth that may possi- 
bly have existed, will no longer be found. In Dr. Ogston’s observations, the 
watery froth in the lungs was not found later than fifty-five and a half hours 
after drowning in summer, and the fourth day in winter. This author states, 
also, that he met with a case of poisoning with laudanum, in which a light 
watery froth like that of the drowned was found in the trachea. () 

§ 935. Hence we may conclude, that the more extensively the froth is found 
in the respiratory passages, the greater will be the probability of death having 
taken place by drowning, and of the struggle having been active and pro- 
longed before the extinction of life. Unless there are marks of strangulation 
upon the body, pathological proof of bronchial catarrh, or evidence that the 
person has been subject to epilepsy, the sign is positive and conclusive of death 
by drowning. If, on the other hand, no froth is found, this circumstance is no 
proof that the person did not die by drowning, unless. the inspection was made 
soon after death, the body having been carefully removed from the water, or 
unless other injuries sufficient to have caused death were discovered. Hven 
then, it cannot be regarded as conclusive. | 

4th. Water in the stomach.—Water is always swallowed in greater or less 
quantity, by a drowning person who retains sufficient consciousness to make a 
struggle for life. It will not, however, always be found, if the inspection have 
been delayed for a long while, or if the popular means have been employed to 
restore him to life, by getting rid of the water in the stomach. Furthermore, 
there are certain cases in which the person falls into the water already asphyx- 
iated, or stunned by a blow or a fall, in which case, consciousness not exist- 


(b) Lond. Med. Gaz. 1851, p. 762. 
49 769 


§ 937] SIGNS OF DEATH BY DROWNING. [BOOK V. 


ing, no struggle will be made, and, consequently, no water swallowed. When, 
however, water 7s found in the stomach, it may have been swallowed immedi- 
ately before the presumed accident. Casper(c) relates an interesting case in 
which a child two years old, playing in the neighborhood of a stream, being 
thirsty, drank eagerly a large quantity of water given to him by his nurse. 
She left him for a moment, and on her return, found that he had fallen into 
the water and was already drowned. In this case, the usual signs of suffoca- 
tion were wanting, there was no watery froth in the trachea or bronchia, but 
the blood was remarkably fluid, and the stomach filled with water. Hence it 
is necessary to observe whether the fluid in the stomach is identical with that 
in which the person apparently was drowned, for although the result will fre- 
quently be a negative one, yet it is often possible to detect sand, gravel, parts 
of water-plants, &c., in the cesophagus and stomach, which it is highly impro- 
bable would have been voluntarily swallowed. If the individual be discovered 
lying in a morass, a stagnant pool, or a privy well, there will be, of course, no 
difficulty in recognizing the liquids from such places, if found in the stomach. 

§ 936. The objection to the evidence from the presence of water in the 
lungs, that it may have penetrated thither after death, cannot be applied to 
the sign under discussion. Experiments by Riedell, Champeaux and Faisolle, 
Maschka, Viborg, Kansler, Orfila, and Piorry, on the dead bodies of animals 
and men, have fully established the certainty, that water does not enter the 
stomach after death, unless putrefaction is far advanced. Hence the conclu- 
sion is warranted, that if the water can be recognized as identical with that 
in which the individual apparently was drowned (unless it was drunk previous 
to submersion) he must have swallowed it in his.drowning struggles. 

§ 937. 5th. The general signs of death by asphyxia are found on drowned 
persons. Contrary to the once prevailing opinion, that apoplexy was the 
cause of death in drowning, an extravasation of blood in the brain is rarely 
met with in the drowned. ‘Those who are predisposed to apoplexy, and who 
suddenly enter cold water, particularly when the stomach is full, may be struck 
with apoplexy; or those who fall on the head, from a height into the water, 
may rupture one of the cerebral vessels, but the reader should bear in mind 
that this is neither a necessary nor a usual condition in those who simply die 
from drowning. Even a congestion or fulness of the vessels of the brain is 
not constantly observed, and the appearances often described as such are most 
probably cadaveric, and due to the depending position in which the head is 
generally found. 

The amount of congestion of the brain depends usually upon that of the 
thoracic viscera. The lungs appear fuller and more voluminous than usual, 
sometimes overlapping each other in the anterior mediastinum, but do not 
contain much blood.(d) The ecchymoses which are found beneath the pleura, 
pericardium and pericranium, in all cases of suffocation, and in some of strangu- 
lation, are never found after death by drowning (Tardieu). M. Faure(e) has 
called attention to the emphysematous condition of the lungs resulting from 


(c) Gericht. Leichen éffnungen. Fall. 77. 
(d) Bock, Gericht. Sectionen. p. 44. 
(e) Arch. Gén. 5eme sér. xii. 301, and xv. 474, 


TT0 


BOOK V.] MARKS OF VIOLENCE ON THE DROWNED. [$ 938 


the rupture of the pulmonary vesicles and the escape of air mixed with water 
from them into the intra-vesicular structure, as a distinctive sign of death by 
drowning, and as being available, therefore, in helping to determine whether 
a body found in the water was thrown there after death, or is that of a person 
who died by drowning. Such lungs are remarkable for retaining their natural 
shape, and for their unusual weight. ‘The heart always contains in its right 
half, fluid or loosely coagulated blood, and is distended with it if the lungs are 
at the same time overloaded. 

According to some authors, the blood is always completely fluid, but this 
statement is liable to exceptions, as coagulated blood has been found in some 
well authenticated cases of drowning, and also in experiments upon animals 
who have been killed in this way.(/) The abdominal organs are usually 
found much congested, especially the liver and kidneys. If the drowning have 
taken place during the process of digestion, the stomach, as observed by Orfila, 
presents a violet color. The bladder sometimes contains urine, at others not; 
as a sign of drowning, it is of the most complete insignificance. Retraction 
of the penis is given by Casper as a sign peculiar to death by drowning. 

§ 938. 6th. Marks of violence.—The first point to be determined in all 
cases where marks of violence are discovered upon the bodies of persons found 
in the water, is, whether the individual was really drowned. ‘This is rendered 
necessary by the fact that persons are not unfrequently thrown into the water 
dead, or supposed to be dead, after criminal violence has been employed, and 
it is hoped in this way to conceal the cause of death. Moreover, suicides 
endeavor sometimes to destroy themselves by drowning, when they have failed 
by other means. If it can be shown, from an absence of the signs of drowning 
before enumerated, that the person was probably dead at the time of submersion, 
it will, of course, not be necessary to consider the possibility of the injuries 
having been accidentally received at that time. The character and extent of 
the wounds or other injuries will often enable us to determine very nearly at 
what period they were received. Indeed, it is only by a careful examination 
of these, and a comparison of them with those which could possibly be made 
accidentally in drowning, or immediately afterwards, that we can hope to 
approach to a correct judgment of the case. A person falling from a height 
into the water, may sustain various severe injuries, especially if the water be 
shallow, and he fall upon the head. Fractures and even dislocations have 
been produced by this means. The first may be caused by sudden, violent 
contact with some hard body in the water, or at its bottom; the second is 
illustrated in the case of a man who for a wager jumped from the parapet of 
London Bridge, and dislocated both arms, probably in consequence of holding 
them in a horizontal position. Besides these injuries, various contusions and 
lacerations may occur in drowning or immediately after it, from accidental 
violence, sustained by the person in his drowning struggles, his body being 
possibly thrown against projecting rocks, roots of trees, or sharp pieces of 
wood or iron. Sometimes a mark, similar to that made in hanging, is found 
upon the neck of persons who have been accidentally drowned, and caused by 


(f) Taylor, Med. Jur. 
rari 


§ a PUTREFACTION IN THE DROWNED. [BOOK Y. 


the pressure of the collar or fastening of the dress mendaved tense by the 
imbibition of water. 

A case is recorded(g) in which the body of an old man, who had volun- 
tarily drowned himself, was drawn out of the water by means of a rope fast- 
ened round the neck for the purpose. This was done probably half an hour 
after death. The thyroid cartilage was broken into several pieces, and there 
was a distinct ecchymosis over it, made by the rope. 

It is the province of the physician to determine whether these injuries could 
have been produced in this fortuitous manner, but most of the circumstances 
which throw light upon these doubtful cases come properly under the cogni- 
zance of the jury. There are some injuries, on the other hand, which are of 
such a nature as to indicate that they were inflicted previous to drowning. 
They are such as cannot be attributed to any cause incidental to drowning, but 
must have been either self-inflicted or homicidal. They are stabs, gunshot 
wounds, incised wounds of the neck, &c. In estimating the cause, nature, and 
effect of these injuries, the physician will be governed by the facts referred to 
in the chapter on Wounds, since evidently the circumstance of subsequent 
immersion will not materially affect the distinction between homicide and sui- 
cide. If, however, the body have lain long in the water, and especially if the 
process of putrefaction have begun, the information derivable from the marks 
of violence upon the body will be greatly impaired in value. Not only will 
the coagula, wherever the water has gained access, be dissolved and washed 
away, but the size, direction, and color of the wound will be altered. The 
cause of this fact will be fully apparent from a consideration of the struc- 
tural changes made by the process of decomposition. 

§ 939. Tth. Putrefaction, éc.—A body which is taken out of the water 
presents a pale and bleached appearance, which is more striking the warmer 
the temperature of the water. In summer it is observable in a few hours; in 
winter, not until several days after death. After the body has been removed 
from the water, and while still fresh, the face and head, the neck and the breast 
as far as the middle of the sternum, acquire one after the other a brick-red 
appearance. But the putrefactive process very soon begins, and spots of a 
bluish-green color appear in the midst of this redness, and generally are first 
evident upon the temples, ears, and nape‘of the neck, and then on the neck and 
breast. These spots mingle together, and more rapidly when the body has 
lain long in the water, so that in summer, after eight to twelve days, and in 
winter, in twelve to fourteen days, the whole head, neck, and somewhat later 
the breast also have acquired a dirty-green color, with interspaces of dark red. 
Casper says that it is not unusual to see bodies of the drowned which exhibit 
this striking putrefactive change, while at the same time the rest of the body, 
particularly the abdomen and extremities, retain their pale color. In water 
of the temperature of 50° to 54° Fahr., the body becomes rigid in a few 
hours. The skin assumes a yellowish-white color, the lips become blue, and 
the joints inflexible. 

§ 940. After the lapse of from three to ten days, the Prion of the body 


(g) Henke’s Zeitschrift, fiir 1844, H. i. 
172 


sO 


BOOK Y.] ACCIDENTAL OR OTHERWISE. [$ 941 


undergoes a markedchange. The development of gas becomes so great as to 
cause the body to float, and in the course of the second week, the skin becomes 
emphysematous, the cuticle loose, and the parts of the body which are above 
the surface of the water acquire tints of green, blue, and brown, and become 
dry and parchment-like. If the body has rolled about in the water, as will be 
the case where the current is rapid, these changes take place more gradually. 
If taken out of the water about this time, the features become in a few hours 
scarcely recognizable, in consequence of the swelling and discoloration, the latter 
being blackish-green ; the whole of the body is swelled and puffy, and the scro- 
tum often distended to the size of a child’s head. The penis, on the contrary, 
is very much shrunken. . The internal organs, with the exception of the brain, 
are comparatively fresh in their appearance. If the body, however, have 
remained in the water, and the weather be cool, few changes worthy of note 
take place during the next six or seven weeks. But about the third or fourth 
month the skin has become so much eroded in various places, but especially 
over the inguinal region, that perforations will be found leading to the various 
cavities of the body. In consequence, the gases generated by decomposition 
escape, and the body sinks again in the water. The skin and the muscular 
tissue become transformed into incrustations of adipocere, and the bones are 
so loosely held together, that portions of the skeleton are apt to be separated. 
The time which a body has lain in the water cannot be determined with any 
precision, after the process of putrefaction has once commenced. The rapidity 
and character of the alterations which it undergoes vary according to age, sex, 
habit of body, temperature of the water and the air, depth of the water, and 
whether salt or fresh, stagnant or running, the attacks of fish and birds of 
prey, and finally whether the body is clothed or not. 

Hence, it may be inferred from these remarks, how easily, after the body has 
lain some time in the water, the external features of wounds and other inju- 
ries may be masked by the progress of putrefaction and the imbibition of 
water by the skin. 

§ 941. IV. Accidental or otherwise.—Infants and the infirm and aged 
may be accidentally drowned in very shallow water, as may also, indeed, adults 
who fall into it, the mouth downward, in a fit of epilepsy or helpless from 
intoxication. A man was in the act of leaving a privy, when he was seized 
with an epileptic fit and fell with his face in a piece of dirty water, which did 
not exceed a foot and a half in breadth, with a depth of from three to four 
inches. When discovered after death, only his mouth and nostrils and one 
cheek were found to have been under water.(h) Moreover, persons bent on 


(h) Dr. Ogston, Med. Gaz. May 2, 1851. Dr. Taylor, in his critique of the medical 
evidence in the case of Kirwan (Dublin Quarterly Jour. Jan. 1853), says: ‘‘ Persons 
while bathing, or exposed to the chance of drowning, are often seized with fits which 
may prove suddenly ee although they may allow of a short struggle; the fit may 
arise from syncope, apoplexy or epilepsy. Hither of the last conditions would, in my 
opinion, reconcile all the medical circumstances of this remarkable case. It is the 
result of twenty years’ experience in the investigation of these cases, that the resist- 
ance which a healthy and vigorous person can offer to the assault of a murderer, 
intent upon drowning or suffocating him or her, is in general such as to lead to the 
infliction of a greater amount of violence than is necessary to insure the death of the 
victim. The absence of any marks of violence or wounds on the body of Mrs. Kir- 
wan, excepting such small abrasions as might have resulted from accident, may be 


113 


§ 942] SIGNS OF DEATH. [BOOK V. 


suicide, have been known to destroy themselves in this way; a case is related 
by Dr. Smith in which a woman thrust her head into an opening which she 
had made in the ice and so perished. Where, however, persons are found 
drowned in shallow water, the natural presumption will be that they have been 
forcibly held there by one or more murderers. It is only by the absence of 
any marks of violence, that we may infer that the act may have been suicidal 
or accidental. 

§ 942. The presence of ligatures upon the hands and feet, and of weights 
attached to the body, rebuts the presumption of accidental drowning, but does 
not prove that it was homicidal. In a case which occurred in Paris, the body 
of a man was found in the river, his neck, legs, and hands being fastened to- 
gether by a cord furnished with slip knots. It was proved that he had died 
by drowning, and had himself secured the cord, to insure a more speedy death.(z) 
If, however, as is remarked by Mr. Taylor, the limbs bear evidence of violent 

constriction from the cord, and especially if these marks are found on the fore- 
- part of the neck or on both wrists, the presumption of murder becomes very 
strong. In another case, the body of a man was found in the water, with his 
legs tied together, over the trowsers, below the knee. The right wrist was 
fastened in a noose, and the free end of the cord, after passing around the 
body, was loosely tied or wrapped around the left. This latter circumstance, 
together with the absence of marks of violence, rendered it probable that this 
also was a case of suicide. (/) 


CHAPTER XE 


SIGNS OF DEATH. (h) 


I. CESSATION OF THE RESPIRATION AND CIRCULATION, § 943. 
II. Finmy ASPECT OF THE EYES, § 944. 
IlI. PALLOR OF THE Bopy, § 945. 
1V. EXTINCTION OF ANIMAL HEAT, § 946. 
V. RELAXATION OF THE MUSCLES, § 947. 
VI. RELAXATION OF THE CORNEA, § 948. 
VII. FLATTENING OF THE FLESHY PARTS, § 949. 
VIII. Suaeriations, § 950. 
Ist. External, § 951. 
2d. Internal, 3 952. 
(1.) Lungs, § 952. 
(2.) Brain, § 953. 
(3.) Kidneys and intestines, § 954. 
(4.) Heart, § 955. 
IX. CADAVERiIc RiaIpiTy, § 956. 
X. Purreraction, § 957. 
Ist. Fat, &., § 958. 
2d. Woman after childbirth, § 959. 
3d. Newly-born infants, § 960. 


taken in support of the only view which, it appears to me, can be drawn, namely, that 
the death was not the result of a homicidal drowning: or suffocation, but most proba- 
bly of a fit resulting from natural causes.” 


(i) Ann. d’Hygiéne, 1833, i. 207. 

(7) Casper’s Vierteljahrschrift, 1854, Heft. i. p. 167. 

(k) This chapter is mainly drawn from Dr. Casper’s Pract. Hand. Gericht. Med., 
Berlin, 1857. 


TT4 


——— 


BOOK V.] EXTINCTION OF ANIMAL HEAT, [§ 948 


4th. Manner of death, § 961. 
5th. Effect of external agents, § 962. 
(1.) Exposure in open air, § 962. 
(2.) Moisture, § 963. 
(3.) Heat, § 964. 
6th. External signs, § 965. 
XI. Saponirication, § 966. 
XII. Momurrication, § 967. 
XIII. Decomposition OF INTERNAL ORGANS, § 968. 
Ist. Windpipe, § 969. 
2d. Brain of infants, § 970. 
3d. Stomach, § 971. 
4th. Intestinal canal, § 972. 
5th. Spleen, § 973. 
6th. Omentum and mesentery, § 974. 
7th. Liver, § 975. 
8th. Brain of grown persons, § 976. 
9th. Heart, § 977. 
10th. Lungs, § 978. 
llth. Kidneys, § 979. 
12th. Urinary bladder, 980. 
13th. Gisophagus, § 981. 
14th. Pancreas, § 982. 
15th. Diaphragm, § 983. 
16th. Arteries, § 984. 
17th. Uterus, § 985. 


§ 943. I. Cessation of the respiration and of the circulation, so that no 
pulsation or murmur can be discovered even with the aid of a stethoscope. 

§ 944. IL Filmy aspect of the eyes. 

§ 945. III. Pallor of the body.—Persons of a very ruddy complexion, how- 
ever, often retain a high color for some time after death. Red or livid rings 
around ulcers on the foot, &c., do not disappear. This is also the case with 
tattoo marks, jaundice, and discolorations produced by a blow received some 
time previous to death. | 

§ 946. IV. HLatinction of animal heat.—This is a gradual process, and the 
time required to produce it varies with the condition of the body at the time 
of death, with the manner of death, and with the medium in which the body 
is kept after death. Fat bodies, for example, retain warmth, ceteris paribus, 
longer than those which are lean. The same is said to be true of the bodies 
of persons killed by lightning, and it is certainly the case with all such as 
perish by any kind of suffocation. Very much depends upon the temperature 
of the medium in which the body is kept. It is well known that a dead body 
if thrown into water will cool very rapidly, while if thrown into a dung-heap, 
or the vault of a water-closet, or even if closely covered in a hed, it will cool 
very slowly. As a general rule, bodies become entirely cold within from eight 
to twelve hours after death. 

§ 947. V. Relaxation of the muscles generally begins immediately after 
death, and is the earliest symptom of the extinction of the turgor vitalis. 

§ 948. VI. The relaxation and sunken state of the cornea after death is 
well known. Still more remarkable is the suppleness or pliancy of the eyeball. 
Up to the last moment of life the eyeball uniformly remains elastic, and resists 
any pressure of the finger; but within twelve or eighteen hours after death 
this resistance ceases, and the ball becomes gradually softer and softer, until 


decomposition takes place. 
T19 


$ 952] SIGNS OF DEATH. [BOOK V. 


§ 949. VII. The flattening of the fleshy paris upon which the body rests, 
not only on the back and sides, but also the calf of the legs, on the upper and 
lower extremities, on the thighs, &c., according to the position of the body at 
the time of death and subsequently. 

§ 950. VIII. Suggillation,(l) or livid discoloration, is the result of the 
settling of the blood in obedience to the law of gravity. Hence it occurs 
upon the depending parts of the body, as on the back, on the calf of the leg, 
on the face, on the ears, and on the sides of the breast. It begins to appear 
within ten or fifteen hours after death, and the spots increase in size until 
decomposition takes place. As suggillation furnishes in itself satisfactory 
evidence of the reality of death, we shall notice it further, distinguishing, 
for the sake of convenience, between external and internal. 

§ 951. Ist. Haternal suggillations, or death spots.—These deserve careful 
attention, because they may be easily mistaken by the inexperienced for ecchy- 
moses, or bruises, and consequently for traces of violence inflicted during life. 
The scalpel, however, furnishes an easy and certain test by which the two may 
be distinguished. In post-mortem suggillations, an incision, no matter how 
bold and deep, will never cause liquid or coagulated blood to appear in the 
wound. At the most, only small specks of blood will be seen arising from 
the division of small veins of the skin. But wherever there is the least ecchy- 
mosis, an incision will be followed by a flow of blood. As this is the only 
decisive test between these two appearances, which in many respects are so 
much alike, it should never be omitted by the examining physician. 

The color of suggillations varies but little between bluish red, scarlet, and 
copper red. They are never raised at all above the level of the skin, as is often 
the case with ecchymoses. They also assume different shapes—round, oblong, 
or angular. At first they appear in separate spots, having the size of a wal- 
nut, of an apple, of the hand, &c., until they gradually run together and 
cover large portions of the body—as the half or the whole of the back. These 
spots are not affected by age, sex, or constitution, and follow upon all kinds 
of death, not excepting death by hemorrhage. Engel maintains that suggilla- 
tions may be caused to disappear by making an incision into them, and allow- 
ing that part of the body in which they are to lie dependent. But Dr. Casper 
remarks that, after a great number of experiments, he had never seen one 
entirely disappear, although they become somewhat smaller and paler. 

§ 952. 2d. Internal suggillation (hypostatic congestion) appears in several 
different organs, but chiefly in the lungs, in the brain, the kidneys, and intes- 
tines. 

(1.) In the Jungs it is seen very frequently. It makes its appearance, 
according to Orfila, within from twenty-four to thirty-six hours after death, 
but there is no doubt that it often arises far earlier than this, at the time that 
the blood in general begins to settle. In the case, of bodies which have 
remained lying on the back, both lungs at their posterior part, or about a 
fourth part of the whole parenchyma, will be found of a much darker color 


(7) This word is now most commonly employed as synonymous with cadaveric 
lividity, to describe those violet-colored spots which form upon the dependent portions 
of dead bodies by the influence of gravity.—Nysten, Dict. de Méd. 1leme éd. 


116 


BOOK V.] THE HEART. [$ 955 


than the rest, and, on being laid open, an evident sanguineous engorgement 
will be seen, even when these organs are anemic. This is so striking that it 
may easily mislead the inexperienced, and cause them to attribute the death to 
apoplexy of the lungs, pnetmonia, &c. This is especially apt to be the case 
where the blood is unusually dark, and where cedema of the lungs had existed. . 

§ 953. (2.) In the brain.—lt is important to observe that hypostatic con- 
gestion often occurs in the brain even in cases of death by bleeding; so that 
a quantity of blood in the cerebral veins generally, and-especially in the pos- 
terior sinuses, is no evidence against this manner of death. Whether, in case 
this condition do not appear soon after death, it can afterwards be made to 
appear by changing the position of the body, is doubtful. This common 
appearance of hypostatic congestion in the brain must not be mistaken for 
active hyperemia, as may easily be done by the inexperienced, who are thus 
led to attribute death to an attack of apoplexy where none existed. 

§ 954. (8.) In the kidneys and intestines.—Hypostatic congestion occurs 
in the kidneys and other organs of the abdomen. It is especially common in 
the organs which lie in the pelvis. The bluish-red color which appears on the 
dependent folds of the intestines may easily be mistaken for disease, whereas 
it is only a cadaveric phenomenon. The diagnosis, however, is easily made by 
drawing out the whole mass of intestine, when the arborescent appearance will 
be seen to occur at regular intervals. When the body has remained resting on 
the back, the posterior half of the kidneys becomes discolored, and in this way 
may easily be distinguished from a general hyperemia in this organ. 

§ 955. (4.) The heart.—Suggillation does not occur in the heart; but as 
this organ exhibits more than any other the so-called polypus, a very import- 
ant formation as regards medical jurisprudence, it may be conveniently noticed 
here. These heart-polypi are merely coagulated fibrin, and are either clear and 
white, or colored red by the blood. It is not to be admitted that this coagu- 
lation of the blood occurs before death, as an ordinary phenomenon, although 
in cases of a protracted agony it may take place in this long interval between 
life and death. Asa general rule it takes place after death, and as the body 
eradually grows cold. Hence, where coagulated blood is found in wounds 
upon a dead body, it cannot safely be concluded that the wounds were pro- 
duced before death, upon the ground that “blood cannot coagulate after death.” 
This is one of the many erroneous notions which have remained undetected, 
from the habit of treating medical jurisprudence in a merely theoretical way. 
Engel is right when he says, “I do not believe that there is any disease or 
manner of death after which blood does not coagulate in the dead body. Some 
special case where it has not occurred may be cited, but many other cases may 
be adduced where it has occurred after the same disease or manner of death.’’ 
This coagulation of the blood must follow peculiar laws which are as yet un- 
known ; for it not only takes place after those kinds of death of which a fluid 
state of the blood is characteristic—as after different kinds of suffocation—but, 
what seems quite inexplicable, the coagulation occurs in many organs and vessels 
sooner than in others, not only in the heart (the right ventricle), but also in 
the inferior vena cava, the liver, &c. The proposition that “coagulated blood 

1a 


§ 956] SIGNS OF DEATH. [BOOK V. 


‘around or in a wound shows reaction during life, because no coagulation of 
the blood can take place after death,’’ is, with all its consequences, erroneous. 

§ 956. IX. Cadaverie rigidity.—This mark of death is well known. It 
occurs within tolerably wide limits, but commonly between twelve and twenty 
hours after death, and lasts from one to seven days. After this rigidity passes 
off the body again becomes as pliant as before. The primary cause of its 
appearance is unknown. After death from narcotic poisons it does not take 
place, or, at least, only for a short time. Neither is it observed, according to 
Casper, in the body of the immature foetus. These two cases constitute per- 
haps the only real exceptions. There is a great difference of opinion as to 
the longer or shorter continuance of cadaveric rigidity after certain specific 
diseases. A low temperature of the air and the use of alcohol tend to prolong 
it. Cases are cited by Dr. Casper, in which he observed it after two, four, six, 
and eight days. ‘The stiffness of a frozen body may easily be distinguished 
from cadaveric rigidity. In the former case the whole body is as stiff as a 
- board, while in the latter some suppleness about the joints of the knees and 
elbows always remains. 

Where the above marks are observed it may be concluded that the body is 
that of a person who has been dead from two to three days.(m) 


(m) The subject of cadaveric rigidity has been very thoroughly investigated by Dr. 
Kussmaul, whose essay upon the subject also presents an epitome of what had pre- 
viously been written concerning it. (See Prager Vierteljahrs, 1. 67.) From this it 
would appear that, whatever may be the cause of death, the phenomenon in question 
is never totally wanting. It has been observed by Bertelsen and by Ehrmann, even 
in the foetus removed by Cesarian section from the womb. Yet it may occupy certain 
portions only of the body. It is usually observed first in the neck and the muscles 
of the lower jaw, whence it extends both upwards and downwards. Ina limb it can, 
if complete, be removed by forcible flexion, and if not complete, the flexed limb will 
become rigid again. The period after death at which it begins and that at which it 
ends are entirely variable. It may commence within an hour, or be delayed for a 
whole day, and it usually appears latest in the bodies of vigorous and muscular per- 
sons. In them, also, it generally lasts longest, and in cold weather may continue for 
eight or ten days; but when the weather is hot and the body emaciated it may dis- 
appear in the course of ten or fifteen hours. Kussmaul lays it down as a law that 
whatever powerfully depresses the vitality of the muscular fibre favors the speedy 
supervention of its rigidity. Oxygen, it is stated, being the agent upon which its 
vital power depends, the more rapidly the influence of this agent is withdrawn the 
earlier will rigidity occur. We see this condition supervening rapidly in animals 
which consume a large proportion of oxygen in breathing, as birds, while in those 
which consume but little air, as the amphibious animals, it is very tardily developed. 

It is stated in the text that warmth delays while cold hastens cadaveric rigidity ; 
but such a statement would seem to be applicable only to the extremes of tempera- 
ture; and hence it matters little in reference to this point whether a body is covered 
with the bedclothes or is naked, or whether it is exposed to the average temperature 
of winter or summer. Sommer placed two stillborn infants in a bath at 900-1009 F., 
immediately after their birth. In from three to four hours rigidity developed itself 
and reached its maximum in six hours. 

The essential cause of cadaveric rigidity is not well known. Briicke, and after 
him Kiihne, have given plausible reasons for supposing it to depend upon the coagu- 
lation of the fibro-albuminous fluid which imparts moisture to the organs. (Prager 
Vierteljahrs, lxi. 93.) Other explanations have been proposed, but none sufiice. 

It has been shown by Orfila, and more recently by Dr. Ogston (Brit. and For. Med. 
Rev., April, 1857, p. 303), that under the general title of cadaveric rigidity two con- 
ditions have been confounded which are apparently distinct from one another. The 
one comes on at a variable period after death, and the other, which the former writer 
terms spasmodic rigidity, and the latter cadaveric spasm, commences at the latest 
instant of life, and continues until the muscular tissues have begun to alter under 
the influence of the putrefactive process. Like ordinary cadaveric rigidity, it differs 


178 


a 


BOOK V.] PUTREFACTION. [$ 961 


§ 957. X. Putrefaction.—The rapidity with which the process of decom- 
position takes place depends partly upon the condition of the body, and partly 
upon external causes. 

§ 958. Ist. Fat, soft, lymphatic bodies putrefy, ceteris paribus, far sooner 
than those which are lean, because the quantity of moisture in them favors 
the work of decomposition. This will account for the fact that the bodies of 
very aged persons generally decompose more slowly than those of others. 

§ 959. 2d. The bodies of women who die soon after childbirth, from what- 
ever disease, decompose very rapidly. But it is not to be supposed that dif- 
ference of sex, in itself, affects the process. . | 

§ 960. 3d. It is known that the bodies of newly-born infants decompose, 
ceteris paribus, sooner than other bodies. But it must be observed that in 
the great majority of cases the bodies of infants judicially examined have been 
subjected to influences to which other bodies are seldom subjected. In most 
cases the body has been exposed in the open air naked, or only slightly covered. 

§ 961. 4th. The process of decomposition is materially affected by the 
manner of death. After the sudden death of a person in health the body 
decomposes much less rapidly than after an exhausting sickness, or a disease 
which impairs the blood, as typhus or putrid fever, organic dropsy, tubercular 
disease, &c. The process is also very rapid in the case of bodies which have 
been much bruised or mangled. Those cases, however, must be excepted in 
which the body remains protected from the air, as when buried underneath 
fallen walls, &c. The bodies of persons suffocated by smoke, coal-gas, and 
sulphuretted hydrogen-gas, decompose very quickly. Decomposition also 
takes place speedily after death from narcotic poisons. This is not so much 
the case after death from other poisons, especially after poison by phosphorus. 
Where a person has been poisoned by sulphuric acid the process of decom- 
position is decidedly retarded, probably because the acid hinders the disengage- 
ment of ammonia. In the case of persons who have been killed by a stroke 
of apoplexy, while in a state of drunkenness, the body has been observed to 
remain sound an unusual length of time, owing to the well known anti-putre- 
scent powers of alcohol. Where death is produced by arsenic decomposition 
takes place as usual up to a certain point, after which it ceases and mummifi- 
cation begins. 

In addition to the above mentioned influences which affect the process of 
decomposition, there must be others, as yet unknown to us. As evidence of 
this fact, Dr. Casper cites a case in which he examined the bodies of fourteen 
men, all of about the same age, who had followed the same course of life, and 
who had been killed at the same moment by a single cannon-ball. In all of 
these cases the progress of decomposition was different. The same author cites 


from tetanic spasmodic rigidity in this, that, as Kussmaul has shown in the form last 
named, the bent limb when forcibly straightened tends to resume its previous pos- 
ture, while in both of the other forms the limb retains the position in which it is 
placed. There are numerous instances in which persons have been found dead in a 
sitting posture from which they must have fallen but for this cadaveric spasm, and Dr. 
Ogston relates the case of a man who committed suicide by hanging, and between 
whose knees a Bible was found, retained solely by the lateral pressure of the closely 
adducted thighs. 
T19 


§ 964] SIGNS OF DEATH. [BOOK V. 


‘also the case of a married couple, of nearly the same age, who had been suf- 
focated during the same night by coal-gas. The bodies had been subjected to 
the same influences up to the time of examination, and yet the back and belly 
of the man were quite green, the windpipe was brownish-red, &c., while the 
body of the wife, an uncommonly fat woman, was perfectly sound both with- 
out and within. 

§ 962. 5th. Lffect of external agents.—The external agents which affect 
the process of decomposition are Air, Moisture, and Heat. 

(1.) Bodies left uncovered in the open air decompose, ceteris paribus, far 
sooner than others. Jt is not uncommon to find in the case of persons who 
have been drowned with their clothing on, that part of the leg which is pro- 
tected by the boot quite sound, when the rest of the body is almost decomposed. 
Owing to this influence of the atmosphere, the rapidity of decomposition will 
be affected by the manner in which the body is clothed, by the kind of coffin 
in which it is inclosed, by the soil in which it is buried, and by the greater 
or less depth of the grave. It is well known, for instance, that pine coffins 
will soon decay and leave the inclosed bodies exposed. So, too, bodies 
interred in shallow graves are less protected from the decomposing effect 
of the atmosphere, than those which are interred deeper. A stiff, clay 
soil shuts out the air more effectually than a porous, sandy soil. But this 
effect of difference of soil may be more than counterbalanced by the pre- 
sence or absence of another agency, viz., moisture. Clay, or turf soils, are apt 
to contain more moisture than sandy soils, and hence promote to a greater 
extent decomposition. 

§ 963. (2.) In proportion to the amount of moisture will be the greater 
or less rapidity of decomposition. Hence bodies which remain in water, 
decompose much more quickly than those which are buried in the earth. 

§ 964. (8.) Although heat of itself has a tendency to dry up the body and 
thus to check the process of decomposition, yet, when united with the above- 
mentioned agencies of air and moisture, it promotes the process very greatly. 
This is seen in the fact, that a body exposed in summer at a temperature of 
68 or 78° F., will, in the course of one or ‘two days, be quite unfit for the 
dissecting table, while in winter, at a temperature of 14° to 20° F., this will 
not be the case after ten or twelve days. The same effect of temperature is 
seen where the body is kept in water. If frozen in ice, it will remain sound a 
very long, and, indeed, an indefinite time, as is proved by the mammoth found 
in Siberia, parts of which are still preserved in the University of Moscow. A 
body kept in water at a temperature of from 35° to 45° often shows, after 
ten or twelve days, the marks of strangulation, while at a temperature of 70° 
or 75° these disappear in from five to seven days. It must also be observed, 
in this connection, that, when the water is deep, the temperature at the bottom 
differs perceptibly from that at the top, the latter being more affected by the 
sun. Hence, a body floating on the top of the water will decompose more 
rapidly than one remaining at the bottom. A body taken out of the water, 
and exposed to the atmosphere, will undergo decomposition to a greater 
extent in a single day than it would have done in two or three days, had it 
remained in water. A higher or lower temperature of the earth quickens or 

780 


BOOK V.] EXTERNAL SIGNS OF DECOMPOSITION. [$ 965 


retards decomposition in the same way as a higher or lower temperature of 
the water. 

Dr. Casper. estimates the comparative effect upon a dead body of exposure 
to the air, and of protection in water or in the earth, as follows: ‘“ A body, 
when freely exposed in the open air, will ordinarily undergo as much decom- 
position in one week or month, as it would in two weeks or months if kept 
in water, or in eight weeks or months if buried in the earth after the usual 
manner. This, of course, is offered only as a general rule. In each individual 
case allowance must be made according to the circumstances. 

§ 965. 6th. Haternal signs of decomposition.—In describing these appear- 
ances, bodies which have been exposed, from the time of death, in the open 
air, may be taken as types. 

(1.) The first appearance, in order of time, is a greenish color upon the 
surface of the belly, accompanied with the smell peculiar to putrefaction. This 
discoloration arises between twenty-four and seventy-two hours after death, 
according to the condition of the body and the temperature of the medium in 
which it is kept. 

(2.) Within the same period the cornea beeomes soft, yielding to the pres- 
sure of the finger. 

(3.) Within from three to five days after death, this green color spreads 
over all the lower part of the abdomen, including the genital organs, which, 
in the case of both sexes, assume rather a dirty, brownish-green color. In all 
cases of death from suffocation, bloody, frothy discharges from the nostrils 
will be observed, mingled with air-bubbles. Green spots of different sizes will 
now appear also on other parts of the body, as on the back, on the lower 
extremities, on the neck, and on the sides of the chest. 

(4.) Between eight and twelve days after death, the whole body presents 
this green appearance, which has become darker in color and is accompanied 
with a stronger smell. On some parts, as on the face and neck, the color is a 
reddish-green, owing to the exudation of blood through the pores of the skin. 
Gases have now begun to form, and to swell up the body. These are generally 
inflammable, and a burning jet may be produced by applying a lighted taper 
to a small opening made in the abdomen. The color of the eyes may still be 
recognized, but the cornea is concave. The anus stands open. On some 
parts of the body, especially on the extremities, and on the neck and breast, © 
dirty red streaks will be seen where the skin remains clear. The nails still 
adhere firmly to the skin. 

(5.) Between fourteen and twenty days after death, a bright green and red- 
dish-brown color spreads. over the entire body. The cuticle is raised in blebs 
of different sizes, many of them as large as the palm of the hand, and which 
in some places have burst open. Maggots now appear in great numbers, 
especially in the folds and orifices of the body. Owing to the continued 
formation of gases, the chest is dilated, the belly acquires the shape of a large 
ball, and in fact the cellular tissue of the whole-body is enormously distended, 
so as to assume gigantic proportions. The features are distorted, and the 
entire physiognomy so changed as to make it almost impossible even for the 
nearest relatives to recognize the person. The color of the eyes is no longer 

781 


§ 966] SIGNS OF DEATH. [BOOK V. 


discernible, for the distinction between pupil and iris can no longer be seen, 
and the whole sclerotica has assumed a uniform dirty red color. In men, the 
penis is greatly swollen, and the scrotum is as large as a child’s head. The 
nails lie loosened at their roots. At this stage of decomposition the effect of 
difference of temperature is remarkable. Exposure for ten or twelve days at a 
temperature of 68° or 78° will produce as great changes in the condition of 
the body as would take place within twenty or thirty days if exposed at a 
temperature of from 32° to 50°. -The body now swarms with maggots, and 
where it is left unprotected in the air or in water, may become the prey 
of numerous other animals, as dogs, cats, foxes, wolves, birds of prey, and 
land and water rats. Fresh-water fish (German) do not feed upon dead 
bodies. Where the body has thus served for food the marks will be found 
upon. the breast and belly and on the extremities, the bones of which are often 
laid bare. The consequent opening of the cavities and the lesions of the soft 
parts of the body may easily be distinguished, with a little attention, from 
~ traumatic injuries. When a body answers to the above description it may be 
safely concluded to be that of a person who has been dead at least so long as 
from fourteen to twenty days, not that this is the ultimate limit, for at this 
stage of decomposition the process is very gradual, several weeks and even 
months often making little difference in the appearance of the body. 

(6.) The stage of putrid colliquation arises within from four to six months 
after death, or, where the body has been kept in a warm and moist medium, 
earlier than this. Owing to the continued swelling the chest and belly have 
now burst open, and these cavities lie exposed. The skull has also yielded to 
the pressure, and the brain has exuded. The orbitar cavities are empty. All 
the soft parts are in a state of dissolution and finally disappear, and entire 
bones, especially of the skull and of the extremities, are laid bare, and the 
latter separate from the trunk. No trace of features any longer remains. 
The breasts of females have disappeared, and of the genital organs nothing 
indicative of sex remains, unless perhaps the hair or the shape of its growth ; 
for in man it ascends towards the navel, but in woman is confined to the 
pubis. But even at this stage the presence of a womb may indicate to which 
sex the dead person belonged. 

§ 966. XI. Saponification. (Adipocere).—In cases where the body is ex- 
posed to the continued action of water, whether by lying in water itself or in 
very damp soil, the process of putrid decomposition proceeds no farther than 
the stage above described, but is succeeded by saponification. It is difficult to 
say exactly how soon this process begins to take place. Devergie thinks that 
it requires a year for a body lying in water, and about three years for one lying 
in the earth, to become entirely saponified, or converted into adipocere. This 
process cannot reach any great extent in less than half a year where the body 
remains in water, or in less than a year where it lies in moist earth, although 
it may begin to appear earlier than this. The appearance is that of a homo- 
geneous, pure or slightly yellowish-white, fatty substance, which is easy to be 
cut, which melts in flame, and has a smell somewhat like mouldy cheese, but 
by no means very disagreeable. The muscles first undergo this process, but 
it finally reaches all the organs of the body, which now becomes one shapeless 

782 


BOOK V.] DECOMPOSITION OF INTERNAL ORGANS. [$ 970 


mass, whose original appearance is no longer discernible. According to 
Guntz, the adipocere thus formed has more bulk than all the fat which 
belonged originally to the body. This fact is important to observe in refer- 
ence to the weight of the dead bodies of infants. 

§ 967. XII. Mummification.—This process, in which the body is dried up 
and assumes a rusty-brown color, is of little interest in connection with medi- 
cal jurisprudence, since little is known of the influences necessary to produce 
it, as well as the time required for the process. Mummification occurs as well 
where the body is exposed in a vault to a drying wind, as where the atmo- 
sphere is entirely excluded. It also takes place often in the case of bodies 
buried beneath the burning sands of the desert. At what time the natural 
process of mummification begins to show itself where the existing circum- 
stances are favorable, is not determined; we only know that, once perfected, 
the mummy will last thousands of years. Hence where a body is discovered 
already mummified, it would be impossible to decide, with any approach to 
accuracy, how long a time has elapsed since the occurrence of death. 

§ 968. XIII. Decomposition of internal organs, in its several stages.— 
The greater number of influences which combine to affect these organs, produce 
a much greater difference in the time of their decomposition than exists in the 
case of the external organs, and hence they furnish marks by which the time 
of death may be more accurately determined. 

§ 969. Ist. The windpipe and larynx are the first of these organs which 
exhibit signs of decomposition. On bodies, which still appear quite sound 
upcn the surface, or, at most, show only a few green spots on the under parts, 
the thin mucous membrane of the trachea exhibits a remarkable paleness 
throughout its whole extent, except when death has been produced by suffoca- 
tion or laryngitis. When the process of decomposition has advanced a little 
farther, so that the whole under part of the body has become green, commonly 
in from three to five days after death in summer, and in from six to eight in 
winter, this thin mucous membrane has assumed a uniform dirty red color, in 
which no vascular injection can be discovered even with a microscope. This 
appearance occurs before any marks of decomposition are visible upon other 
internal organs, and is not influenced by age, constitution, or manner of death. 
The inexperienced should be careful not to mistake this natural effect of de- 
composition for capillary injection or the effect of suffocation or of drowning. 
In the farther course of decomposition, the mucous membrane of the windpipe 
becomes olive-green, the cartilages of the tube separate, until at last the whole 
organ disappears. 

§ 970. 2d. The organ which next, in order of time, yields to decomposi- 
tion, is the brain of infants, not more than a year old. The delicate texture 
of the organ at this age, and its comparatively slight protection from the 
atmosphere, render it an easy prey to decomposing influences, so that it will 
often be found to be quite destroyed when other organs are perfectly sound, 
and when no discoloration is to be seen, except upon the surface of the body. 
In decomposing, it changes to a thin pulpy substance of a rosy-red color, 
which discharges itself as soon as any opening is made in the skull, and leaves 
no trace of the several parts of the organ. 

783 


§ 977] SIGNS OF DEATH. " [BOOK Vv. 


§ 971. 3d. The stomach decomposes at an early period. The first traces 
of the decomposition are certain irregular, dirty-red spots in the fundus; 
they vary much in size, being sometimes as large as a plate, and often have 
bluish-red streaks, or veins, running through them. These spots appear 
first on the posterior surface, where they are partly due to hypostatic conges- 
tion, but soon after show themselves on the anterior surface. They are 
described by some authors as inflammatory, or as evidences of asphyxia by 
hanging or drowning, but are really nothing more than the result of early 
‘decomposition. In case of doubtful poisoning, it is very important to mark 
these changes. As the process of decomposition advances, the color changes 
from a dirty-red to a grayish-black. 

§ 972. 4th. The intestinal canal follows next in order in the progress of 
decomposition. The peculiar color produced by bile, owing to the contact of 
a portion of the intestine with the gall-bladder, cannot be mistaken. In the 
course of decomposition the intestines assume a dark-brown color, they burst 
- open and discharge their contents, become greasy, and are finally reduced to a 
dark, shapeless, pulpy substance. 

§ 973. 5th. The spleen, when not diseased, commonly continues sound 
longer than the intestines, but belongs to the class of organs which decompose 
at an early period. It grows softer and softer and is easily crushed, and 
afterwards assumes a bluish-green color, and becomes so soft that it may be 
rubbed down with the knife-handle. 

§ 974. 6th. The omentum and mesentery, if free from fat, may remain 
sound several weeks after death; but if fatty, not so long. These organs 
assume a grayish-green color and dry up. 

§ 975. 7th. The ver in grown persons may remain sound for some weeks 
after death. In infants it begins to decompose earlier. The first appearance 
is that of a changeable-green color seen first on the convex surface, and which 
afterwards spreads over the whole organ, and finally changes to a coal-black. 
The size of the liver is lessened in the same proportion as that of the other 
organs by the evaporation of its fluid constituents, and the parenchyma 
becomes pulpy. The texture of the gall-bladder, however, may be discerned 
at a later period. 

§ 976. 8th. The first trace of decomposition in the brain of grown persons 
is a light-green color, seen first at its base, and which gradually spreads over 
the whole organ, from without inwards. In a medium temperature the brain 
softens within two or three weeks, but months may elapse before it changes 
into that reddish pulpy substance, into which, at so early a period, the brains 
of infants are converted. Where the brain is exposed by a wound in the skull 
decomposition may take place much earlier. 

All the above mentioned organs belong to the class of those which decom- 
pose at an early period. 

§ 977. 9th. The heart. This organ is often found still sound, although 
collapsed and, quite empty of blood, for weeks after death, and after the 
decomposition of the liver, intestines, &c., has reached an advanced stage. 
It becomes soft, first in the columne carnex, and then in the walls, and 
assumes a greenish, then a grayish-green, and, finally, a black color. The 

184 


BOOK V.| LUNGS.—KIDNEYS.—BLADDER, ETC. [$ 985 


small quantity of liquor pericardit which the heart contains disappears by 
evaporation, as the process of decomposition advances, and the pericardium 
becomes quite dry. This stage of decomposition, however, is not commonly 
reached until some months after death. 

§ 978. 10th. The lungs begin to exhibit marks of decomposition about the 
same time as the heart. They are often found in such a state of preservation 
that their structure may be readily discerned, after the external portions of 
the body are far advanced in the process of decomposition. The first appear- 
ance upon these organs is that of little bladders, varying in size from a millet 
seed to a bean, which are occasioned by the formation of gas under the pleura. 
These bladders at first appear singly and on different parts of the lungs, but 
afterwards they increase to such an extent that they cover large portions of 
the organ, especially on its under surface. The color of the lungs remains 
for a while unchanged, but as decomposition advances they become of a dark, 
bottle-green color, and, finally, entirely black. 'They now become soft, collapse, 
and, at last, their characteristic structure is destroyed. 

§ 979. 11th. The kidneys continue sound longer than the heart and lungs, 
and will never be found to have reached the putrid state in such bodies as are 
only half decomposed. These organs become soft, and of a checolate-brown 
color, but even at this stage their granular texture may be easily discerned. 
Afterwards, but long after death, they become greasy, of a blackish-green color, 
and are easily torn. 

§ 980. 12th. The urinary bladder yields to decomposing influences still 
later than those organs which have been mentioned. 

§ 981. 13th. The wsophagus will often be found tolerably firm, and only 
of a dirty grayish-green color, some months after death, when the stomach 
and intestines admit no longer of close examination. 

§ 982. 14th. The pancreas resists decomposing influences so strongly that 
one must have a body almost entirely putrid in order to observe the process 
in this organ. 

§ 983. 15th. The diaphragm. Green spots appear upon this organ within 
the first week after death, but after four or six months its muscular and tendi- 
nous structure may be distinguished from each other. . 

§ 984. 16th. The arteries decompose among the last of all the soft organs. 
Devergie reports a case where the aorta was perfectly discernible fourteen 
months after death. 

§ 985. 17th. According to Dr. Casper, the werus yields to decomposition 
last of all the internal organs. . It is often found lying in its place, tolerably 
firm, though of a dirty-red color, and in such a state of preservation that it 
may be cut open and examined, when this would not be possible with any 
other organ. This statement is applicable even to newly-born female infants. 

50 785 


$ 986] MEDICO-LEGAL EXAMINATIONS. [BOOK V. 


CHAP The XE, 
MEDICO-LEGAL EXAMINATIONS ((n) 


§ 986. The physician who is called upon to make an examination of a per- 
son found dead under suspicious circumstances, has devolved upon him a task 


(n) Thesubject of medico-legal examinations in insanity has been already noticed, 
ante, § 90, &c. In addition to the cases already mentioned, we may here cite the fol- 
lowing :— 

On oe trial of an indictment for selling unwholesome meat, it was held that physi- 
cians might be allowed to testify that the eating of unwholesome meat does not always 
cause apparent sickness, and to state their opinion, founded on what other witnesses 
had testified, as to the disease of which the cow died, and whether the disease would 
cause fever, and whether the flesh of animals sick of fever was unwholesome. Good- 
rich v. People, 3 Parker R. (N. Y.) 622. 

Physicians who are not experts in analytical chemistry are admissible to form an 
analysis of the contents of the stomach in cases of poisoning. State v. Hinkle, 6 Iowa, 
380. 

In a homicide trial in New York (People v. Bodine, 1 Denio, 288), it appeared in evi- 
dence, that the dwelling-house occupied by the deceased had been discovered to be 
on fire ; that after the fire was extinguished, her dead body was discovered amid the 
rubbish in one corner of the kitchen, where her bed had stood, and where she had 
been accustomed to sleep; that the fire had been in that part of the house, and that 
a hole had been burned through the floor in that corner of the room, and that the fire 
had extended up the side walls of the room, had consumed the bed and bedding, and 
partly destroyed the bedstead ; that the heap of rubbish among which the body had 
been found consisted of bricks and mortar from the wall, of partially destroyed pump- 
kins and onions which had been kept under the bed, of the bedstead and of the cinders 
from the bed, bedding, and other articles which had been entirely consumed ; that 
several physicians had made a post-mortem examination of the body, and had given 
it as their opinion that the body had been dead before it had been subjected to the 
action of fire, for the reason among others that portions of the body had been protected, 
and had not suffered at all from the action of the fire, which could not have happened 
unless the body had lain perfectly still during the continuance of the fire. Upon the 
cross-examination of one of these physicians, the counsel for the prisoner asked the 
following question: ‘ Would not almost any protection and stillness of the body be 
accounted for, on the supposition that the bed-cords on the back of the bed were 
burned off and the body let down, and that then the bed had fallen upon it before life 
was entirely extinct ?”’ which question was objected to by the counsel for the prosecu- 
tion and excluded by the court, and exception was taken by the counsel for the prisoner 
and carried to the Supreme Court. That court held: “The question put to one of the 
physicians on his cross-examination by the prisoner’s counsel, was in my opinion cor- 
rectly overruled. This witness and other physicians had made a post-mortem exa- 
mination of the person alleged to have been murdered, and they gave it as their 
opinion that the death had preceded the action of fire on the body. This opinion, as 
is stated in the bill of exceptions, was founded on the reason, among others, that por- 
tions of the body which had been protected by covering upon them had not suffered 
at all from the action of the fire.” 

If a surgical witness testify as an expert, he may, having examined a wound, give 
his testimony as to the nature of the instrument which inflicted it (State v. Knights, 
43 Maine, 11), and as to whether such wound was adequate to the production of 
death. (Livingston’s case, 14 Grattan, 592.) 

Evidence of scientific persons in a capital trial, as to any distinction evinced by 
scientific investigation between the appearance of stains of human blood and those of 
animals, is properly admissible. State v. Knights, 43 Maine, 11. 

Maps and diagrams may be used by scientific witnesses, to render intelligible their 
verbal testimony. State v. Knights, 43 Maine, 11. 

On atrial for murder, a medical witness testified that he saw defendant on the even- 
ing of the day after the killing, conversed with him, and then thought him deranged ; 
that he thought the insanity was delirium tremens; that he knew defendant’s habit of 

786 


BOOK V.] INDICATIONS OF VIOLENCE OR UNNATURAL DEATH. [§ 988 


of no little gravity. He therefore should endeavor to come to it prepared to 
acquit himself of his duty in such a manner that he will afterwards not have 
to regret having imperfectly discharged it. Not only is familiarity with ana- 
tomical dissection required, but a far greater carefulness, and a more searching 
examination than in cases of death from disease, since in the latter, the object of 
the investigation is into the nature of the morbid cause of death, and the acquisi- 
tion of greater familiarity with pathological facts. Moreover his attention must 
be given to many circumstances which, in these, it is not necessary to observe, 
viz: all those matters which may throw light upon the mode of death, such, 
for instance, as the position of the body in relation to surrounding objects, and 
the locality in which it is found. The duties of the examiner, and the facts 
necessary to observe, may be arranged under the following heads :— 
I. Locarttry, § 987. 

II. Ipenrity, § 988. 

III., INDICATIONS OF VIOLENCE OR UNNATURAL DEATH, § 989. 

IV. MANNER OF CONDUCTING THE AUTOPSY, § 990. 


V. NATURAL ASPECT OF THE ORGANS AT DIFFERENT AGES, § 992. 
VI. MopE oF DRAWING UP REPORTS, § 1002. 


§ 987. I. Locality.—The chief points for notice under this head are those 
which, by indicating the situation in which the body is found, may afford a clue to 
the detection of the manner in which itcamethere. Thus in cases of infanticide 
an accurate description of the locality in which the child’s body is discovered is 
of the utmost importance in the subsequent investigation of the mode of death. 
Or, a person may be murdered and the body afterwards transported to a con- 
siderable distance for concealment, or the deceased may have had sufficient 
strength after receiving his mortal wound to follow the steps of the assassin, 
and yet finally perish at a point more or less remote from the place where he 
was attacked, and where the indications of a struggle will be found. It is 
proper also in case of exhumations, but here has a closer bearing on the deter- 
mination of the next point, viz :— 

§ 988. II. Identity.—This subject we have treated in detail in another 
chapter. It is only necessary to state here that the knowledge of the iden- 
tity of the deceased in cases of recent death, is as far as the medical evidence 
is concerned, secured by a careful notice of the clothing, the stature and appa- 
rent age, physical development, deformities, color of the hair, eyes, &c., scars, 
marks of tattooing and peculiarities indicating the habitual trade or occupa- 
tion. 

§ 989. III. Indications of violence or unnatural death.—All indications 
of a struggle in the vicinity of the body should be carefully observed, such as 
traces of blood, fragments of clothing or hair upon the ground, and anything 
that may have served as a weapon, or been the accidental cause of death. 
The hands of the deceased should be carefully examined ; if they hold a wea- 
pon it should be noted whether it is loosely or firmly grasped, and also if 


drinking, and supposed drinking to be the cause of his insanity ; and that he had been 
present and heard all the evidence. The witness then stated, under objection, how 
long he thought defendant had been in this state of delirium, but was not allowed to 
state whether, in his opinion, he was in this state onthe night of the alleged killing. 
It was held here was no error. People v. McCann, 3 Parker, C. R. (N. Y.) 272. 


187 


$ 990] MANNER OF CONDUCTING THE AUTOPSY. [BOOK Y. 


- there are portions of hair or clothing contained in them. In many cases of 
poisoning from prussic acid, the vial from which the poison was taken will 
be found in the hands or pockets, or lying near the deceased ; and in other 
cases when poisoning is suspected, the room in which the body is found should 
be carefully searched for poisonous substances, or for vessels which may have 
contained them. If wounds are discovered upon the body, their nature and 
extent must be ascertained, and if lacerated, incised or punctured, the weapon, 
if any is found, carefully compared with them. The examiner should not omit 
to- ascertain whether there are any fractures or dislocations present, and whe- 
ther any foreign bodies are to be found in any of the natural openings of the 
body. In the case of females, in addition to the above, the signs of recent or 
previous delivery (as elsewhere detailed) must be observed, and the vulva 
should be examined for traces of injury which might otherwise go unnoticed. 

§ 990. IV. Manner of conducting the autopsy.—The physician should be 
assisted at the examination by one or more persons, the duty of one of whom 
should be to write down the observations as they are dictated to him. 
The exterior of the body should be examined if possible before it is moved 
from the position in which it is found, and in case circumstances permit, it is 
better that the examination should be made on the spot, than that the body 
should be transported elsewhere. The time elapsed since death should be 
approximately estimated by a consideration of the state of rigidity or flaccidity 
of the body, and the degree of putrefaction. The order in which the internal 
organs should be examined admits of some variety, although on the whole it 
is better, where time and circumstances allow, to commence with the head, and 
proceed therefrom to the other organs in regular succession. 

To open the cranium, the best method is to begin by making an inci- 
sion vertically from the root of one zygomatic process to that of the other; a 
few strokes of the scalpel will loosen the attachment of the scalp to the peri- 
cranium, and by a slight effort the two flaps may be inverted, the one over the 
face, the other over the occiput. After removing the temporal muscles from 
their attachments, the cranium may be opened speedily and safely by the saw, 
which should be used first on either side and then behind and in front. A 
chisel used carefully as a lever will then easily detach the calvarium. In young 
children a pair of strong scissors will suffice to cut the bone, with less risk of 
injuring the subjacent parts. A triangular block with rounded edges, placed 
under the neck, will much facilitate these operations. The integrity of the 
calvarium having been first noted, we then proceed to the examination of the 
contents of the cavity of the head. The dura mater may be divided around 
the edges of she skull, and then, being cut free from its connection with the 
crista gallt, thrown back over the occiput. The other membranes, after 
being examined in situ, may be observed with reference to their connections 
when the brain is itself examined. This should be done partly in and partly 
out of the cranium. The upper half should be removed on each side, by a 
horizontal incision which shall leave the thalami optici untouched while it 
lays open the lateral ventricles. Placing the fingers of the left hand under 
the anterior lobes of the brain, the remainder of the encephalon should be 
removed by cutting successively through the nerves, the tentorium, and the 

788 


BOOK V.]| MANNER OF CONDUCTING THE AUTOPSY. [§ 990 


medulla oblongata as far as the knife can conveniently penetrate. The various 
parts may be then examined by successive horizontal sections made regularly 
in parallel planes. The state of the sinuses should also claim attention. 

Previous to the examination of the neck, the block should be removed and 
the head thrown back, in order to render the neck tense. An incision is then 
made in the trachea, and prolonged carefully upwards, with the precaution to 
hold the knife in such a manner as not to injure the posterior wall of the 
trachea or larynx. This done, the tongue, if it seem necessary, may be taken 
out by an incision following the inner circumference of the lower maxilla, and 
by dividing the posterior pillars of the fauces. The examination of the neck 
should not, however, be commenced until the cavities next to be examined 
have been prepared for inspection. A longitudinal incision, commencing at 
the top of the sternum, may be made and extended to the pubes, and a 
transverse one passing across the abdomen and intersecting the first at the 
umbilicus. These incisions should not penetrate more deeply than through 
the skin. 

The abdominal cavity may now be opened by carefully dissecting in the 
epigastric region until the peritoneal cavity is reached; through the hole thus 
made, two fingers of the left hand may be introduced, and holding the edges 
of the incision stretched apart, the incision may be prolonged by the knife in 
the other hand down to the pubis, without injury to the intestines. The 
transverse incision is then made through the muscles, and the four flaps thrown 
back. Grasping the upper flap on the side on which the operator stands, and 
drawing it tensely back over the margin of the costal cartilages, an incision 
should be carried along the edge of the thorax a sufficient distance in order to 
separate the abdominal muscles from their attachments. The dissection should 
now be continued upwards, in order to expose the sternum and cartilages as 
far up as the clavicle, and laterally exposing an inch or two of the ribs. 'The 
same operation is to be repeated upon the opposite side. In case of wounds 
passing through any portion of the parts thus noticed, they should be first cir- 
cumscribed by circular incision, and thus isolated, so that their relations with 
the subjacent parts can be known. 

It is not advisable to use much force in cutting through the cartilages of 
the ribs, on account of the risk of wounding the lungs or pericardium. The 
best plan is to begin with the fifth or sixth rib, and divide first those which 
lie below on each side; then taking hold of the fragment attached to the ster- 
num, to divide the diaphragm between the two incisions of the costal carti- 
lages and these up to the clavicle. In order to separate the sternum from 
the clavicle without wounding the large veins, take hold of the lower part of 
the sternum with one hand, and follow the articulation with the scalpel; 
7. e., make the incision upwardly and outwardly, and then inwardly. The 
thoracic and abdominal cavities being now laid open, it is optional with which 
to begin. ‘ 

It is perhaps better and more systematic to examine first the thoraa. 
Having observed the relative position of the organs and such of their qual- 
ities as may be judged of by the eye alone, the pleural cavities should be 
explored. In order to remove the lungs without injury, the safest mode, espe- 

789 


§ 992] MANNER OF CONDUCTING THE AUTOPSY. [BOOK V. 


cially where pleural adhesions exist, is to detach the costal pleura—an opera- 
tion which can be easily, although it must be slowly done. In this way we 
preclude entirely the possibility of lacerating the pulmonary substance, and 
have subsequently no doubts to contend with as to whether certain lacerations 
of substance are the result of disease, injury, or our own mismanagement. 
The lung is less easily handled when separated from the body, than when it 
is left with its natural attachments. It is, therefore, always better in the be- 
ginning at least, after having drawn it out and laid it upon the thorax, to 
preserve its connections. Its roots may be afterwards divided, if it should be 
necessary to make a minute and protracted investigation. An incision which 
will lay open as great a surface as possible of the interior of the lung, is to 
be preferred, and this is one commencing at the apex and dividing it com- 
pletely through to its base. Afterwards, incisions at right angles with the 
first one, will most probably reveal any structural disease or injury that may 
exist. The bronchia should be laid open with an appropriate pair of scissors, 
and an examination of the bronchial glands should not be omitted. 

The pericardium should be opened in such a manner as to prevent the 
escape of the fluid contained within it until its quantity and character have 
been first ascertained. The examination of the heart for the purpose of de- 
tecting diseased structure need not here be dwelt upon. If gunshot or other 
wounds be found in its substance, their direction, extent, and character must be 
carefully examined, and search made here, or in the pericardial or pleural cavi- 
ties, for any foreign bodies, such as balls, wadding, or fragments of weapons. 

§ 991. In the examination of the abdomen, where poisoning is suspected, it 
is better that the stomach and duodenum should be each separated by double 
ligatures and removed, with their contents, from the body, for subsequent 
anatomical and chemical examination. In this case they should be put into 
perfectly clean vessels of porcelain, glass, or wood, and without the addition 
of any preservative liquid. The vessels should then be closely sealed and put 
away in a secure place. In other cases these organs may be opened by the 
enterotome, the stomach along the lesser curvature, and the intestines close to 
their attachment to the mesentery. The liver, in many cases of poisoning, 
particularly by arsenic or mercurial preparations, must be reserved for chemical 
investigation. The state of the bladder should be also observed. In the female 
the internal organs of generation require particular attention, with a view to 
the determination of questions of abortion, rape, &c, Finally, the examiner 
should not forget that although there may be strong reason, from circumstances, 
to suppose that the individual has met with a violent death, yet he may unex- 
pectedly meet with some lesion, such as strangulation of the intestines, rapture 
of an aneurism, intestinal perforation, &c., which is in itself sufficient to ex- 
plain the symptoms which preceded the death of the individual. Hence he 
cannot be too careful in examining systematically and minutely every part of 
the body, and making accurate notes of all that he observes. 

§ 992. V. Natural aspect of the internal organs.—The following summary 
we have taken, with some alterations, from the valuable work of Professor 
Engel. (0) 


(o) Entwurf einer pathol.-anatomischen Propadeutik, Wien. 1845. 
790 


BOOK V.| _ NATURAL ASPECT OF THE ORGANS. [§ 993 


The dura mater is, in children and adults, drawn tensely over the surface of 
the brain; in old persons, however, it is wrinkled, and sinks in between the 
convolutions. It increases in its consistence with age; is in children semi- 
transparent, and of a pale bluish-gray color, white and less transparent in the 
adult, and assumes a yellow tinge in advanced life. The under surface is 
smooth and polished. In old age the dura mater is frequently perforated by 
the glands of Pacchioni, and contains often, especially over the falx major, 
needle-like spicule of bone. These phenomena are of no pathological im- 
portance, except in early life, and even then, when uncombined with distinct 
lesions, are of little significance. ; 

The arachnoid and pia mater are, in infants, thin, easily torn, colorless, and 
transparent, their larger veins generally filled with dark blood; the amount of 
blood is in mature years relatively less, and in old age the membranes have 
become thick and tough, lose much of their transparency, and assume a white 
or yellowish-white color. 

The turbidness or milky appearance of these membranes does not in advanced 
life deserve much attention, except when over a large surface, and is then natu- 
rally connected with other symptoms of disease. It is always accompanied 
with increased consistence, and appears first on the edge of the fissures and the 
upper surface of the cerebellum. In youth, however, it is a pathological sign 
of much importance. The arachnoid is chiefly concerned, the plexus choroides 
being the only part of the pia mater which is affected. The vascularity of 
these membranes is within the normal limits subject to very great variation, as 
it depends upon the general amount of blood in the circulation. But it would 
be certainly a symptom of disease if, in a case of general anemia or general 
plethora, the amount of blood in these membranes should be such as is found 
in health. It can only then be considered in relation to the amount of blood 
in the rest of the body, and it ought to be remembered that in early life it is 
proportionally larger than in its later periods. The quantity of blood should 
be determined, not by observation of the large vessels, but of the smaller ones; 
for the finer the vessels which are seen to be injected, the greater is the amount 
of blood, and the same remark may be made of their tortuosity. 

The amount of watery secretion in the internal membranes is also subject 
to much variation, and depends upon the age of the individual and the condi- 
tion of the blood. In infants it is comparatively more abundant than in adults, 
and in the latter less than in old persons. A large amount of watery effu- 
sion may have caused no symptom during life, if it depend upon general 
dropsy ; if, however, it have occurred in the course of some acute general 
disease, it will have given rise to striking symptoms. When there is but a 
small quantity of water present, the arachnoid is not raised by it in its passage 
over the spaces between the convolutions; a large quantity will render it tense, 
and in cases of abundant effusion the space between the membranes is filled 
- everywhere with it, and they become thickened and tumid. But the amount 
of effusion does not warrant, by itself, without the presence of other symptoms, 
any conclusion. 

§ 993. The brain in newly-born children is of a gelatinous consistence, and 
throughout of a gray or reddish-gray color. Some of its inferior portions— 

791 


§ 995] NATURAL ASPECT OF THE ORGANS. [BOOK V. 


as, for example, the medulla oblongata—are white and firm. The lateral ven- 
tricles contain a few drops. of clear, slightly yellowish fluid. It undergoes 
putrefaction very rapidly. The consistence of the adult brain is much greater; 
it can be broken up in the direction of its fibres, and there is a marked differ- 
ence in color between the medullary and cortical portions. When a section is 
made through the substance of the brain, the blood contained in it appears 
upon the surface in red, watery points; more than this is generally indicative 
of disease. The normal amount of liquid in the ventricles varies from one- 
half of a drachm to four drachms, according to the greater or less consistence 
of the brain. It is clear and colorless, contains no albumen, and the lining 
membrane of the ventricles is generally not dissolved by it until the lapse of 
several days. In most cases where a softening of the cerebral substance around 
both ventricles is found, it may be regarded as a cadaveric change. In old 
persons the volume of the brain is somewhat diminished, hence the dura mater 
will often be found in folds. The substance of the brain is tough and elastic, 
and the medullary portion has a yellowish-white color. The ventricles are 
dilated, and contain sometimes as much as an ounce and a half of clear, color- 
less, slightly albuminous liquid. There is but little blood in the brain, and the 
arteries at its base contain fibrinous clots. 

§ 994. In newly-born children the cartilages of the larynx are thin and 
elastic, its mucous membrane pale, smooth, and covered with a puriform epithe- 
lial coating, which is found in the most normal conditions, and particularly in 
the ventricles of Morgagni. The antero-posterior diameter of the larynx and 
trachea is less than the transverse. The bronchia are membranous and their 
mucous coat pale; they contain a whitish mucus, a circumstance which should 
not be supposed, as is too often done, to indicate catarrhal inflammation. 
After the age of puberty the air-passages acquire an increased volume and 
altered form, the antero-posterior diameter exceeds the transverse in length, 
the cartilages become firmer, the tracheal glands become prominent, and the 
posterior wall of the trachea often appears injected. No fluid is to be found 
except in the ventricles of Morgagni, which contain a thick whitish mucus 
consisting of the effete epithelium. -The bronchial mucous membrane is 
wrinkled, of a pale gray color or reddish, the finer bronchia have a perfectly 
colorless and transparent wall, and contain only a small quantity of a colorless, 
watery fluid. 

In old persons the cartilages of the larynx, trachea, and the larger bronchia 
are often found ossified; this is not the case in women, however, except some- 
times the thyroid cartilage. The mucous membrane appears almost dry. The 
air-passages are more capacious than in adult life. Their contents are not 
always the result of the secretion from the mucous membrane itself, but from 
the deeper parts of the lungs. 

§ 995. The lungs in children who have not breathed, are found in the pos- 
terior part of the thorax, the rest of this cavity being filled with a yellowish, 
glutinous, watery fluid. The edges of the lungs are rounded, and their length 
greater than their breadth. They are dense, and resemble in their granular 
structure and reddish-brown color, the liver. They are specifically heavier 
than water. To distinguish from hepatization those parts which not having 

792 


BOOK V.] NATURAL ASPECT OF THE ORGANS. [$ 995 


been dilated by the air, present this appearance, the inflation of the lungs will 
suffice, as it will not cause the first to disappear but will do so with the latter. 
Again, to discover whether the fluid contained in the chest is a pleuritic exu- 
dation which may have so compressed .the lungs as to cause them to resemble 
their foetal condition, we must be guided by the quantity of albumen and spon- 
taneously coagulable constituents, and the form also of the lungs, which in 
pleuritic exudation are pressed flat against the vertebral column, and are not 
empty of blood, but rather, on the contrary, gorged with it. 

The lungs of children who have breathed, occupy the greater part of the 
thorax; their edges are sharp and slightly curved ; here and there tongue-like 
processes project caused by a partial increased force of inflation ; the surface 
retains the impression of the finger, and by strong pressure the air is all ex- 
pelled and the lung falls together like a ribbon. The tissue is elastic, and if 
not containing much water or blood, tough. The vesicular structure is not 
visible to the naked eye on the incised surface, but, through the pleura, nume- 
rous very small air bubbles may be seen, corresponding to the pulmonary vesi- 
cles. The color is grayish-white at the edges, in the front and outer parts 
a spotted rosy-red, in the under and posterior parts an intense purple. The 
same differences are observable upon incision. But little blood exudes upon 
incision, and that chiefly in the posterior portions. The pleura is thin, color- 
less, and transparent, and but a few drops of watery fluid are found in its 
cavity. | 

The lungs of adults sink upon opening the thorax an inch or two from its 
anterior wall; their borders are somewhat inflated, pale, dry, containing but 
little blood, and the pulmonary vesicles are visible through the pleura; the 
middle part of the upper lobes is of an ashen or reddish-gray color, variegated 
with patches of white and blue, in some spots bright red, the parenchyma is 
tough, and frothy serum exudes upon pressure. Bloody serum is not found, 
but sometimes streaks of blood from the larger vessels mix with the frothy 
serum which is pressed out. The lower part of the upper lobes, as well as of 
the under, with the exception of the borders of the latter, are more easily lace- 
rated, denser, elastic, and have a purple hue on the surface, and when cut a 
brownish-red color ; bloody serum mixed with bubbles of air exudes spontane- 
ously upon the cut surface. Coagula are often found, but chiefly in the large 
vessels, but fibrinous coagula only when the agony has been long, and in in- 
flammations of the lung. The parenchyma is more lacerable and denser in 
proportion to its contents of blood or serum, and the greater the quantity of 
air contained in it the longer it retains the impression of the finger; its color 
depends in its varieties upon the amount and character of the fluids it contains. 
The pigment spots are anormal appearance, they are rarely found earlier than 
the tenth or twelfth year, but are constantly found in adults. The amount of 
blood contained in the lungs is proportional to that in the heart. The pleura 
is at this period clear, colorless, shining, and transparent. The normal amount 
of fluid in this sac, varies within the normal condition between one and six 
ounces. 

The lungs in very old persons, when the chest is opened, occupy only the 
posterior part of the thorax, so that their anterior portion is distant about a 

193 


§ 998] NATURAL ASPECT OF THE ORGANS. [BOOK Y. 


hand’s breadth from the front of the chest. They have a peculiar feel, retain 
the impression of the finger, are tough, and easily deprived of the air contained 
in them by pressure, falling together into a thin, membranous, wrinkled form. 
The color is a dark gray owing to the quantity of pigment, intermingled with 
bright red patches; the lower portions are of a dirty brownish-red color. 
The tissue is mostly dry, the posterior part alone moderately moist, with a 
pale, brownish fluid; in the pulmonary bloodvessels, a very small quantity of 
fluid blood is found. Any increase in the quantity of air, blood, or water, is 
at this age of more importance than in younger persons. ‘The pleura is some- 
what thicker and less transparent, and numerous deposits of pigment are found 
underneath it. The products of past diseases are frequently to be observed. 

§ 996. The heart in children is firm and of a darker color than the other 
muscles. The relative thickness of the right side is greater than in adults, 
as also that of the auricles relatively to the ventricles. The endocardium 
is thin and transparent, the free edge of the ventricular valves soon becomes 
fringed in consequence of early commencing maceration. Both sides contain 
nearly the same amount of blood with a few coagula. The pericardium is 
transparent and more closely attached to the heart than in adults, containing 
from a few drops to a scruple of liquid of a yellow color, albuminous, dissolv- 
ing soon the epithelium of the pericardium, and thus acquiring a turbid ap- 
pearance, and rendering it possible to mistake it for an inflammatory exuda- 
tion. The heart has a pyramidal shape in adults, but is more four-sided in 
old people. The endocardium in the former has a tendinous appearance ; in 
the latter, particularly in the auricles, it is thick, wrinkled, opaque and yel- 
lowish in appearance, and in spots marked with the so-called atheroma. The 
free edge of the valves is in them, also, involuted, thickened, almost cartilagin- 
ous, and there is but a small amount of blood found in the cavities, while in 
adults, and chiefly in the right ventricle, coagula of blood and fibrin are 
found (almost) constantly. The pericardium becomes opaque in adult life, 
and contains from one to two ounces of a yellowish serum. The pulmonary 
artery and aorta are of nearly equal calibre; in children the former being 
somewhat the largest, but in old persons the latter. 

In young persons there is relatively a large amount of blood contained in 
the veins, and chiefly in those of a medium size, the longitudinal sinus of the 
dura mater, contains in children a large amount of blood, but in adults gene- 
rally only coagulated fibrin. 

§ 997. The perttoneum is characterized by the same differences in the three 
periods of life as have been mentioned of the pleura. A few ounces of serous 
fluid in the peritoneum are not pathological ; on the other hand, the dryness 
of this membrane is doubtless a morbid symptom, as are also deposits of granu- 
lar pigment in old age. 

§ 998. The liver in young children is relatively larger than in adults ; 
the upper surface more convex, the under more concave; the parenchyma 
thick and tough, and indistinctly granular ; its color is very dark, and it con- 
tains a large amount of dark viscid blood. In anemia the color is of a light 
yellow, the edges translucent, and the parenchyma contains a reddish serum. 
In adults, the structure is inelastic, distinctly granular, and in ansemia retains 

794 


BOOK V.]| NATURAL ASPECT OF THE ORGANS. [$ 1000 


the impression of the finger. In old people the volume of the organ is 
diminished, the borders become sharper, the capsule becomes wrinkled, the 
tissue firmer, tougher, and dryer, of a brownish or greenish yellow, or soft and 
putty-like, containing a dirty reddish fluid, and an increased quantity of fat. 
In advanced age numerous vessels become obliterated, and the portion to 
which they belong atrophied. 

The ble is, in new-born children, viscid, clear, or of a sap-green color; in 
adults thinner, and of a bright yellow, or viscid and reddish-brown, and in 
aged persons, scanty, but very thick and dark, and leaving a thick sediment. 

§ 999. The spleen, in the early years of life, is dense, granular, and of the 
consistence of liver, dark red in color, and when incised yields no fluid blood. 
But in adults it presents within the normal limits some important varieties. 
Its size is variable, depending upon the general amount of blood. It is easily 
lacerable, and its substance is thick, and in color grayish-red. In the increase 
of its. volume depending upon augmentation in the amount of blood, it is softer 
in its substance, but harder under the opposite condition. In old persons, this 
organ is small, its surface wrinkled, it retains the impression of the finger, is 
broken down by pressure, and is of a clear reddish-brown color. The pancreas 
and other analogous glands are of a grayish-yellow color, firm, not easily lacer- 
able, and granular in structure. Upon pressure a small quantity of a glutinous 
fluid exudes. 

§ 1000. The digestive canal presents important differences at the different 
periods of life. Its mucous membrane is, in early life, delicate, transparent, 
without redness or injection, except that of the mouth, which is of a pale 
grayish-red ; of the stomach, which is red in points, and of the ileum which is 
injected around the aggregated follicles. The stomach is without rug, and 
those of the small intestine are few and imperfect. The isolated follicles of 
the small intestine are numerous and well developed; also in the duodenum 
and stomach, but fewerin number. The internal surface of the duodenum has 
a finely granular feel. The mucous membrane of the large intestine is smooth 
and white, its follicles prominent, opaque, and more numerous at its lower 
extremity. In the cavity of the mouth is found a scanty fluid secretion, and 
a little also in the csophagus. The stomach contains a small quantity of a 
stringy, clear fluid, in the small intestine (after the meconium is passed) a 
bright yellow, flocculent muciform substance. In the large intestine, a green- 
ish-yellow or brownish pasty fecal matter. Besides this the intestine always 
contains gas. 

In adults the mucous membrane of the stomach is sometimes rugose, and 
covered with a thick, tough, pale-gray mucus, but at other times is quite 
smooth, and contains only a small quantity of thin mucus. The color is 
generally of a pale gray, but if there be present any ingesta, it will be red in 
points, or if irritating substances, such as pepper, tartrate of antimony, &c., 
there will be vascular injection. ‘The mucous membrane of the fundus is often 
softened in a degree corresponding to the quantity of fluids contained in the 
stomach ; but this softening does not penetrate into the deeper strata of the 
sub-mucous cellular tissue. ‘The lining membrane of the duodenum has a 
somewhat granular surface, owing to the projecting glands, it contains a thick 

195 


§ 1002] NATURAL ASPECT OF THE ORGANS. [BOOK V. 


and turbid liquid, tinged with bile. This membrane, through the whole of 
the small intestine, has a velvety appearance under water, is very thin, and 
cannot be stripped off in pieces of any size. The solitary and agminated 
glands may be seen with the unassisted eye in the ileum. The mucous mem- 
brane of the large intestine is white and polished, and covered with a layer of 
thick transparent mucus, which is very adherent. The transverse colon usually 
contains much gas, the rest of the large intestine is contracted. When fecal 
matter has been a long time in contact with the mucous membrane, it.assumes 
a bluish-gray appearance or sometimes is red and injected. The glands of the 
rectum may be prominent and opaque without necessarily being morbid. In 
old people the deposit of pigmentary matter in many parts of the intestine 
must be regarded as a normal appearance. i 

§ 1001. The kidneys of newly-born children are comparatively thick, their 
surface nearly uniform, and adherent to the capsules; the color is of a dark 
grayish-brown, and the tubular only distinguished from the cortical substance 
by the direction of its fibres. In the tubuli urinifert may be remarked some- 
times a reddish sediment, and out of the papille may be expressed a turbid 
reddish urine. The mucous membrane of the pelvis of the kidney and the 
ureter is smooth and white. The bladder is generally contracted, its lining 
membrane of a rosy white, with here and there vascular injection. In adults, 
the kidney can be easily turned out of its capsule, the tissue is inelastic, the 
cortical substance is of a lighter color than the tubular. Vessels disposed in 
a stellated manner are seen upon the surface, and when cut, reddish points. 
The pelvis of the kidney is enveloped in a dark granular fat, fhe mucous mem- 
brane of this, the ureter and urethra is smooth and polished. The bladder 
is generally contracted. In old persons the kidneys are usually diminished in 
size, and surrounded with fat and a thick capsule, the surface is granular and 
uneven, the substance firm and tough, the color of the cortical substance is a 
pale reddish-brown or grayish-red. There are but few Malpighian bodies to 
be seen, but on the other hand minute vesicles filled with fluid. The tubular 
substance does not differ from the cortical in its color ; hyperzemia, and anemia 
of the kidneys commence in the former, diminution of consistence in the 
latter. ; . 

§ 1002. VI. Reports.—It has been already stated, that careful notes should 
be taken during the progress of the autopsy. These should be preserved, and 
as soon as possible afterwards, a report drawn up embracing all the medical 
facts resulting from the inspection. The utmost precision is requisite in these 
reports and the avoidance as far as possible of technical terms is desirable. The 
report of the chemical analysis should be appended to the general report; and 
at the conclusion, the opinion as to the cause of death may be given, together 
with the general inferences resulting from the facts observed at the examination. 
Where written reports are not required, it is nevertheless advisable that the 
physician should prepare one for his own use, since by this means he cannot 
fail to gain a more intelligent view of the whole case. 

The reader will find in the following remarks, selected from ‘“‘ Suggestions 
for the Medico-Legal Examination of Dead Bodies, by Professors Traill, 

196 


BOOK V.] RULES FOR POST-MORTEM EXAMINATION. [$ 1002 


Christison and Syme (with additions by A. Watson, M.D.,”) more minute 
directions upon some points than we have thought necessary to give above :— 


“Tt is desirable that the Medical Inspectors shall have an opportunity of viewing the 
body before it is undressed or moved from the spot where it was first found. If the 
body had been previously removed or meddled with, they ought to inform themselves 
accurately as to its original position. In many cases it is material that they personally 
visit the place where it was first seen; and they should inquire minutely into all the 
particulars connected with the removal of it. i 

“5. In cases where the body has been buried, and disinterment becomes necessary, 
it ought not to be removed from the coffin, except in presence of the inspectors. 

“6, Where a considerable period has elapsed between death and disinterment, the 
inspection must in all cases be proceeded with, although the body be found in a state 
of decay, unless the inspectors can positively say that the progress of decay is such 
as to render the examination nugatory in relation to its special objects. The degree 
of decay which will justify such an opinion will differ with a variety of circumstances 
which cannot be properly specified here. It may be observed, however, that where 
the injuries of the bones are to be looked for, or the traces of certain poisons, it is 
scarcely possible to assign the limit at which an inspection must of necessity be fruit- 
less. It is of moment to remember that the internal organs are often in a great mea- 
sure entire, although the external parts are much decayed. The inspection, where the 
body is much decayed, will be rendered greatly less annoying to those present by 
frequently washing the parts successively exposed with a solution of chloride of lime, 
of the strength of one part in forty; but this must be carefully kept clear of any 
parts which may afterwards require to be examined for poison. 

“7. No one should be allowed to be present at the examination out of mere curiosity. 
But especially every individual, not of the medical profession, ought to be excluded, 
who is likely to be a witness either in the precognition or trial; and consequently any 
one who attends to give information, if likely to be a witness, should remain in an 
adjoining room. The reason for this rule is, that the medical inspection often fur- 
nishes good tests of the value of otherwise doubtful evidence of a general nature ; 
and it is therefore necessary that the general witnesses should not have an opportunity 
of knowing what is observed in the dissection of the body. 

“8. The examination and dissection of the body should not be tee ae, if pos- 
sible, except with sufficient daylight in prospect to allow the whole inspection to be 
made without artificial light. 

“9. While the one inspector conducts the practical details of the examination, the 
other should take notes of its successive steps, indicating all the points inquired into, 
with the observations made and appearances presented, negative as well as positive, 
and stating simple facts only, without either generalizations or opinions. These notes 
should be looked over by both inspectors before the body is sewed up, that omissions 
in the notes or in the inspection itself may then be supplied; and the notes, properly 
signed, dated, and sealed, must be lodged with the law authorities, a copy being pre- 
served, if thought advisable by the inspectors. 

“10. The inspectors must deliver to the same authorities, and within two days, 
where no further examination is required, a distinct report containing their opinion on 
the case, with the reasons succinctly and clearly stated. They must understand that 
they cannot found their opinions on any facts represented to have been ascertained 
by themselves during the inspection, which are not specified in their notes. 

“11. Great attention must be paid not to express any premature opinion of the 
nature of the case from appearances presented on a partial examination, because the 
real cause of death often turns out very different from what it seems in the first in- 
stance to have been. In cases of injuries, or apparent drowning, hanging, strangling, 
burning, and the like, it should always be remembered that the appearances of such 


T9T 


§$ 1002] POST-MORTEM EXAMINATIONS. [BOOK V. 


death may have been accidentally induced or purposely contrived after death, while 
the actual cause of death is different, and only to be detected by a careful and thorough 
inspection of the whole body. 

“12. It is a good general rule that all injured or diseased parts should be removed 
and preserved, wherever this is practicable. Soft parts, except what are to become 
the subject of analysis in the search for poison, are best preserved in a concentrated 
or strong solution of common salt. 

“13. When any portions of the body, or any substances found in or near it, are to 
be ‘preserved for further examination, they ought never to be put out of the custody 
of the inspectors, or of a special law-officer. They must be locked up in the absence 
of the person who keeps them. When they are to be transmitted to a distance, they 
should be labelled, and the labels signed by the inspectors ; and, after being properly 
secured and sealed, they should be delivered by the inspectors themselves, or the 
special law-officer, at the coach-office by which they are to be forwarded.” 


SECTION II.—Necessary Implements. 


“14, Besides the ordinary instruments used in common dissections, the inspectors 
should be provided with a foot-rule, and an ounce-measure graduated to drachms, for 
measuring distances and the quantities of fluids; a few clean bladders for carrying 
away any parts of the body which it may be necessary to preserve for future examina- 
tion; and, in cases of possible poisoning, three or four bottles, of 8,12, and 16 ounces, 
with glass stoppers or clean corks, for preserving fluids to be analyzed. [It is also 
necessary to be provided with paper, pens, ink, and sealing-wax. ] 

“15. All distances, lengths, surfaces, and the like, whose extent may require to be 
described, ought to be actually measured ; and the same rule ought to be followed in 
ascertaining the volume of fluids. Where large quantities of fluids are to be mea- 
sured, any convenient vessel may be used whose capacity is previously ascertained 
by the ounce measure. Conjectural estimates and comparisons, however common in 
medico-legal inspections, are quite inadmissible. 

“16. The importance of the external examination, and the particulars of it to be 
chiefly attended to, will vary in different cases with the probable cause of death. It 
comprehends, 1. An examination of the position of the body when found. 2. Of the 
vicinity of the body, with a view to discover the objects on which it rested [might 
have fallen upon, or been suspended from], marks of a struggle, signs of the presence 
of a second party about the time of death, or after it, weapons or other objects the 
property or not the property of the deceased, the remains of poisons, marks of vomit- 
ing; and, where marks of blood are of importance, and doubts may arise as to their 
really being blood, the articles presenting them must be preserved for examination. 
3. Of the dress; its nature and condition, stains on it of mud, sand, or the like, of 
blood, of vomiting, of acids, or other corrosive substances, in the case of suspected 
poisoning ; marks of injuries, such as rents and incisions: and where injuries have 
been inflicted upon the body, care should be taken to compare the relative position of 
those on the body and those on the clothes ; and where stains apparently from poison 
are seen, the stained parts are to be preserved for analysis. 4. Ligatures, their mate- 
rial and kind, as throwing light on the trade of the person who applied them, the pos- 
sibility or impossibility of the deceased having applied them himself, their sufficiency 


for accomplishing their apparent purpose, &c.”’ 
* * % * “ * % * * * 


SECTION V.—Examination in cases of Wounds and Contusions. 


“33. The most approved mode of examining injuries is, if they be not situated over 
the great cavities, to expose the successive layers of muscles in the manner of an 
ordinary dissection, observing carefully what injuries have been sustained by the 
parts successively exposed before they are divided. No advantage will be derived 


798 


BOOK V.| POST-MORTEM EXAMINATIONS. [$ 1002 


from previous injection of the bloodvessels, even supposing this were always attain- 
able. Careful dissection, with a knowledge of the structure and relation of the parts, 
is a safer guide. 

“34. The seat of wounds must be described by actual measurement from known 
points, their figure and nature also carefully noted and their direction ascertained 
with exactness. 

“35. Before altering by incisions the external appearance of injuries, care must be 
taken to consider what weapon might have produced them ; and, if a particular weapon 
be suspected, it should be compared with them. 

“36. Apparent contusions must be examined by making incisions through them ; 
and the inspectors will note whether there be swelling or puckering of the skin, 
whether the substance of the true skin be black through a part or the whole of its 
thickness, whether there be an extravasation below the skin, and whether the blood be 
fluid or coagulated, generally or partially ; whether the soft parts below be lacerated 
or subjacent bones injured, and whether there be blood in contact with the lacerated 
surfaces. By these means the question may be settled whether the contusions were 
inflicted before or after death. 

‘37. In the case of wounds, too, the signs of vital action must be attended to, 
especially the adhesion of blood to their surfaces, or the injection of blood into the 
cellular tissue around, or the presence of the signs or sequel of inflammation. 

“38. Where large arteries or veins are found divided, care must be taken to corro- 
borate the presumption thus arising by ascertaining, in the subsequent dissection, 
whether the great vessels and membranous viscera be unusually free of blood. 

*¢ 39. In the course of the dissection of the wounds, a careful search must be made 
for foreign bodies in them. Where firearms have occasioned them, the examination 
should not be ended before discovering the bullet, wadding, or other article lodged ; 
and whatever is found must be preserved. Where the article discharged from fire- 
arms, or indeed any other weapon, has passed through and through a part of the 
body, the entrance wound and exit wound must be carefully distinguished by their 
respective characters. 

“40. When wounds are situated over one of the great cavities, they ought not to be 
particularly examined until the cavity is laid open; and, in laying open the cavity, 
the external incisions should be kept clear of the wounds. 

“41. The organs in the abdomen furnish the best source of information as to the 
sign of bloodlessness in presumed death by hemorrhage. [The state of the brain is 
also a good criterion.” ] 


SECTION VI.—Lxamination in cases of Poisoning. 


“42. In examining a body in a case of suspected poisoning, the inspectors should 
begin with the alimentary canal, first tying a ligature round the cardiac end of the 
stomach, and two round its pyloric end; then removing the stomach and whole intes- 
tines: next, dissecting out the parts in the mouth, throat, neck, and chest, in one 
mass; and, finally, dissecting the gullet, with the parts about the throat, from the 
other organs of the chest. The several portions of the alimentary canal may then be 
examined in succession. 

“43, In all their operations they ought to make sure that the instruments, vessels, 
and bladders used are quite clean. 

“44, In cases of supposed poisoning, a minute inquiry must, in the first instance, 
be made into the symptoms during life—their nature, their precise date, especially in 
relation to meals or the taking of any suspicious articles, their progressive develop- 
ment, and the treatment pursued. It is impossible to be too cautious in collecting 
such information ; and, in particular, great care must be taken to fix the precise date 
of the first invasion of the symptoms and of the previous meals. The same care is 
required in tracing the early history of the case, where the inspector happens to visit 


799 


§ 1002] POST-MORTEM EXAMINATIONS. [BOOK V. 


the individual before death; and if suspicion should not arise till his attendance has 
been going on for some time, he ought, subsequently to such suspicions, to review 
and correct the information gathered at first, especially as to dates. All facts thus 
obtained should be immediately committed to writing, and ought to form part of the 
narrative of the inspection to be delivered to the law authorities. —(See § 9, 10.) 

“45, Before inspecting the bodies, the inspectors, after ascertaining the history of 
the case, should proceed, if they see cause, to search, in company with the proper law 
officer, for suspicious articles in the house of the deceased. These are suspected 
articles of food, drink, or medicine; the vessels in which they had been prepared 
or afterwards contained, the family stores, or the articles with which suspected food, 
&c., appears to have been made. All such articles must be secured, according to 
rules in § 13, for preserving their identity. In this examination, the body, clothes, 
bedclothes, floor, and hearth should not be neglected, as they may present traces of 
vomited matter, acids spirted out, or spilled, and the like. 

“46. When a medical man is called to a case, during life, where poison is sus- 
pected, he ought as soon as possible to follow the instructions laid down for securing 
articles in which poison may have been administered. 

“47, In the same circumstances, it is his duty to observe the conduct of any sus- 
pected individuals, were it for no other reason than to prevent the remains of poi- 
soned articles from being put out of the way, and to protect his patient from further 
attempts. 

“48, The whole organs of the abdomen must be surveyed, but particularly the 
stomach and whole track of the intestines, the liver, spleen, kidneys, and the bladder; 
and, in the female, the uterus and its appendages. The intestines should in general 
be slit up throughout their whole length; and it should be remembered that the 
most frequent seat of disease of the mucous membrane is in the neighborhood of the 
ileo-ccecal valve. \ 

“49, In cases where the possibility of poisoning must be kept in view, the contents 
of the stomach should be preserved ; also, sometimes, those of the great and small 
intestines, and occasionally even those of the gullet. 

“50. It is generally necessary to ascertain whether any spirituous fluid [or opium] 
be contained in the stomach. This may sometimes be done by the order of its con- 
tents, but oftener not; so that, where the point is one of evident consequence, it may 
be necessary to search for alcohol by distilling the contents [if any], and examining 
the distilled liquid as directed in works on poisons. 

“51. The intestines may be examined at once by laying open their whole course. 
The parts, where appearances are most frequently found in poisoning, are, the duode- 
num, upper part of the jejunum, lower part of the ileum, and rectum. Care should 
be taken to preserve their contents in a bottle, and the intestines themselves in a 
bladder, if they present any unusual appearance which will keep. The stomach 
should be taken out entire, and its contents emptied into a bottle. The smell pro- 
ceeding from its contents should be observed when it is first laid open, as this often 
alters speedily. If the stomach present any remarkable appearance, its examination 
may be reserved, if convenient, till a future opportunity ; but in every circumstance 


it must be preserved and carried away. The throat and gullet may be examined at 


once, and preserved with their contents, which, if abundant, may be kept apart in a 
bottle. 

“52. No person ought to undertake an analysis in a case of suspected poisoning, 
unless he be either familiar with chemical researches, or have previously analyzed 
with success a mixture of organic substances, containing a small proportion of the 
poison suspected. 

“53. The inspectors will learn from the law authorities, whether, in the event of the 
discovery of poisoning by them, it is probable that the opinion of some other person 
practised in toxicological researches may be required ; and, in that case, they will take 
to use only one-half of the several articles preserved for analysis. They will remember 


800 


BOOK V.]| POISONING—SUFFOCATION—BURNING. [$ 1002 


that the stomach itself is one of the articles for analysis, because poison may be found 
there, though not present in the contents. The identity of the subjects of analysis 
must be secured by the rules of § 13.” 


SECTION VI.—Ezxamination in cases of Suffocation. 


54. In cases of suspected drowning, the inspectors will observe particularly whe- 
ther grass, mud, or other objects are clutched by the hands, or contained under the 
nails; whether the tongue be protruded or not between the teeth; whether any fluid, 
froth, or foreign substances be contained in the mouth or nostrils, in the trachea or 
bronchial ramifications ; whether the stomach contain much water ; whether the blood 
in the great vessels be fluid. When water, with particles of vegetable matter or mud, 
is found within the body, these must be compared with what may exist in the water 
in which the body was discovered. Marks of injuries must be compared diligently 
with the objects both in the water and the banks near it. 

“55. In cases of suspected death by hanging, strangling, or smothering, it is im- 
portant to attend particularly to the state of the face as to lividity, compared with the 
rest of the body; the state of the conjunctiva of the eyes, as to vascularity ; of the 
tongue, as to position; of the throat, chin, and lips, as to marks of nail scratches, 
ruffling of the scarf-skin, or small contusions ; the state of the blood, as to fluidity ; the 
state of the membranous organs in the abdomen, and of the lungs, as to congestion. 
The mark of a cord or other ligature round the neck, must be attentively examined ; 
and here it requires to be mentioned, that the mark is often not distinct until seven 
or eight hours after death, and that it is seldom a dark livid mark, as is very com- 
monly supposed, but a pale, greenish-brown streak, if made with a rope, representing 
in general no ecchymosis, but the thinnest possible line of bright redness at either 
edge, where it is conterminous with the sound skin. Nevertheless, effusions of blood 
and lacerations should be also looked for under and around the mark, in the skin, 
cellular tissue, muscles, cartilages, and lining membrane of the larynx and trachea. 
Accessory injuries in other parts of the body, more especially on the chest, back, and 
arms, must be looked for; as likewise the appearance of coagulated blood having 
flowed from the nostrils or ears, and the discharge of feces, urine, or semen.” 


- SECTION VIII.—Examination in cases of Burning. 


“56. In supposed death from burning, the skin at the edge of the burns should be: 
carefully examined for redness, or the appearance of vesicles containing fluid.” 


SECTION IX.—LExamination in cases of Infanticide. 


“57. In cases of suspected infanticide, certain peculiarities must be borne in mind.. 
The cavity of the head should be laid open with a pair of scissors. In opening the. 
abdomen the incision may be carried through the whole parietes at once; and the 
navel should be avoided, so that the state of the vessels of the navel-string may be 
examined correctly. 

“58. The inquiry in cases of infanticide should be conducted with a distinct refer-. 
ence to the five following questions: 1. The probable degree of maturity of the child. 
2. How long it has been dead? 3. Whether it died before, during, or after delivery, . 
and how long after? 4. Whether death arose from natural causes, neglect, or violence ? 
5. Whether the suspected female is the mother of the child ? 

“59, The points to be attended to for ascertaining the probable degree of maturity 
of the child, are the state of the skin, its secretions, and its appendages, the hair and 
nails ; the presence or absence of the pupillary membrane; the length and weight of © 
the whole body; the relative length of the body and its members ; and the point on 
the abdomen corresponding with the middle of the length of the body; the relative 
size of the lungs and heart ; the relative size of the liver, indicated by the position of 


51 801 


§ 1002] POST-MORTEM EXAMINATIONS, [BOOK V. 


its margin; the situation of the meconium in the intestines ; the position of the tes- 
ticles in the case of males. 

“60. The points of chief importance, in reference to the period which has elapsed 
after death, are those specified in the last clause of section 17. 

“61. The circumstances which indicate whether the child died before or during 
parturition, and how long after it, are the signs of putrefaction within the womb; the 
marks of the crown, feet, buttocks, shoulders, &c., indicating presumptively the kind 
of labor; the state of the lungs, heart and great vessels, showing whether or not it had 
breathed ; the nature of the contents of the stomach, and of the intestines ; the pre- 
sence or absence of urine in the bladder; the presence of foreign matters in the wind- 
pipe ; the state of the umbilical cord, or of the navel itself, if the cord be detached. 

‘662. In order to examine properly the state of the lungs, heart, and great vessels, 
with a view to determine whether or not the child had breathed, the inspection should 
be made in the following order: Attend first to the situation of the lungs, how far 
they rise along the sides of the heart—to their color and texture—and whether they 
crepitate or not. Examine next, but without displacing them, the condition of the 
ductus venosus and umbilical vessels. Then secure a ligature round the great ves- 
sels at the root of the neck, keeping clear of the ductus arteriosus, and another round 
the vena cava above the diaphragm. Cut both sets of vessels beyond the ligatures, 
and remove the heart and lungs in one mass; which must be weighed and put in 
water to ascertain whether the lungs, with the heart attached, sink or swim. In the 
next place, put a ligature round the pulmonary vessels, close to the lungs, and cut 
away the heart by an incision between it and the ligature. Compare now the relation 
of the diameter of the ductus arteriosus to that of the pulmonary trunk and of the 
pulmonary branches, and look for any indication of partial contraction in the duct 
towards its aortal end. Lastly, ascertain the weight of the lungs; their relative 
weight to that of the whole body ; whether they crepitate when handled ; whether they 
sink or swim in water; whether blood issues freely or sparingly when they are cut 
into; whether any fragments swim in the instances where the entire lungs sink; and, 
in every instance of buoyancy, whether fragments of them continue to swim when well 
squeezed in a cloth. 

“63. The points to be considered in relation to the cause of death, are the signs of 
natural death before parturition, and of natural, accidental, and violent death during 
parturition as well as after delivery. The most frequent forms of violent death during 
labor, are, puncture of the fontanelles, orbits, or nucha; twisting of the neck after 
delivery of the head ; compression of the head; detruncation of the head; strangling 
and smothering. - The chief varieties of violent death after delivery are: smothering 
by overlaying or otherwise; hemorrhage from the umbilical cord; simple exposure; 
starvation; injuries of the head from falls, blows, or compression ; wounds of the 
throat; puncture of the fontanelles, nucha, orbits, cribriform plate, spine, ears, or 
heart ; laceration of the great gut, or of the internal parts of the throat, by instruments - 
thrust in the anus or mouth; drowning; poisoning ; burning; strangling with the 
hand of a ligature ; choking by foreign bodies thrust into the back of the throat, or by 
dividing the frenum linguz and doubling back the tongue. 

“64, The circumstances noticed in §§ 59, 61, 62, compared with the signs of recent 
delivery in the female, will lead to the decision of the question, whether the suspected 
female be the mother of the child. These are the signs of the degree of maturity of 
the child; the signs on the body of the kind of labor; the signs which indicate the 
date of its death, and the interval which elapsed both between its birth and death, 
and between its death and the inspection.”— Watson on Homicide. 


802 


POO Rs T: 


LEGAL RELATIONS OF HOMICIDE, FOTICIDE, 
AND INFANTICIDE. 


PRELIMINARY OAN ALY. SiS. 


A. ELEMENTARY DEFINITIONS, § 1003. 
I, Murper, § 1005. 
General definition of, § 1005-7. 
Malice the essential ingredient, § 1006. 
Malice either express or implied, § 1006. 
When malice to be presumed, § 1006. 
Ist. Murder from general malice, § 1006. 
When homicide is committed from general malevolence it is murder, 
§ 1006. 
But when from wantonness, but manslaughter, § 1006. 
2d. Murder from individual malice, § 1007. 
(1.) In reference to the party killed, § 1007. 
How such malice to be proved, § 1007. 
In what it consists by the civil and common law, § 1007. 
(a) Intent to kill, § 1008. 
In this case the offence is always murder, § 1008. 
How such intent may be proved, § 1009. 
Declarations and acts of defendant admissible for this 
purpose, §§ 1009, 1156, 1173. 
(b) Intent to do bodily harm, § 1010. 
In this country such homicide generally is murder in 
the second degree, § 1010. 
The grade therefore depends on the intent, § 1010. 
(2.) In reference to the party killed, when the blow falls on the de- 
ceased by mistake, § 1011. 
When in an attempt to produce abortion, the mother is unin- 
tentionally killed, § 1011. 
3d. From collateral malice, § 1012. 
This includes those cases where the malice is directed to an object 
other than that of human life or limb, § 1012. 
II]. MANSLAUGHTER, § 1013. 
General definition of, § 1013. 
Involuntary manslaughter, § 1014. 
II. Excusasie Homicipg, § 1015. 
Ist. Where a man doing a lawful act, without any intention of hurt, by acci- 
dent kills another, § 1015. 
2d. Where a man kills another in self-defence, § 1015. 
The distinction between excusable and justifiable homicide, is in this 
country merely theoretical, § 1016. 
IV. Jusrir1ABLE Homicipg, § 1017. 
Ist. When committed by unavoidable necessity, 3 1017. 
2d. When committed in advancement of public justice, § 1017. 
V. MurvER IN THE SECOND DEGREE, § 1018. 
Object of distinction is the restriction of capital punishment to those cases 
only in which there is an intent to take life, §§ 1018-19. 
The distinguishing feature between the two degrees is a specific intent to 
take life, §§ 1018-19-20. 


LEGAL RELATIONS OF HOMICIDE, ETC. [BOOK Vi. 


Homicide by poisoning not necessarily murder in the first degree, § 1023. 

Homicide collateral to rape, robbery, &c., is necessarily murder in the first 
degree, § 1021. 

Homicide of A., when the intent was to kill B., is murder in the second 
degree, § 1022. 

Specific intent to take life to be inferred from circumstantial evidence, and 
from declarations, &c., § 1023. 


B. CORPUS DELICTI. 


if 


II. 


THAT A DEATH TOOK PLACE, § 1024. 
Universal rule of civil and common law, that the fact of death should be 
proved, § 1024. 
Identification of dead body—see ante, § 473, &c. 
Cases of conviction of innocent parties, from neglect of this precaution, §§ 
1024-6. 
Exceptions to the rule, § 1027. 
Ist. Possession of body is unnecessary when decease is proved by eye- 
witnesses, § 1027. 
2d. And so where it is proved that the body was destroyed by chemical 
or mechanical agents, § 1028. 
Webster’s case reported, § 1029. 
THAT THE DEATH WAS FROM VIOLENCE. 
It must appear that it was not natural, §§ 833-846. 
How autopsy to be conducted, ante, §§ 947-962, § 1002, n. 
Ist. Poisoning. 
(a.) Measures to be taken by the prosecution when poisoning 
is suspected, § 1084. 
(b.) Chemical proof of poison in stomach not essential, § 1092. 
(See ante, § 493-791.) 
Importance of chemical examination of stomach and its contents, 
§§ 1093. (See ante, as to nature and character of post-mortem, 
§§ 501-503, 514, 515, 516, 522, 532, 537, 544, 563, 582, 622, 646, 
649, 654, 669, 684, 700, 716, 731, 746, 748, 768, 772, § 1002, n.) 
When, however, this is prevented by the accused, he cannot set up 
the want of it, § 1093. 
On the other hand, neglect by the prosecution to procure it, if in its 
power, is a powerful presumption in favor of the accused, § 1093. 
(c.) Summary of reported cases in the common law courts, § 
1095. 
Donellan’s case, 1781, § 1093. 
Donnall’s case, 1817, § 1097. 
Anonymous, 1835, § 1098. 
Chapman’s case, 1831, § 1100. 
Tawell’s case, 1825, § 1102. 
Graham’s case, 1845, § 1103. 
Hartung’s case, 1354, § 1105. 
Palmer’s case, § 1110. 
(d.) Facts on which a verdict of guilty can be supported, § 1120. 
(e.) Duties of counsel for prosecution and defence, § 1125. 
2d. Wounds and blows, § 1127. 
a. Legal definition of wounds, § 1127. 
b. Under what circumstances wounds imply criminal agency, § 1130. 
a'. Character of the wounds themselves, § 1130. 
a®?, Adaptation to a particular instrument, § 1130. 
b*. Shape and direction, § 1132. 
ce’, Particular class, § 1133. 
a’, Gunshot, § 1133. 
6°. Punctured, § 1134. 
c3. Incised, § 1135. 
d’, Contused, § 1136. 
d*. Number, § 1137. 
e*, Situation, § 1138. 
b'. Expression of countenance, § 1139. 
c'. Inferences from surrounding objects, § 1140. 
a*, Clothing, § 1140. 
b’, Agent commensurate to the effect, § 1141. 
c’, Place where found, § 1142. 
d'. Position and appearance of the body, § 1151. 
a*, Attitude, § 1151. 


804 


BOOK VI.] PRELIMINARY ANALYSIS. 


b?. Marks of blood, § 1151. 

c®, Bruises, § 1153. 
el, Probability of infliction of injury before death, § 1154. 
J'. Connection of the wound with the death, § 1155. 


C. INTENT AND DESIGN, FROM WHAT TO BE INFERRED, § 1156. 


x 


II. 


#11, 


IV. 


VII. 


VII. 


PRIOR ATTEMPTS, PREPARATIONS AND THREATS, § 1156. 
Evidence of such always admissible, §§ 1156-7. 
And so as to obtaining instruments of mischief, and possession of them, ? 1157. 
Cases illustrative of this, §§ 1158-9. 
Threats to be received for the same purpose, § 1158. 
Cases illustrative of this, § 1160. 
MARKS OF VIOLENCE, § 1161. 
Presumptions to be drawn from such, § 1162. 
Presumptions to be drawn from nature of gunshot wounds, § 811. 
It must appear that the alleged violence was the cause of death, either in part 
or in whole, § 1163. 
Distinction between wounds made before and after death, §§ 798, 804. 
Blood-stains, §§ 820-831. 
Suicidal or homicidal, §§ 810, 816. 
INSTRUMENT OF DEATH, § 1164. 
The use of a lethal instrument leads to the presumption that death was 
intended, § 1164. 
Suicide may be inferred from the position of the weapon, § 1165. 
Other presumptions to be drawn from instrument of death, §§ 819, 1166-7. 
LIABILITY OF DECEASED TO ATTACK, §§ 1166-7. 
lst. Possession of money, § 1170. 
Avarice and ambition, § 1170. 
2d. Old grudge, §§ 972, 1133, 1173. 
3d. Jealousy, § 1174. 


. Posirion OF DECEASED, §§ 946, 1152. 


Presumption to be drawn from this as to suicide, §§ 819, 1152. 
In cases of hanging, §§ 907, 926. 

In cases of drowning, § 938. 

In cases of poisoning, § 1175. 


. MATERIALS APPROPRIATE TO BE CONVERTED INTO INSTRUMENTS OF CRIME, § 1177. 


Importance of indicatory evidence in this respect, § 1177. 

Purchase of poison and powder; preparation of other materials, § 1177. 

DETACHED CIRCUMJACENT BODIES, § 1178. 

Dress of deceased. Footprints. Presumptions to be drawn from the latter, 
§§ 1180-1-2. 

Detached articles of clothing, § 1181. 

Wadding of gun, &c., § 1179. 

Cases illustrative of the importance of this species of evidence, § 1185, &c. 

POSSESSION OF FRUITS OF OFFENCE, § 1193. 

Illustration of the general value of indicatory evidence, § 1194, &c. 


D. INFANTICIDE AND FQCSTICIDE, § 1195. (See for the Medical view of this sub- 


bl 


Il. 


Hil. 


ject, ante, §§ 335, 355.) 

How FAR FGTICIDE IS AFFECTED BY THE DEGREE TO WHICH GESTATION HAS PRO- 
CEEDED, § 1195. 

At common law destruction of an unborn infant is a misdemeanor. Late dif- 
ferences of opinion as to whether there must be a quickening. Better 
opinion is, that all attempts of this character are misdemeanors, no mat- 
ter what be the stage of gestation, §§ 1195-97. 

How FAR THE OFFENCE IS AFFECTED BY THE FACT OF BIRTH, § 1202. 

When a child dies after birth, from a wound inflicted before, the offence is 
murder; when the death takes place before birth, it is at common law 
but a misdemeanor, §§ 1203-4. 

TESTS OF VIABILITY RECOGNIZED BY THE COURTS, § 1204. 

Viability medically considered, §§ 356, 378. 

Time of gestation—see ante, §§ 310, 327, 

Difference of opinion as to actual degree of birth which is requisite to consti- 
tute the legal offence, § 1205. 

General propositions of law bearing on this topic :— 

(1.) Where there is a malicious wound inflicted on an infant, with intent 
to produce death, and death ensues after birth, the offence is murder, 
§ 1205. 


805 


§ 1005] LEGAL RELATIONS OF HOMICIDE. [BOOK VI. 


(2.) Where there is a malicious exposure of an infant, with intent to pro- 
duce death, and death ensues after birth, it is murder, § 1205. 

(3.) Where there is a wanton exposure of an infant, without the intent to 
procure death, but with the expectation of shifting the support of 
the infant upon some third person, and death ensues after birth, it is 
manslaughter, § 1205. 

(4.) Where there is an exposure resulting from necessity, ignorance, or 
insanity, and death ensues after birth, the offence is excusable homi- 
cide, in which, in accordance with American practice, the defendant 
is entitled to an acquittal, 1205-8. 

IV. CoRPUS DELICTI IN INFANTICIDE, § 1208. 
Difficulties arising in this respect from 

(1.) The uncertainty of the fact of pregnancy, § 1208. See ante, §§ 310, 329. 

(2.) The uncertainty of the time of death, § 1208. 

(3.) Uncertainty of presumptions, § 1208. 

(4.) Casualties of gestation and delivery, §1208. See this subject medi- 
cally considered, ante, §§ 379, 398. 


_§ 1003. The learning of the law of homicide has been elsewhere abundantly 
set forth,(a) and neither the object nor the compass of the present treatise 
_ requires its exhibition in anything more than outline. Homicide may, in this 
light, be considered as follows :— 


I. MuRDER : 
II. MANSLAUGHTER : 
Til. ExcusaBLeE HomIcivE : 
IV. JUSTIFIABLE HOMICIDE: 
V. MurveErR IN THE SECOND DEGREE. 


§ 1004. The distinction between excusable and justifiable homicide, as will 
presently be seen, is one which, however well marked in theory, is, in this 
country, obliterated in practice, since -here the uniform course is to acquit 
wherever either an adequate excuse or a justification is proved. 


I. Murper. 


§ 1005. Murder is where a person of sound memory and discretion unlaw- 
fully kills any reasonable creature in being, in the peace of the commonwealth, 
with malice, prepense or aforethought, either express or implied. The dis- 
tinguishing feature in this definition, as will at once be seen, is that of malice. 
By this term, at common law, is meant to include not only special malevo- 
lence to the individual slain, but a generally wicked, depraved, and malignant 
spirit—a heart regardless of social duty, and deliberately bent on mischief. 
And, in general, says Sir Wm. Russell, any formed design of doing mischief 
may be called malice; and, therefore, not such killing only as proceeds from 
premeditated hatred or revenge against the person killed, but also, in many 
other cases, such killing as is accompanied with circumstances that show the 
heart to be perversely wicked, is adjudged to be of malice prepense, and con- 
sequently murder. Malice is express or implied. When one person kills 
another with a sedate, deliberate mind, and formed design, it is said to be 
express. Of this the usual evidence is circumstantial ; such, for instance, as 
lying in wait, antecedent menaces, former grudges and concerted schemes to 


(a) See Wharton on Homicide, and Wharton’s Criminal Law, § 884 et seq. 
806 


BOOK VI.] GENERAL DEFINITIONS, [$ 1006 


do the party some bodily harm, and, in general, any deliberate, cruel act com- 
mitted by one person against another, however sudden; as where a man kills 
another suddenly, without any, or without a considerable provocation, and 
where a man wilfully poisons another. And where one is killed in conse- 
quence of such a wilful act as shows the person by whom it is committed to 
be an enemy to all mankind, the law will infer a general malice from such a 
depraved inclination to mischief. Where the act is committed deliberately, 
and is likely to be attended with dangerous consequences, the malice requisite 
to murder will be presumed; for the law infers that the natural or probable 
effect of an act deliberately done is intended by its actor. The killing proved, 
even though nothing else be shown, it has been repeatedly held in Massachu- 
setts that the offence is murder; the burden of extenuation being then thrown 
on the defendant—and such is undoubtedly the general rule. In Ohio, the 
presumption of killing alone is that of murder in the second degree, and so 
also is held to be the law in Virginia. In the latter State, however, it is said 
that where the mortal wound is given with a deadly weapon in the slayer’s 
previous possession, there being no evidence of provocation, the case is prima 
facie murder in the first degree: and so also is the rule in Pennsylvania. 
Malice once ascertained is presumed to continue down to the fatal act. Thus, 
where it appeared that the deceased had threatened the prisoner about three 
weeks before that he would kill him, that they met in the street on a starlight 
night, when they could see each other, that the deceased pressed for a fight, 
but the prisoner retreated a short distance, that when the deceased overtook 
him the prisoner stabbed him with some sharp instrument which caused his 
death, and that at the time of this meeting the deceased had no deadly weapon ; 
it was held that in such a case, to mitigate the offence from murder, it must 
appear, from the previous threats and the circumstances attending the rencon- 
tre, that the killing was in self-defence—the presumption being that the kill- 
ing was malicious. Malice may be exerted against a party in his absence: as 
where A. lays poison for B. in his victuals, which B. afterwards takes, and 
dies. So where A. procures an idiot or lunatic to kill B., which he does. In 
both instances, A. is guilty of the murder as principal. 

There may be a class of cases, to use the words of Chief Justice Shaw, 
‘when, if reasonable doubt arises as to the matter of malice, the court will 
properly instruct the jury to find manslaughter; as where a mother exposed 
her infant child in a garden, and it was devoured by a kite, or where the death 
of a pauper was produced by constant shifting, on the part of the overseers of 
the poor, from parish to parish.’’(b) 

§ 1006. Malice is either general, individual, or collateral, and will be con- 
sidered successively in each relation. 

Ist. General.—When an action, unlawful in itself, is done with delibera- 
tion, and with intention of mischief or great bodily harm to particulars, or of 
mischief indiscriminately, fall where it may, and death ensue against or beside 
the original intention of the party, it will be murder. But if such an original 
intention doth not appear, which is a matter of fact, and to be collected from 


(b) See Wharton on Hom. 35, and cases cited. 


807 


§$ 1007] \ LEGAL RELATIONS OF HOMICIDE. [BOOK VI. 


circumstances given in evidence, and the act was done heedlessly and incau- 
tiously, it will be manslaughter, not accidental death; because the act upon 
which death ensued was unlawful. Thus, if a person breaking in an unruly 
horse, wilfully ride him among a crowd of persons, the probable danger being 
great and apparent, and death ensue from the viciousness of the animal, it is 
murder. For how can it be supposed that a person wilfully doing an act so 
manifestly attended with danger, especially if he showed any consciousness of 
such danger himself, should intend any other than mischief to those who might 
be encountered by him. So, if a man mischievously throw from a roof in a 
crowded street, where passengers are constantly passing and repassing, a heavy 
piece of timber, calculated to produce death on such as it might fall, and 
death ensue, the offence is murder, at common law. And upon the same 
principles, if a man, knowing that people are passing along the street, throws 
_a@ stone likely to do injury, or shoot over a house or wall with intent to do 
hurt to people, and one is thereby slain, it is murder on account of previous 
malice, though not directed against any particular individual: it is no excuse 
that the party was bent upon mischief generally. The line of this species of 
homicide is very important to preserve intact ; for, as has been lately pointedly 
observed, ‘‘ particular malice has the limited bounds of the person who is the 
object of it, and who may be on his guard against it: but general malice has 
a wider scope, and falls on the unsuspecting. Is a man who fires a pistol at 
an individual against whom he has ill-will, less criminal than one who fires a 
pistol at a crowd of an hundred people, against whom he has ill-will as a 
body, or as a part of the community ? The absence of the personal animosity 
really aggravates the crime. In cases of particular malice, the sophistry of 
the passions often gives the act the character of a wild retribution, and the 
assassin persuades himself that he is getting rid of a monster who is a curse 
to society. This reasoning is perverse and dangerous; but is the state of 
mind less detestable in which no wrongs, real, exaggerated, or imaginary, 
inflame the passions against the individual, but in which the knife is driven 
home to his heart simply because he wears the form of a brother man? Which 
would argue the higher degree of depravity, the resolution—‘ I will kill A. 
and B., who have insulted or injured me,”’ or ‘I will kill the first man I meet, 
be he who he may ?” 

§ 1007. 2d. Individual, which may be considered (1) in reference to the 
party killed, and (2) to a third party, when the blow falls on the deceased by 
mistake, 

(1.) In reference to the party killed. : 

So far as concerns the individual killed, malice is either express or implied. 
Express malice is defined to be, where one person kills another with a sedate, 
deliberate mind, and formed design: Such formed design may be evinced by 
external circumstances, discovering the inward intention: as lying in wait, 
antecedent menaces, former grudges and concerted schemes to do the party 
some bodily harm. And malice is implied by law from any deliberate cruel 
act committed by one person against another, however sudden: thus, where a 
man kills another suddenly without any or without a considerable provocation, 
the law implies malice: for no person, unless of abandoned heart, would be 

808 


BOOK VI.| DEFINITIONS OF MALICE, [$ 1007 


guilty of such an act upon a slight or no apparent cause. And, as will be 
seen presently, where one is killed in consequence of such a wilful act, as 
shows the person by whom it is committed to be an enemy to all mankind, 
the law will infer a general malice from such a depraved inclination to mis- 
chief. It may be indeed treated as a general rule, that all homicide is pre- 
sumed to be malicious where an instrument, likely to cause death, is used.(c) 
It should not be forgotten in this connection, that the legal meaning of the 
term malitia, or malice, is different from its popular meaning, which makes it 
synonymous with spite. Thus, Lord Holt says: “Some have been led into 
mistakes by not well considering what the passion of malice is; they have 
construed it to be a rancor of mind, lodged in the person killing for some 
considerable time before the commission of the fact: which is a mistake, 
arising from the not well distinguishing between hatred and malice. Envy, 
hatred, and malice, are three distinct passions of mind.(d) Amongst the 
Romans, and in the civil law, malit¢a appears to have imported a mixture of 
fraud, and of that which is opposite to simplicity and honesty. Cicero speaks 
of it as,(e) “versuta et fallax nocendi ratio: and in another work(/) he 
says: “ Mihi quidem etiam vere hereditates non honest videntur si sint 
malitiosis (7. e., according to Pearce a malo animo profectis), blanditiis 
officiorum; non veriiate sed simulatione quesite.” And in the Pandects,(q) 
in speaking of a banker or cashier giving his accounts, it is said: ‘‘ Ubi exigztur 
argentarius rationes edere tunc punitur cum dolo malo non exhibit. Dolo 
malo autem non edit, et qui malitiose edidit et qui in totum non edit.” At 
common law, malice is a term of law importing directly wickedness, and 
excluding a just cause or excuse. Thus, Lord Coke, in his comment on the 
words, per malitiam, says: “If one be appealed of murder, and is found by 
verdict that he killed the party se defendendo, this shall not be said to be 
per malitiam, because he had a just cause.”(h) And where the statute 
speaks of a prisoner on his arraignment, standing mute of malice, the word 
clearly cannot be understood in its common acceptation of anger or desire, of 
revenge against another. Thus, where the 25 Hen. VIII. c. 3, says, that 
persons arraigned of petit treason, &c., standing ‘“‘ mute of malice or froward 
mind,” or challenging, &c., shall be excluded from clergy, the word malice, 
explained by the accompanying words, seems to signify a wickedness or fro- 
wardness of mind, in refusing to submit to the course of justice: in opposition 
to cases where some just cause may be assigned for the silence, as that it pro- 
ceeds from madness, or some other disability or distemper. And in the Statute 
21 Edw. I., De malefactoribus in parcis, trespassers are mentioned, who shall 
not yield themselves to the foresters, &ec., but “immo malitiam suam prose- 
quendo et continuando,” shall fly or stand upon their defence. And where 
the question of malice has arisen in cases of homicide, the matter for consider- 
ation has been, whether the act was done with or without just cause or excuse: 
so that it has been suggested, that what is usually called malice implied by 
law, would, perhaps, be expressed more intelligibly and familiarly to the under- 


(c) Wh. GC. L. §§ 930-950. (d) Kel. 127. — (e) De Nat. Deor. Lib. 3, s. 30. 
(f) De Offic. Lib. 3,8.18.  (g) Dig. Lib. 2, Tit. 13, Lex. 8. 
(h) 2 Inst. 384. 

809 


§$ 1009] LEGAL DEFINITIONS OF HOMICIDE, [BOOK VI. 


standing, if it were called malice in a legal sense. Malice, in its legal sense, 
denotes a wrongful act, done intentionally, or without just cause or excuse. 

§ 1008. Malice in this intent, may be considered under the following 
heads :— 

(a) Intent to kill. 

(b) Intent to do bodily harm.(7) 


(a.) Intent to Kill. 


§ 1009. This head admits of no question in its primary sense. Of course, 
where there is a deliberate intent to kill, unless it be in the discharge of a 
duty imposed by public authorities, the offence must be murder at common 
law.(j) And it should be observed that an intermediate provocation, imme- 
diately after the happening of which the offence occurred, forms no defence.(/) 
The reason of this is obvious, for if all that is necessary for a man to do to 
relieve himself from the guilt of murder is such provocation, there would 
surely not be a case of homicide without it. 

In a leading case on this point, the prisoner, with the deceased and another 
brother, and some neighbors, were drinking in a friendly manner at a public 
house, till, growing warm in liquor, but not intoxicated, the prisoner and 
deceased began in idle sport to pull and push each other about the room. 
They then wrestled—one fell; and soon afterwards they played at cudgel by 
agreement. All this time no token of anger appeared on either side, till the 
prisoner, in the cudgel play, gave the deceased a smart blow on the temple. 
The deceased thereupon grew angry, and, throwing away his cudgel, closed in 
with the prisoner, and they fought a short space in good earnest; but, the 
company interposing, they were soon parted. ‘The prisoner then quitted the 
room in anger, and when he got into the street was heard to say, ‘Damnation 
seize me if I do not fetch something and stick him;’’ and being reproved for 
using such expressions, he answered, ‘‘I’ll be damned to all eternity if I do 
not fetch something and run him through the body.’ The deceased and the 
rest of the company continued in the room where the affray happened; and in 
about half an hour the prisoner returned, having put off a thin, slight coat he 
had on when he quitted the room, and put on one of coarse, thick cloth. The 
door of the room being open into the street, the prisoner stood leaning against 
the door-post, his left hand in his bosom, and a cudgel in his right, looking in 
upon the company, but not speaking a word. The deceased seeing him in 
that posture, invited him in to the company; but the prisoner answered, “I 
will not come in.” ‘‘ Why will you not?” said the deceased. The prisoner 
replied, “‘Perhaps you will fall on me and beat me.’? The deceased assured 
him he would not; and added, ‘Besides, you think yourself as good a man as 
me at cudgel; perhaps you will play at cudgels with me.’”’ “I am not afraid 
to do so, if you will keep off your fists.” Upon these words the deceased got 
up and went towards the prisoner, who dropped the cudgel as the deceased 
was coming up to him. ‘'The deceased took the cudgel, and with it gave the 


(7) See Wharton on Hom. 39. (7) Wh. C. L. § 944, 
(k) Ibid.; Russell on Crimes, 515. | 


810 


es 


BOOK VI.] , MEANING OF TERM MALICE. [$ 1009 


prisoner two blows on the shoulder. The prisoner immediately put his right 
hand in his bosom, and drew out the blade of a tuck sword, erying, ‘“‘Damn 
you, stand off, or Pll stab you;”’ and immediately, without giving the deceased ~ 
time to step back, made a pass at him with the sword, but missed him. The 
deceased thereupon gave back a little, and the prisoner, shortening the sword 
in his hand, leaped forward towards the deceased, and stabbed him to the 
heart, and he instantly died. The judges unanimously agreed that there were 
in this case so many circumstances of deliberate malice and deep revenge on 
the defendant’s part, that his offence could not be less than wilful murder. 
He owned that he would fetch something and stick Aicm—to run him through 
the body. Whom did he mean by him? Every circumstance in the case 
showed that he meant his brother. He returned to the company, provided, to 
appearance, with an ordinary cudgel, as if he intended to try skill and man- 
hood a second time with that weapon; but the deadly weapon was all the 
while carefully concealed under his coat, which, most probably, he had changed 
for the purpose of concealing the weapon. He stood at the door, refusing to 
come nearer, but artfully drew on the discourse of the past quarrel; and as 
soon as he saw his brother disposed to engage a second time at cudgels, he 
dropped his cudgel, and betook him to the deadly weapon, which till that 
moment he had concealed. He did, indeed, bid his brother to stand off, but 
he gave him no opportunity of doing so before the first pass was made. His 
brother retreated before the second; but he advanced as fast, and took the 
revenge he had vowed. ‘The circumstance of the blows before the sword was 
produced, which probably occasioned the death, did not alter the case, nor did 
the preceding quarrel, because, all circumstances considered, he appeared to 
have returned with a deliberate resolution to take a deadly revenge for what 
had passed. (7) 

Malice can never or rarely be directly proved, and the evidence of it there- 
fore being circumstantial, any facts which go to afford an inference of its 
existence are admissible. But it would seem that the malice proved must be 
directed to the particular act for which the prisoner is tried, as otherwise the 
issue might become much encumbered. Thus it was held in Tennessee that, 
on a trial of an indictment for murder, evidence that the prisoner, a short time 
before the murder, had set fire to the house of the deceased in the night-time, 
was inadmissible for the purpose of proving that the prisoner had committed 
the murder ; where, however, there is established a settled purpose of revenge 
on the part of the prisoner, such evidence would seem to be admissible if it 
appeared to be one of the manifestations of such spirit. Hvidence that the 
prisoner had beaten his wife, and forced her to abandon the house and seek 
refuge under the protection of the deceased, has been held proper proof of 
malice prepense on the part of the prisoner. Malice of this kind, it is well 
stated by Mr. Greenleaf, may be shown from the circumstances attending the 
act—such as the deliberate selection and use of a lethal weapon, knowing it 
to be such; a preconcerted hostile meeting, whether in a regular duel with 
seconds, or in a street fight mutually agreed upon, or notified or threatened by 


(1) Wharton on Homicide, p. 40. 
811 


SuOseL] LEGAL DEFINITIONS OF MALICE. ; [BOOK VI. 


the prisoner; privily lying in wait; a previous quarrel or grudge; the prepa- 
ration of poison, or other means of doing great bodily harm or the like. (m) 


(b.) Intent to do Bodily Harm. 


§ 1010. At common law the intent to do bodily harm, followed up by 
homicide, constitutes murder; though such an offence falls in this country, in 
those States where the distinction exists, under the head of murder in the 
second degree. Homicides of this kind are numerous, and it is easy to sup- 
pose of homicide in a duel that may be so ranked, e. g. where the intention is 
to maim, and not to kill. The distinction in a case of this kind is undoubt- 
edly very delicate ; and where a statutory line must be drawn, it would perhaps 
be wiser to say that when the damage intended was such as would probably 


result in death, it is murder in the first degree, even though death may have 


been but incidental to the offender’s purpose. Although A. intends only to 
beat B. in anger, from preconceived malice, and happens to kill him, it will be 
no excuse that he did not intend all the mischief that followed; for what he 
did was malum in se, and he must be answerable for its consequences. He 
beat B. with an intention of doing him some bodily harm, and is therefore 
answerable for all the harm he did. So if a large stone be thrown at one with 
a deliberate intent.to hurt, though not to kill him, and by accident it kill him, 
or any other, it is murder. But the nature of the instrument, and the manner 
of using it as calculated to produce great bodily harm or not, will vary the 
offence in all such cases. In a more recent case it appeared that the deceased, 
being in liquor, had gone at night into a glass-house, and laid himself down 
upon a chest, and that while he was there asleep the prisoners covered and 
surrounded him with straw, and threw a shovel of hot cinders upon his belly, 
the consequence of which was that the straw ignited, and he was burnt to 
death. There was no evidence of express malice, but the conduct of the pri- 
soners indicated an entire recklessness of consequences, hardly consistent with 
anything short of design. Patterson, J., adverted to the fact of there being 
no evidence of express malice, but told the jury that if they believed the 
prisoners really intended to do any serious injury to the deceased, although 
not to kill him, it was murder; but if they believed their intention to have 
been only to frighten him in sport, it was manslaughter.(n) 

§ 1011. (2.) In reference to a third party when the blow falls on the de- 
ceased by mistake.—Where an injury, intended for one person, mortally affects 
another, as where a blow aimed at one person alights upon another, and kills 
him, the inquiry will be whether, if the blow had killed the person against 
whom it was aimed, the offence would have been murder or manslaughter. 
For, if a blow intended against A. and lighting upon B., arose from a sudden 
transport of passion, which, in case A. had died by it would have reduced the 
offence to manslaughter, the fact will admit of the same alleviation if it shall 
have caused the death of B.(0) And, on the same principle, A. having malice 
against B., strikes at and misses him, but kills C.; this is murder in A.: and 


(m) een on Homicide, p. 41. (n) See Wharton on Homicide, p. 42. 
(0) Fost. 262. 


812 


BOOK VI.] COLLATERAL MALICE. [$ 1011 


if it had been without malice under such circumstances that, if B. had died, it 
would have been manslaughter, the killing of C. also would have been but 
manslaughter.(p) Again, A. having malice against B., assaults him and kills 
C., the servant of B., who had come in aid of his master ; this is murder in A. ; 
for C. was justified in attacking A. in defence of his master who was thus 
assaulted. In another case, where A. gavea poisoned apple to B., intending to 
poison her, and B., ignorant of it, gave it to a child, who took it and died, this 
was held murder in A. but no offence in B. ; and this, though A., who was pre- 
sent at the time, endeavored to dissuade B. from giving it to the child.(q) So 
where Plummer and seven others opposed the king’s officers in the act of seiz- 
ing wool. One of those persons shot off a fusee and killed one of his own 
party. The court held, in giving judgment upon a special verdict, that, as the 
prisoner was upon an unlawful design, if he had in pursuance thereof dis- 
charged the fusee against any of the king’s officers that came to resist him in 
the prosecution of that design, and by accident had killed one of his own ac- 
complices, it would have been murder in him. Asif a man, out of malice to 
A., shoot at him, but miss him and kill B., it is no less a murder than if he had 
killed the person intended. And, again, where the prisoner had fired a loaded 
pistol at a person on horseback, and declared that he did so only with the in- 
tention to cause the horse to throw him, and the ball hit another person and 
killed him, it was held that the crime was murder. If a man have a sudden 
quarrel and fight with A., by which his passions are strongly excited, and 
while his passions are thus excited, he, without any real or supposed provoca- 
tion, kill B., who is an utter stranger to the whole affair, and has not inter- 
fered in the quarrel nor been in any way connected therewith, even in the 
party’s own suppositions, it will be murder. But where the prisoner having 
had a quarrel with his wife, and aimed a blow at her with an axe which fell on 
the head of his infant son then in her arms, by which it was instantly killed, 
it being shown that the prisoner was ignorant of his child’s position, and was 
at the time in the heat of blood, seeking to avenge himself on his wife for a 
supposed injury, it was held that as the case was to be considered as if the 
wife had been the victim, the same grade of homicide would attach to the 
killing of the child as it would have done to that of the wife, had she been 
killed. But in this, as in cases of malice prepense and express, if the blow in- 
tended for one would in law have amounted to manslaughter, it will still be 
the same, though by mistake or accident it kill another. Thus, in an old case, 
a quarrel arising between some soldiers and a number of keelmen at Sandgate, 
a Violent affray ensued, and one of the soldiers was very much beaten. The 
prisoner, a soldier who had before driven a part of the mob down the street, 
with his sword in his scabbard, on his return, seeing his comrades thus used, 
drew his sword and bid the mob stand clear, saying he would sweep the street ; 
and on their pressing on him he struck at them with the flat side, and as they 
fled pursued them.’ The other soldier in the mean time had got away, and 


(p) 1 Hale, 379, 439, 466 ; Dyer, 128 ; Bd. 111, 112, 117; Pult de Pace, 1246 ; Foot, 
261; 1 Hawk. C. 31, 542; State v. Cooper, 1 Green, N. J. R.; State v. Benton, 2 Dev. 
and Bat. 196. 

(q) 1 Hale, 230; 2 Plowden’s Com. 474. 


813 


§ 1012] LEGAL DEFINITIONS OF HOMICIDE. [BOOK VI. 


when the prisoner returned he asked whether they had murdered his comrade ; 
and being several times again assaulted by the mob, he brandished his sword 
and bid them keep off. At this time, the deceased, who from his dress might 
be mistaken for a keelman, was going along about five yards from the prisoner ; 
but before he passed, the prisoner went up to him and struck him on the head 
with his sword, of which he presently died. This was holden manslaughter ; 
it was not murder, because there was no previous provocation, and the blood 
was heated in the contest; nor was it self-defence, because there was no in- 
evitable necessity to excuse the killing in this manner. (7) 

A widow, finding that one of her sons had not prepared her dinner as she 
had directed him to do, began to scold him, upon which he made her some 
very impertinent answers, which put her in a passion, and she took up a small 
piece of iron used as a poker, intending to frighten him, and seeing she was 
very angry, he ran towards the door of the room, when she threw the poker 
at him, and it happened that the deceased was just coming in at the moment, 
and the iron struck him on the head and caused his death. Parker, J. A. J., 
said to the jury, “‘ No doubt this poor woman had no more intention of injur- 
ing this particular child than I have, but that makes no difference in the law. 
If a blow aimed at an individual unlawfully—and this was undoubtedly un- 
lawful, as an improper mode of correction—and strikes another and kills him, 
it is manslaughter; and there is no doubt if the child at whom the blow was 
aimed had been struck and died, it would have been manslaughter ; and so it 
is under the present circumstances.’’(s) 

Under this head may be classed the cases where medicine is administered or 
an operation performed with an intent to produce an abortion, and where the 
mother dies under the process. At common law this has been held to be mur- 
der. (¢) If there is mixed up in the offence an intent to do bodily harm to 
the mother, the same result follows.(w) In a case in Maine, it has been 
said, that as the general principle of law is that homicide, with an intent to 
commit a misdemeanor, is but manslaughter, so in this case, if the destruction 
of the fetus be but a misdemeanor, the offence is only manslaughter.(v) This, 
however, is not the received doctrine, (w) by which the offence is treated as 
murder, the destruction of an infant, en ventre sa mere, being, even at com- 
mon law, in some respect felonious, and the act in its nature malicious and 
deliberate, and necessarily attended with great danger to the person on whom 
it is practised. 

§ 1012. (8.) rom collateral malice.—Malice may be said to be collateral 
when it is directed to an object other than that of human life or limb ; as, for 
instance, when the object is to commit a felony or a misdemeanor, in the pur- 
suit of which human life is incidentally taken. At common law, when a party 
in the attempt to perpetrate a felony takes life, he is guilty of murder, though 
the taking of life was the result of mere accident—e.g., where he shoots a 
tame fowl with the intention of killing it, and the ball aimed at the fowl 


(r) Wharton on Hom. 43. (s) R. v. Couner, 1 C. & P. 438. 


(t) 1 Hale, 90; Com. v. Chauncy, 2 Ashmead, 227; Smith v. State, 3. Redding, 48 
(u) Ibid. (v) Smith v. State, 3 Redding, 48. 


(w) Wh. C. L. L. 3 ed. 537; 1 Hale, 90; Com. v. Chauncy, 1 Ashmead, 227. 
814 


BOOK VI.] MANSLAUGHTER. [$ 1014 


strikes a child and kills it. By statutes which obtain in most of the States 
this principle, so far as concerns the higher grade of felonies, has been defi- 
nitely established, it having been enacted that all murder committed in the 
perpetrations of, or the attempt to perpetrate any burglary, rape, robbery, or 
arson, shall be murder in the first degree. Where, at common law as well as 
under these statutes, the unlawful act to which death is incidental is a mere 
misdemeanor, the homicide is but manslaughter. Thus, if the attempt is to 
poach on another man’s premises for the purpose of shooting wild game, and 
a stranger is accidentally killed, this is but manslaughter; and so if death 
ensue in the prosecution of an unlawrul game. 


IT. MANSLAUGHTER 


§ 1013. Is the unlawful and felonious killing of another, without any malice 
either express or implied.(#) Manslaughter differs from murder in this, that, 
though the act which occasions the death be unlawful, or likely to be attended 
with bodily mischief, yet the malice either express or implied, which is the 
very essence of murder, is presumed to be wanting, the act being imputed to 
the infirmity of human nature; and the punishment is proportionately leni- 
ent.(y) It is no defence to an indictment for manslaughter that the homicide 
therein alleged appears by the evidence to have been committed with malice 
aforethought, and was therefore murder; but the defendant in such a case 
may notwithstanding be properly convicted of the offence of manslaughter. (z) 

Manslaughter at common law is of two kinds. Ist. Voluntary man- 
slaughter, which is the unlawful killing of another without malice, on sudden 
quarrel or in heat of passion. Where, upon sudden quarrel, two persons 
fight, and one of them kills the other, this is voluntary manslaughter, and so 
if they, upon such occasion, go out to fight in a field; for this is one con- 
tinued act of passion. So, also, if a man be greatly provoked by any gross 
indignity, and immediately kills his aggressor, it is voluntary manslaughter, 
and not excusable homicide, not being se defendendo ; neither is it murder, for 
there is no previous malice. In these and such like cases, the law, kindly 
appreciating the infirmities of human nature, extenuates the offence committed, 
and mercifully hesitates to put on the same footing of guilt, the cool delibe- 
rate act and the result of hasty passion. 

§ 1014. 2d. Involuntary manslaughter, where a man doing an unlawful 
act, not amounting to felony, by accident kills another. It differs from homi- 
cide excusable by misadventure, in this: that misadventure always happens in 
the prosecution of an lawful act, but this species of manslaughter in the 
prosecution of an unlawful one. Where a person does an act lawful in itself, 
but in an unlawful manner, this excepts the killing from homicide excusable 


(x) 1 Hale, 449; 1 Hawk. c. 30, s.3; Parker J., Selfridge’s Trial, 158; State v. 
Norris, 1 Hay. 429. 

(y) Ex parte Taylor, 5 Carver, 51; King v. Com. 2 Ma. Cas. 78; Com. v. Bob, 4 
*Dall. 125; State v. Lorkey, 2 Kell. 8 C. Dig. 104; Penn v. Levin, Addison, 279; State 
v. Travers, 2 Wheel. C. C. 506; Com. v. Mitchell, 1 Va. Cas. 716; Parker, J., Self- 
-ridge’s Trial, 158; 1 Hale, 449, 450,466; 3 Inst. 55; 1 Hawk. c. 30, s. 2, vide R. v. 
Mawegridge, Kel. 124; Fost. 290, vide Lord Cornwallis’ case, Dom. Proc. 1678; 2 St. 
Tr. 730. (z) Com. v. McPike, 3 Cush. 18. 

815 


§$ 1015] GENERAL DEFINITIONS OF HOMICIDE. [BOOK VI. 


per infortunium and makes it involuntary manslaughter. In general where 
an involuntary killing happens in consequence of an unlawful act, it will be 
either murder, or manslaughter, according to the nature of the act which occa- 
sioned it: if it be in prosecution of a felonious intent, or in its consequences 
naturally tended to bloodshed, it will be murder; but if no more was intended 
than a mere civil trespass, it is manslaughter. (a) 

§ 1015. Ill. ExcusaBLe HOMICIDE is of two kinds: Ist. Where a man 
doing a lawful act, without any intention to hurt, by accident kills another ; 
as for instance, where a man is hunting in a park, and unintentionally kills a 
person concealed. This is called homicide per infortunium, or by misadven- 
ture. 2d. Se defendendo or in self-defence, which exists (to adopt the defini- 
tion of Mr. Greenleaf ),(b) where one is assaulted upon a sudden affray, and 
in the defence of his person, where certain and immediate suffering would be 
the consequence of waiting for the assistance of the law, and where in such 
case, there being no other means of escape, he kills the assailant. To reduce 
homicide in self-defence to this degree, it must be shown that the slayer was 
closely pressed by the other party, and retreated as far as he conveniently or 
safely could, in good faith, with the honest intent to avoid the violence of the 
assault. The jury, as will be presently seen more fully, must be satisfied that 
unless he had killed the assailant, he was in imminent and manifest danger of 
either losing his own life, or of suffering enormous bodily harm.(¢c) By the 
older text-writers, this species of homicide is sometimes called chance medley, 
or chaud medly, words of nearly the same import ; and closely borders upon 
manslaughter. In this case, as well as that of manslaughter, the theory is, 
that passion has kindled on each side, and that blows have passed. The dis- 
tinction, however, is that in manslaughter, it must appear that either the par- 
ties were actually in mutual combat when the mortal stroke was given, or that 
the slayer was not at that time in imminent danger of death; but that in 
homicide excusable in self-defence, it must appear, either that the slayer had 
not begun the fight, or that, having begun, he endeavored to decline any fur- 
ther struggle, and afterward, being closely pressed by his antagonist, he killed 
him, to avoid his own destruction.(d) The same right of self-defence is 
extended to the relations of master and servant, parent and child, and husband 
and wife ; and to those cases where homicide is unavoidably committed in the de- 
fence of the possession of one’s dwelling-house, against a trespasser, who, having 
entered, cannot be put out otherwise than by force ; and where no force is used, 
and where no instrument or mode is employed than is necessary and proper for 
that purpose. Under the same general head of excusable homicide may also 
be enumerated that class of cases, where two persons are reduced to the alter- 
native, that one or the other or both must certainly perish, as, where two 


(a) 4 Bl. Com. 191. (b) 3 Greenleaf Ev. § 116. 
(c) Bl. Com. 182; 1 Russ. on Crimes, 666, 661; Whart. Am. Crim. Law, § 1019, 
&c. Qui cum, aliter tueri se non possunt, damni culpam dederint, innoxii sunt. Vim 
enim vi defendere omnes leges omniaque jura, permittant.—Dig. lib. 9, tit. 2, 1. 45, 
§ 4. Is, qui aggressorem vel quemcunque alterum in dubio vite discrimine constitu-- 
tus occiderit, nullam ob id factum calumniam meruere debet.—Cod. lib. 9, tit. 16, 1. 2. 
(d) 4 Bl. Com. 184; 1 Russ. on Crimes, 661; State v Hill, 4 Dev. & Batt. 491. 


816 


BOOK VI-4 MURDER IN THE SECOND DEGREE. [$ 1018 


shipwrecked persons are on one plank which will not hold them both, and one 
thrust the other from it, so that he is drowned, the survivor is excused. 

§ 1016. The distinction, in result, between justifiable and excusable homi- 
cide is now practically exploded. In former times, in the latter case, as the 
law presumed that the slayer was not wholly free from blame, he was punished, 
at least by forfeiture of goods. But in this country, this rule is not known 
ever to have been recognized; it having been the uniform practice here, as it 
now is in England, where the grade does not reach manslaughter, for thejury, 
under the direction of the court, to acquit. 

§ 1017. IV. JUSTIFIABLE HOMICIDE(eé) is that which is committed either, 
Ist. By unavoidable necessity, without any will, intention, or desire, or any 
inadvertence or negligence in the party killing, and, therefore, without blame; 
such as, by an officer, executing a criminal, pursuant to the death-warrant, and 
in strict conformity to the law in every particular; or, 2dly. For the advance- 
ment of public justice; as, where an officer in due execution of his office, kills 
a person who assaults and resists him; or where a private person or officer 
attempts to arrest a man charged with felony and is resisted, and in the 
endeavor to take him, kills him; or if a felon flee from justice, and in the pur- 
suit he be killed, where he cannot otherwise be taken; or, if there be a riot, 
or a rebellious assembly, and the officers or their assistants, in dispersing the 
mob, kill some of them, where the riot cannot be otherwise suppressed ; or, if 
prisoners in jail, or going to jail, assault or resist the officers, or their aids, in 
repelling force by force, kill the party resisting ; or, 3dly. For the prevention 
of any atrocious crime, attempted to be committed by force ; such as murder, 
robbery, house-breaking in the night time, rape, mayhem, or any other act of 
felony against the person.(f) But in such cases, the attempt must not be 
merely suspected, but apparent, and the danger must be imminent, and the 
opposing force or resistance necessary to avert the danger or to defeat the 
attempt. (q) 


V. MURDER IN THE SECOND DEGREE. 


§ 1018. As already observed, statutes exist in most of the United States, 
dividing murder as it stood at common law into two degrees, to the first of” 
which is attached the penalty of death, and to the second imprisonment. The 
origin of this distinction was the reluctance felt to attach death to any other 


(e) United States v. Wiltberger, 3 Washburn, 515. And see State v. Rutherford, 1 — 
Hawks. 457; State v. Roane, 2 Dev. 58. F 

(f) 4 Bl. Com. 182; 1 Russ. on Crimes, 657-660. 

(g) The above definition is taken from Mr. Greenleaf (3 Greenl. on Evid. 315), 
who refers to 4 Bl. Com. 178-180 ; 1 Russ. on Crimes, 660; Whart. Am. Crim. Law, 
§ 1026, &. The Roman civil law recognized the same principles. Qui latronem. 
(insidiatorem) occederit, non tenetur, utique sialiter periculum effugere non protest.— 
Inst. lib. 4, tit. 3, § 2. Furem nocturnum, si quis occiderit, ita demum impune feret, 
si parcere ei sine periculo suo non potuit.—Dig. lib. 48, tit. 8,1. 9. Quistuprum sibi 
vel suis per vim inferentem occidit, dimmittendum.—Dig. lib. 48, tit. 8,1.1,§4. Si 
quis percussorem ad se venientem gladio repulerit, non ut homicida tenetur; quia 
defensor proprie salutis in nullo pecasse videtur.—Cod. lib. 9, tit. 16,1. 3. In the 
cases mentioned in the text, if the homicide is committed with undue precipitancy, or 
the unjustifiable use of a deadly weapon, the slayer will be culpable.—See Alison’s 
Crim. Law of Scotland, p. 100; Id. 132-139. 


52 817 


§ 1023] GENERAL DEFINITIONS OF HOMICIDE, [BOOK VI. 


offences than those in which death was intended. The Lex Talionis, as well 
as the necessities of human society, would require, it was thought, a continuance 
of capital punishment in cases of deliberate homicide; but it seemed hard, as 
well as unnecessary, to take the life of the offender where the offence for which 
he was tried was one which he had never premeditated. To obviate these 
difficulties the statutes were passed, which, while they differ among themselves 
in phraseology, unite in the general principle that where murder is intentional, 
or where it is committed in the perpetration or the attempt to perpetrate any 
burglary, arson, rape, or robbery, or where it is by poison, it is murder in the 
first degree; when not falling under either of these heads, murder in the 
second degree. | 

§ 1019. By judicial interpretation the following propositions may be con- 
sidered as established :— 

Ast. A specific intent to take life is the distinguishing test by which murder 
in the first degree may be determined. Where it exists the capital offence is — 
- consummated. Where it is wanting, no matter how long may have been the 
premeditation, how decided the wilfulness, or how pointed the malice, it is but 
murder in the second degree. Thus, if a man designedly beat another to a 
jelly, from which death results, this is but murder in the second degree, if it 
appear that the intent was merely to inflict bodily harm. And so if in a riot, 
in the wildness of collision, fire-arms are discharged with intent merely to maim 
an antagonist, or to redress some imaginary wrong, and life is taken, it is but 
murder in the second degree.(h) 

§ 1020. 2d. Homicide by poison is not necessarily murder in the first 
degree. The statutes, it should be recollected, use the term, all ‘ murder,” 
(not all “‘ homicide,’’) by poison, &c., is murder in the first degree. Hence, 
if the poisoning would have been manslaughter or misadventure at common 
law, it will not be raised to murder in the first degree by the mere force of the 
statute. Thus, if poison be laid for the purpose of unlawfully killing game, or 
for the purpose of effecting any other misdemeanor, or if a poisonous drug be 
negligently administered by a quack, and death result, this would be man- 
slaughter at common law; and not being “ murder,’ is not affected by the 
statute which applies to ‘‘murder’’ alone.(z) Hence, a verdict of murder in 
the second degree will not be disturbed, even though it appear that the case 
was one of deliberate poisoning. (7) 

§ 1021. 38d. When the murder is collateral to any arson, rape, robbery, 
or burglary,—and in Tennessee, larceny,—it is necessarily murder in the first 
degree. 

§ 1022. 4th. When in the pursuit of the life of A., B. is unintentionally 
killed, the general opinion is, this is murder in the second degree, though as 
to this there has been some doubt.(X) 

§ 1023. 5th. The specific intent to take life, which is the distinguishing 
feature of murder in the first degree, may be inferred from the same circum- 
stances from which design in other cases is presumed. If one man shoot 


(h) Wharton on Hom. 386. (2) Ibid. 359. 
(7) Ibid. 359, 360. (k) Ibid. 362, 463. 


818 


BOOK VI.] MURDER IN THE SECOND DEGREE. [$ 1024 


another through the head with a musket or pistol ball—if he stab him in a 
vital part with-a sword or dagger—if he cleave his skull with an axe or the 
like—it is almost impossible for a reflecting and intelligent mind to come to 
any other conclusion than that the perpetrators of any such acts of deadly 
violence intended to kill. Where the defendant deliberately procured a butcher’s 
knife, and sharpened it for the avowed purpose of killing the deceased ; where 
he concealed a dirk in his breast, stating shortly before the attack that he knew 
where the seat of life was; where he thrust a handspike deeply into the fore- 
head of the deceased; the presumption was held to exist that the killing was 
wilful. But it is not necessary, to warrant a conviction of murder in the first 
degree, that the instrument should be such as would necessarily produce death. 
Thus, where the weapon of death was a club, not so thick as an axe-handle, 
the jury, under the charge of the court, rendered a verdict of murder in the first 
degree, it appearing that the blow was induced by a deliberate intention to take 
life. The same presumption of intention is drawn with still greater strength 
from the declared purpose of the defendant, which is always admissible in evi- 
dence for such a purpose. Thus, where the prisoner, a negro, said he intended 
‘“‘to lay for the deceased, if he froze, the next Saturday night,”’ and where the 
homicide took place that night; where it was said, ‘“‘I am determined to kill 
the man who injured me;”’ where the prisoner declared, the day before the 
murder, that he would certainly shoot the deceased; where, in another case, 
the language was, ‘‘I will split down any fellow that is saucy ;’’ where the 
prisoner rushed rapidly to the deceased, and aimed at a vital part; where a 
grave had been prepared a short time before the homicide, though the deceased 
was not ultimately placed in it, the whole plan of action being changed; in 
each of these cases it was held murder in the first degree. 


B.—Corpus DE.Lictr.(/) 


§ 1024. I. THatT A DEATH TOOK PLACE. 

‘“‘T would never,”’ said Lord Hale, “convict any person of murder or man- 
slaughter, unless the fact were proved to be done, or at least the body found 
dead.”’(m) ‘The civilians are no less emphatic. ‘ Diligenter cavendum est 
judici, ne supplicium preecipitet, antequam de crimine consteterit.”’(n) ‘De 
corpore interfecti necesse est ut constet.”(o) Numerous cases attest the 
necessity of this check. Thus we are told of a Frenchman who was convicted 
on his own confession, of the murder of a widow, who, two years afterwards, 
returned to her home, and had never received any injury whatever. And as 
Bunyan tells us: ‘‘Since you are entered upon stories, I also will tell you 
one, the which, though I heard not with my own ears, yet my author I dare 
believe. It is concerning one old Tod that was hanged about twenty years 
ago, or more, at Hartford, for being a thief. The story is this: At a Sum- 
mer Assize, holden at Hartford, while the judge was sitting upon the bench, 


(1) See as to Identification of Dead Body, ante, § 473, &c. 
(m) 2 Hale, P. C. 290, and see Tyner v. State, 5 Humph. 383. 
(n) Matth. de Crim. in Dig. lib. 48, tit. 16, ch. 1. 

(0) Matth. Probat. ch. 1, n. 4, p. 9. 


819 


§ 1025] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


comes this old Zod into the court, clothed in a green suit, with his leathern 
girdle in his hand, his bosom open, and all in a dung sweat, as if he had run 
for his life; and being come in he spake aloud as follows: My Lord, said he, 
here is the veryest rogue that breathes upon the face of the earth; I have 
been a thief from a child; when I was but a little one, I gave myself to rob 
orchards, and to do other such like wicked things, and I have continued a 
thief ever since. My Lord, there has not been a robbery committed this 
many years, within so many miles of this place, but I have either been at 
it, or privy to wt. The judge thought the fellow was mad; but after some 
conference with some of the justices, they agreed to indict him, and so they 
did, of several felonious actions; to all of which he heartily confessed guilty, 
and so was hanged with his wife at the same time.” And yet, in this case, 
the guilt, if not imaginary in fact, was so in law, so far as concerned all the 
purposes of the trial. 

§ 1025. A case occurred at Ratisbon, in 1849,(p) of which the following 
is a brief abstract: A girl 20 years of age was arrested on the supposition 
that she had committed infanticide. Being brought before the examining 
magistrate, a few days after the alleged commission of the crime, she made 
the following statement: “I was a domestic in the house of the brewer L., 
but was dismissed from his service on account of being far gone in pregnancy, 
and near my confinement. After returning to my home in the country, I came 
back to the town to get my clothes. But on the way, as I came near the 
bridge, I felt severe pains, and soon became sure that labor had commenced. 
My situation was distressing; I was entirely alone and helpless. Meanwhile 
it became dark, the pains became more and more severe, and about midnight 
I was delivered of a boy. The child was living when it came into the world, 
for it cried, and when I put my finger in its mouth it sucked ; in truth, at first, 
I had great joy over the child; soon, however, I could not bear to look at it: 
the fear of shame and exposure, and the thought that perhaps I would never 
be able again to obtain a situation, got the better of me; I ran, without 
further hesitation to the bridge, with the child in my arms, and threw it over 
into the deepest part of the river, where it soon disappeared.”’ She afterwards 
gave still more minute details, relative to her pregnancy and the birth of the 
child, all of which were perfectly consistent and natural.. Upon the physical 
examination (which is directed by the Bavarian penal code), it was discovered 
that she had not been pregnant! She was taken to the hospital and leeches 
freely applied to her head, under which treatment she soon recovered her 
reason and her usual bodily health. Very probably the delusion might have 
become a fixed one, had this rational treatment not been adopted at the proper 


time. (q) 


(p) Henke’s Zeitschrift, E. H. 41. 

(q) See ante, § 473, &. Iam indebted to Mr. Wm. B. Reed for the following note : 
In the case of Margaret Shreves, tried for infanticide in the Oyer and Terminer of 
Philadelphia, in October, 1855, there was a striking illustration of the rule as to the 
corpus delicti, and of the necessity of accurate observation on the part of the coroner 
on the inspection of doubtful remains. The daughter of the prisoner was delivered of 
a female illegitimate child on 7th June, at 10 A.M. The infant was handed to the 
grandmother (the prisoner) on its birth. It was neither washed nor dressed. At 6 

0 


BOOK VI.] PRODUCTION OF BODY OF DECEASED. [$ 1026 


§ 1026. An equally singular case in this country is that of two brothers, 
named Boorns, who, on being charged with the murder of another, were con- 
victed and sentenced to death, chiefly on their admissions, but were fortunately 
relieved from execution by the reappearance of their alleged victim. To the 
same effect is a case in Illinois, in 1841, where three brothers, named Trailor, 
were arrested on the charge of murdering a man named Fisher, who, when 
last seen, had been in their company. Strong circumstantial evidence was 
produced, showing the traces of a death struggle, where the homicide was 
alleged to have been committed; and the case was fortified by expressions 
alleged to have been subsequently used by one of the brothers as to his having 
become legatee of the deceased’s property. The examination had scarcely 
finished before one of the three defendants made a confession, detailing circum- 
stantially the whole transaction, showing the previous combination, and ending 
with a direct statement, under oath, of the homicide. ‘To the amazement of 
the whole country, however, the deceased made his appearance in just time 
enough to intercept a conviction; and the only way of accounting for the 
confession which had been produced, was, that the party who made it, in the 
desperation of impending conviction, took this method of cutting short sus- 
pense.’’(7r) 


P. M., the prisoner was seen in the street at some distance from her home with the 
infant, still undressed, wrapped in a shawl. It was raining heavily. The child was 
blue, and moaned, making a noise as ifinaspasm. The prisoner said laudanum had 
been given, which was proved to be false. At a late hour the prisoner was again seen 
with the child alive but moaning. She tried to leave it at the Foster Home, but was 
refused. The child was never again seen alive. Two weeks afterwards, the conduct 
of the prisoner being in the mean time very mysterious, and she being detected in 
many falsehoods, on the 14th, the body of a female new-born infant was found in the 
prisoner’s privy, very much decomposed. The identity of the remains was in ques- 
tion. The attending physician testified he had at the delivery tied the cord with 
common sewing thread. The string around the cord of the infant found in the privy 
was said to resemble thick twine rather than thread, but there was difference of opin- 
ion about it. It may have swelled and altered by the action of liquid. The produc- 
tion of the string would have determined this, but this the coroner failed to preserve. 
The court (Thompson, P. J.) held it necessary to establish—l. The identity of the 
remains beyond doubt. 2. That the infant had not died accidentally, possibly by 
neglect, and was not merely concealed in the privy. The jury properly acquitted the 
prisoner. Here no element of proof as to the corpus delicti was clear. For other 
cases, see post, § 1274 et seq. 

(r) In the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, for July 4, 1860, appeared the following 
very curious communication in reference to this case :— 

Messrs. Eprrors: An article in your issue of the 2d inst., from the Cleveland Plain- 
dealer, entitled, ‘“‘False Personation at a Critical Moment,” attracted my attention. 
It purports to be a confession of a notorious counterfeiter, by the name of Boorn, that 
he killed a man by the name of Cobley, forty years ago, in Vermont, and escaped by 
producing a man from New Jersey so much resembling Cobley as to induce the belief 
that he was the very man, and so cleared him from the gallows, and let him and his 
brother go free. 

Perhaps I can cast some light upon this most singular transaction. More than forty 
years since, a deranged man came to my father’s house, near Tuckerton, New Jersey, 
hungry, ragged, and dirty. He was cared for during the night. He said that he had 
been murdered in Vermont, and never would return there again. It was winter, and 
extremely cold. He walked across the bay on the ice, and lounged about the neigh- 
borhood for weeks ; said his name was Russell Colvin, and his people lived in Ver- 
mont. He travelled up shore a few miles above Toms River, to the house of a Mr. 
Polhamus. The family so pitied him as to give him a home with them during the 
balance of his life. I have been there several times, and always have seen him at- 
tending to pigs and poultry about the farm. A number of years after he came there— 
say some fifteen years or less, I can’t recollect—two men were tried, I think it was in 


821 


§ 1027] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


§ 1027. To the general rule, however, two qualifications may be recognized. 
In the first place, when the decease is proved by eye witnesses, inspection of 


Burlington, Vermont, for the murder of this same man. One was found guilty of 
murder in the first degree, and sentenced to be hanged; the other was sentenced to 
imprisonment for life. 
A lawyer, connected with the trial, deemed the case a most singular one, and inserted 
a notice in the paper inquiring if any one knew the said Russell Colvin, giving withal a 
description of the man. This caught the eye of a brother of Mr. Polhamus, at whose 
house the man Colvin was living. He forthwith wrote to said lawyer, detailing the 
above facts. Polhamus and the lawyer were soon on the way to New Jersey to see 
the murdered man. They found him there, and Colvin knew the lawyer, and called 
him by name at first sight. After some persuasion, his reluctance to go to Vermont 
was overcome, and all three started north. When they arrived in Burlington, the 
court-house was soon filled with an excited community, all anxious to see the dead 
man. Officers were soon collected, the prisoners were brought in, and they, as well as 
the community, recognized Colvin at once. The prisoners were discharged of course. 
Colvin’s wife and two sons came to see him, and used every endeavor to induce him 
to go home and remain with them. All entreaty proved useless and vain; return to 
New Jersey he would and did, and lived many years after at the house of Mr. Polhamus. 
A pamphlet was published of the trial and all the facts therein stated, which I was 
reading one evening at the house of Mr. Polhamus, and in the presence of Mr. Colvin. 
He muttered all the time I was reading, until I had to lay it aside, as he was getting 
angry at the sight of it. Mrs. Polhamus said the sight of the book always enraged 


him. 
x x % % y= x x % % 


A Newspaper Account of the Affair.—Mr. Barna Boorn, and his aged partner, were 
respectable inhabitants of Manchester, in the State of Vermont. They were the pa- 
rents ef a son and two daughters, beside the unhappy Stephen and Jesse, who figure 
in the story we are about to narrate. 

Sally, one of the daughters, became the mother of several children, all of whom 
were dispersed among their relatives, owing to the mental derangement of their father, 
which rendered him incapable of attending to his family concerns, and of providing 
for them a necessary support. 

Mr. Colvin was in the habit of frequently absenting himself, without giving any 
previous information, and rambling in various parts of the country. At one time he 
was absent as long as nine or ten months, after which he was found in the State of 
Rhode Island. 

About eleven years after his marriage to Miss Boorn, he was again missing; which 
at the time caused little or no alarm, as it was expected that he would return as on 
former occasions. But after a lapse of several years, nothing having been heard of 
him, surmises were circulated that he had been murdered; and suspicion rested upon 
his brothers-in-law, Stephen and Jesse Boorn, as his murderers. This suspicion was 
created by a reference to the frequent altercations that had taken place between Col- 
vin and the Boorns previous to the disappearance of the former, and to some unguarded 
expression of the latter afterwards, intimating that Colvin was dead, and by their oc- 
casionally showing some signs of compunction. 

A Mr. Boorn, uncle to Stephen and Jesse, a gentleman of respectability and unim- 
peachable character, dreamed that Russel Colvin came to his bedside and told him 
that he had been murdered, and he must follow him and he would lead him to the 
spot where he was buried. This was repeated three times. The deposit was a place 
talked of previous to the dream, which was where a house had formerly stood, and 
under it was a hole about four feet square, which was made for the purpose of bury- 
ing potatoes, and then filled up. This pit was opened, and nothing discovered but a 
large knife, a penknife, and a button. Mrs. Colvin, anterior to their being presented 
to her, described them accurately, and on seeing them, said they belonged to her hus- 
band, excepting the small knife. 

A lad, walking from Mr. Barna Boorn’s, a small distance, with his dog, a hollow 
stump standing near the path engaged the notice of the spaniel, which ran to the place 
and back again several times, lifting up his feet on the boy, with whining notes, as 
though to draw the attention of his little master to the place, which had the effect. A 
cluster of bones were drawn from the roots of the stump by the dog’s paws. Further 
examination was made, and in the cavity of the stump were found two toe-nails, to 
appearance belonging to a human foot; others were discovered in a crumbled state, 
which to appearance had passed through the fire. It was now concluded by many 
that some fragments of the body of Russel Colvin were found. The cluster of bones 
were brought before the Court of Inquiry. They were examined by a number of phy- 


822 


BOOK VI. | PRODUCTION OF BODY OF DECEASED. [$ 1027 


the body is unnecessary. Thus, in a case in England, the prisoner, a seaman 
on board of the ship Holus, was charged with the murder of his captain. 


Ba A EE ee ee ee eee ee ee eee eee 


sicians, who thought them to be human; one of the profession, however, thought 
otherwise. A Mr. Salisbury, about forty years previous, had his leg amputated, which 
was buried at the distance of four or*five miles. The limb was dug up, and, by com- 
paring, it was universally determined that the bones were not human. However, it 
was clear that the nails were human, and so appeared to all beholders. The bones 
were in a degree pulverized, but some pieces were in a tolerable state of preservation. 
Suspicions were excited that the body was burnt, and some part not consumed cast 
into the stump, and other bones put among them for deception. Sometime after the 
departure of Colvin, a barn belonging to Mr. Barna Boorn was consumed by fire, acci- 
dentally ; it was conjectured that the body was taken up and concealed under the 
barn, and mostly consumed. About that time a log heap was burnt by the Boorns, 
near the place where the body was supposed to be deposited ; it was thought by some 
that it was consumed there. . 

The subject occupied the attention of almost every mind in the neighborhood. 

Previous to the general excitement, Stephen Boorn, with his family, moved to Den- 
mark, County of Lewis, in the State of New York, about two hundred miles from the 
place of his nativity, where they were comfortably settled ; while Jesse remained in 
Manchester, where he was arrested and frequently brought before a Court of Inquiry. 
He at first boldly asserted his innocence; but, after several days’ confinement, and 
after every art made use of to induce him to criminate himself and his brother, and 
being told that a confession would probably be the means of obtaining his liberty, as 
strange and unaccountable as it may appear, he did confess that his brother Stephen 
had told him that he (Stephen) had given: Colvin a blow, and laid him aside where 
no one could find him. Upon this, the authority issued a warrant to apprehend Ste- 
phen. Capt. Truman Hill, grand juryman for the town of Manchester, Squire Ray- 
mond, and Mr. R. Anderson, set out for Denmark, and arrived there in three days. 
They called on Mr. Eleazer 8. Sylvester, innkeeper, who, in the night, together with a 
Mr. Orange Clark and Mr. Hooper, belonging to the town, accompanied them to the 
house of the supposed criminal. Mr. Clark went in first, and began some conversation 
about temporal concerns ; the others surrounded the house, and he was easily taken. 
The surprise and distress of Mrs. Boorn on this occasion are not easily described ; they 
excited the compassion of those who had come to take away her husband, and they 
made her some presents. The prisoner was put in irons and brought to Manchester. 
He peremptorily asserted his innocence, and declared that he knew nothing about the 
murder of his brother-in-law. The prisoners were kept apart for a time, and assigned 
to separate cells. Nothing material transpired, and they were afterwards confined in 
one room. 

Stephen denied the evidence brought against him by Jesse, and treated him with 
severity. Both the prisoners were repeatedly admonished to pay the strictest regard 
to truth. Many days were taken up in public examinations of the reputed criminals. 
Circumstantial evidence was brought forward, which was much against them, and 
they were bound over to await their trial at the sitting of the Supreme Court, to be 
held at Manchester on the third Tuesday of September, 1819. 

Jesse Boorn, after an interview with his brother, denied that Stephen ever told him 
that he killed Colvin, and that what he reported about him was false. Forsome time 
they both continued to assert their innocence; but being told that they would un- 
doubtedly be convicted upon the testimony already against them, and hopes of pardon 
being held out if they would confess the crime, at last Stephen wrote a statement of 
what he said were facts, in which he acknowledged he killed Colvin, deposited him in 
the place where the knife and button were found; that he took the bones from that 
place and put them under his father’s barn, which was soon after burned, and the 
body principally consumed. 

A person in jail with them for perjury, testified to a full confession of the murder, 
made to him by Stephen and Jesse, and it was so artfully framed, so corroborated by 
other facts, that it had great weight with the court and jury, though it was wholly 
false. But he had his end answered—he got bail by this means, and went off. 

During the interval, the prisoners were frequently visited by the Rev. Mr. Haynes, 
in his official capacity, but they did not discover any symptoms of compunction, per- 
sisting in declaring their innocence, with appeals to heaven. Stephen particularly, at 
times, appeared absorbed in passion and impatience. One day Mr. Haynes introduced 
the example of Christ under suffering as a pattern worthy of imitation. He exclaimed, 
“J am as innocent as Jesus Ghrist!” for which extravagant expression he was re- 
proved. He replied, “I don’t mean that Iam as guiltless as he was; I know lama 
great sinner; but I am as innocent of killing Colvin as he was.” The court sat in 


823 


g 1027] CORPUS DELICTI, [BOOK VI. 


The first count of the indictment alleged the murder to have been committed 
by a blow from a large piece of wood, and the second by throwing the de- 
ceased into the sea. It appeared in evidence that, while the ship was lying 
off the coast of Africa, where there were several other vessels near, the priso- 
ner was seen one night to take the captain up in his arms and throw him into 
the sea, after which he was never seen or heard of; but that near the place on 
the deck where the captain was seen, was found a billet of wood, and the deck 
and part of the prisoner’s dress were stained: with blood. On this, it was ob- 
jected by the prisoner’s counsel that the corpus delictt was not proved, as the 


September, and a judicious and impressive charge was given to the grand jury by his 
honor Judge Doolittle, and a bill of indictment was presented against Stephen and 
Jesse Boorn ; but as it was not a full court, the trial could not commenée. 

The court was accordingly adjourned to the 26th of October, 1819. It was with 
much difficulty that a jury was obtained. 

.The court ruled that Stephen and Jesse Boorn should be jointly tried for the murder 
of Russel Colvin. 

About fifty witnesses were successively examined, but they were only corroborative 
. of each other, all tending to prove the leading facts, and too voluminous for this brief 
sketch. 

The jury retired, and within about one hour returned, and, in compliance with a 
request of Mr. Skinner, they were severally inquired of whether they had agreed upon 
a verdict, and each agreed that they had found both of the prisoners guilty of the 
murder charged against them. The verdict was then publicly read by the clerk. 
After a short recess his honor Judge Chase pronounced the sentence, that the priso- 
ners be remanded back to prison, and that, on the 28th day of January, between the 
hours of 10 and 2 o’clock, they should be hung by the neck until they were dead ! 

Mr. Taber Chadwick, of Shrewsbury, Monmouth County, N. J., brother-in-law of 
Mr. William Polhamus, of Dover, in the same State, where Colvin had lived ever since 
April, 1813, seeing the account of the trial of the Boorns at Manchester, wrote that 
Colvin was still alive, and with his brother-in-law, Polhamus, in Dover, about forty 
miles from Shrewsbury. When the letter came to town, every one was struck with 
consternation. A few partly believed, but the main doubted. 

“Tt cannot be that Colvin is alive,” was the general cry. Mr. Chadwick’s letter 
was carried to the prison and read to Stephen; the news was so overwhelming that, 
to use his own language, “nature could scarcely sustain the shock ;” but as there was 
some doubt as to the truth of this report, it tended to prevent an immediate dissolu- 
tion. He observed that he “ believed had Colvin then made his appearance, it would 
have caused immediate death ; even now a faintness was created that was painful to 
endure.” Soon a letter was received from New York, stating that the man who was 
supposed to be murdered was probably still alive. 

Mr. Whelply, formerly of Manchester, and who was intimately acquainted with 
Colvin, had actually gone to New Jersey in quest of him. Thus there was increasing 
evidence in confirmation of the letter. As soon as Mr. Whelply had returned to New 
York, he immediately wrote that he “had Colvin with him.” A New York paper an- 
nounced his arrival also, and that he would soon set out for Vermont. Notwithstand- 
ing all this, many gave no credit to the report, but considered it a mere deception. 
Large bets were made. Colvin was unwilling to return to Vermont with Mr. Whelply, 
who was obliged to have recourse to stratagem. A young woman of Colvin’s acquaint- 
ance agreed to accompany him, pretending that she only designed a visit to New York. 
While there she was missing, which excited some uneasiness in the mind of the exile. 

While staying a few days at New York, to prevent his returning, Mr. Whelply told 
him there were British men-of-war lying in the harbor, and unless he kept within 
doors he would be kidnapped. This had the desired effect. Colvin, when he set out 
for Manchester, concluded that he was on his way home to New Jersey, and never per- 
ceived the deception until he came to Bennington, where he arrived on the 22d of 
December, and saw many people with whom he had formerly been acquainted, which 
filled him with surprise. 

The county court being then in session, all were filled with astonishment and sur- 
prise. The court suspended business for some hours, to feed upon one who, in a sense, 
had been dead and was alive again. 

Stephen related the facts amid great excitement and rejoicing, and Jesse was soon 
at liberty. 


824 


BOOK VI.] PRODUCTION OF BODY OF DECEASED. [§ 1029 


captain might have been taken up by some of the neighboring vessels ; but the 
court, although they admitted the general rule of law, left it to the jury to say, 
upon the evidence, whether the deceased was not killed before the body was 
east into the sea, and the jury being of that opinion, the prisoner was con- 
victed and executed. 

§ 1028. So also when it is shown that the body was destroyed by any che- 
mical or mechanical agents it is, of course, unnecessary that the existence of 
the remains should be proved. Mr. Bentham very naturally asked whether 
Lord Hale’s rule would not have necessarily to be relaxed whenever a part of 
the guilty plot was the decomposition of the body in lime, or in any of the 
other known chemical menstrua, or of its being submerged in an unfathoma- 
ble part of the sea. And the late trial of Dr. Webster furnishes an apposite 
answer to this inquiry. Some portions of the deceased’s body, it is true, were 
in this case recovered, and these enough to insure its identification, but had 
this not been the case, and had there been adequate positive evidence of the 
fact of guilt elsewhere, it is not likely that the result would have been differ- 
ent. That an entire destruction of the body is practicable was lately illus- 
trated by a case but too familiar to the professional mind in this country. A 
gentleman of much respectability was accidentally caught under the rafters of 
a burning building, and when, a few hours after, his remains were sought for, 
nothing could be found that afforded the slightest index of identity. And 
still more complete would be the obliteration of this species of evidence by the 
method suggested by Mr. Bentham, of submerging in an unfathomable part of 
the sea. Murders on shipboard must generally be of this class, and yet the 
books abound with cases where this species of homicide has been punished. 
And the testimony taken in the Webster case, which will in a moment be re- 
ported in full, shows that by means of chemical menstrua there could be an 
entire immunity secured to guilt if the production of the remains were insisted 
on. Thus Dr. Jackson said ‘that the flesh of a human body, if cut up into 
small pieces and boiled in potash, might be dissolved in two or three hours. 
Next to this the best substance to use in dissolving or disposing of a human 
body would, I think, be nitric acid, and the difficulty or danger attendant upon 
it use, so far as the evolution of noxious vapor is concerned, would depend 
upon the degree of heat applied.’’ Since then the destruction of the body is 
practicable, and since, if the production of the body be necessary to conviction, 
the worst species of homicide would go unpunished, it is obvious that the con- 
tinued existence of the body cannot be considered, as is popularly supposed, 
essential to the judicial establishment of guilt. And, in fact, an examination 
even of Lord Hale’s dictum, which is most relied on for the contrary opinion, 
shows that the ‘finding of the body dead” is only given as an alternative to 
“proving” that the fact was done. But when the fact of death is not posi- 
tively and indisputably shown, there should be the severest scrutiny applied 
and the most conclusive evidence afforded, in order to make a conviction jus- 
tifiable. 

§ 1029. If the circumstances connected with the homicide of Dr. Parkman 
by Jonn W. Wesster do not of themselves place that case in the front rank 
of those in which the value and nature of indicatory testimony are determined, 

825 


§$ 1081] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


the admirable manner iu which the case was tried, both by the prosecution and 
the defence, and the elaborate and perspicuous character of the report pub- 
lished by Mr. Bemis, combine to secure to it that position.(s) According to 
the introductory summary by the Attorney-General, in which the evidence as 
subsequently developed is stated with great exactness and fairness, Dr. George 
Parkman, a well-known and highly respectable citizen of Boston, was living 
in that city in good health and cheerful spirits, on the twenty-third day of 
November, 1849, and was engaged in his usual occupation on that day, up to 
fifteen minutes before two o’clock, at which time he was last seen alive enter- 
ing the Medical College in Grove Street. He did not return to his dinner on 
that day ; a fact which, on account of his well-known habits of punctuality, 
was of itself calculated to excite uneasiness in his family. It will appear that 
he had, at that time, an invalid daughter to whom he was tenderly attached; 
and upon that day, with a view, probably, of procuring a delicacy agreeable 
to her taste, he had purchased a quantity of lettuce—a rare plant at that sea- 
son—which he left at a shop near the Medical College, with the intention, as 
the evidence indicates, of returning and taking it home with him upon going 
to his dinner. At the Medical College, the defendant, Dr. Webster, was then 
possessed of apartments used by him as a laboratory, and offices connected 
with his professorship. At that shop he made certain purchases, went from 
thence towards the Medical College, saying he would return in a few moments. 
He did not return. His family and his friends became alarmed. They waited, 
however, until the next morning before making any public movement in rela- 
tion to his absence. On that day, which was Saturday the 24th, his relatives, 
those who had been in his employment, those who knew him and knew his 
habits, were informed of his disappearance, and a general search, though con- 
ducted with somewhat less of publicity than was afterwards resorted to, was 
commenced. 

§ 1030. The police were applied to, to aid in that search ; and in the even- 
Ing papers of Saturday, notices were published, calling the attention of the 
public to the fact of his disappearance. Rumors of his having been seen were 
rife. When brought to the knowledge of those who conducted the search, 
they were promptly traced out, and were found in every instance to be entirely 
unfounded. His friends and the police heard so many confident statements of 
his having been seen in different parts of the city, that in one of the advertise- 
ments which was published at a very early period after his disappearance, he 
was represented by them as having been seen in or near Washington Street on 
Friday afternoon at five o’clock. 

§ 1031. On tracing this rumor and others like it to their source, it was 
satisfactorily ascertained by those who had the deepest interest in following 
up this search with assiduity, vigilance, and care, that the persons from whom 
these rumors proceeded, in every instance, were either mistaken in respect to 
the time when he was seen, or the identity of the person. The entire police 
force of the city were brought into requisition ; handbills were issued offering 
the most liberal rewards; one of them a reward of three thousand dollars. 


(s) Rept. of case J. W. Webster, Boston, 1850. 
826 


BOOK VI.] WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 10384 


When these rewards were offered to the public, and no tidings of him were 
obtained, whatever might have been the hopes and expectations of those who 
had looked for his reappearance, those hopes and expectations gave way ; and 
the apprehensions which had begun to be entertained by his friends, the police, 
and the public, deepened into certainty that he was no longer in the land of 
the living. In the course of Sunday, the day following the first publications 
in the newspapers, the family of Dr. Parkman learned from Dr. Webster that, 
on the Friday previous, Dr. Parkman had been in his company, at the Medical 
College, at half-past one o’clock. 

§ 1032. The search was continued through Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, 
Thursday, and up to Friday of the week following his disappearance; and 
although those who were engaged in it did occasionally hear, as I have already 
remarked, that he had been seen after the time when he was represented by 
the prisoner to have been in his rooms at the Medical College, and although 
they pursued every report, and followed up diligently every rumor which came 
to their knowledge—going to Salem, East Boston, to different parts of the 
city where he was reported to have been seen—yet no reliable information 
could be obtained respecting him. Handbills were circulated in every direction. 
The river was dredged. 

1033. The yards, the out-buildings, the dwelling-houses in the west part of 
the city, where he was known to have had a large property, were thoroughly and 
faithfully searched. And beyond the city, for an extent of sixty miles throughout 
the adjacent towns, the most diligent inquiries were set on foot by the chief of 
police. And although there was some floating evidence that Dr. Parkham 
had been seen after he had entered into the Medical College, upon a critical 
examination of this evidence it was found to rest on no such data, as to time, 
as to secure for it any confidence. On Monday and Tuesday there was a search 
at the Medical College; but, while in other portions of the building the search 
was prosecuted with extreme thoroughness, the examination of Dr. Webster’s 
apartments was a mere formal one-—no suspicion on the part of the police then 
having attached to him; and such a suspicion, of course, being very unlikely, 
unless upon some strong grounds, to be fastened upon him by any one. On 
Friday, the thirtieth of November, in a vault of the privy connected with the 
prisoner’s laboratory at the Medical College, were found certain parts of a 
human body answering to the description of Dr. Parkman. They consisted 
of a pelvis (or the hips and the portion of the body included between them) 
of the right thigh, from the hip to the knee, and of the left leg from the knee 
to the ankle; and with them were found certain towels marked with the initial 
of the prisoner’s name, and similar to those used by him in his laboratory. 
On Friday evening and Saturday morning were also found in an assay furnace 
of the laboratory, fused with slag and cinders, a great number of fragments of 
human bones, and certain blocks of mineral teeth ; portions of the bones fused 
in with the residuum of the coal, still adhering to the sides of the furnace— 
thus demonstrating that they had been subjected to the action of the fire in 
that furnace. 

§ 1034. Small quantities of gold which had been melted, and other sub- 
stances, including a shirt button, were also found in the same place, the details 

827 


§ 1036] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


of which will be disclosed to you by the testimony. In the course of the day | 
on Saturday, there was found in a remote corner of the laboratory, in a place 
which had been noticed but not examined on the Tuesday previous, by one 
witness, who will state the circumstances under which he observed it, a tea- 
chest, containing imbedded in a quantity of tan, and covered with minerals, 
the thorax or chest of a human body, the left thigh, from the hip to the knee, 
and a hunting knife of a peculiar description. Around the bone of the thigh 
was tied a piece of twine or marline, with a ball of the same species of twine 
found in one of the private drawers of the prisoner. These remains of a 
human body, found in the privy and tea-chest, were subjected to the examina- 
tion of competent medical and scientific men. They were put in apposition 
with each other, and were found to resemble, in every respect, and in no 
respect to differ from, the corresponding portions of the body of Dr. Park- 
‘man. ‘There were missing from this human body, when thus placed in appo- 
sition, the head, the arms, the hands, the feet, and the right leg from the knee 
to the ankle. The evidence showed that they belonged to a person about the 
age of Dr. Parkman, which was sixty years. 

§ 1035. The height of this body, five feet ten and a half inches, corres- 
ponded to the height of Dr. Parkman, which was precisely five feet ten and a 
half inches. The evidence shows that he was of a peculiar form and shape, 
and that this body had the same peculiarities, and that the hair on these re- 
mains was similar to his. Of the bones found in the furnace, not a fragment 
was discovered, which is a duplicate of any one found in the vault or tea- 
chest; showing, that unless there existed a miraculous coincidence, the bones 
found in the furnace, the parts found in the tea-chest, and the parts found in 
the vault, all constituted portions of one human body. There was also some 
evidence that some of the bones of the cranium, found in the furnace, were 
fractured before they had been subjected to the action of fire. 

§ 1036. A block of mineral teeth was found in the furnace, resting upon 
the grate, so near the bottom of the furnace, that it took the current of cold 
air, whereby its original form was singularly preserved. This block of teeth, 
two accomplished dentists, Dr. Keep, and his assistant, Dr. Noble, testified, 
were the teeth of Dr. Parkman, made for him in 1846, upon an occasion 
which they distinctly remember. Dr. Keep had in his possession, and pro- 
duced before the jury, an exact mould of the entire jaws of Dr. Parkman, 
taken at the tinie he had made this set of mineral teeth. By that mould it 
appeared that Dr. Parkman’s jaws had a peculiar conformation ; so peculiar, 
that unless through some caprice of nature, their precise counterpart could 
not exist. It also appeared, that these mineral teeth must have been thrown 
into the furnace, and subjected to the action of the fire in connection with the 
head. Beyond this there was exhibited to the jury the bones of the right 
lower jaw, found in that furnace, with the broken and serried edges, which will 
be put together, showing that they belonged to one and the same jaw; and 
the conformation of that jaw, when the fragments are thus put together, was 
found precisely corresponding in all its striking peculiarities with the mould 
of Dr. Parkman’s jaw taken by Dr. Keep. The thorax found in the tea-chest 
exhibited a perforation as to which there was evidence tending to show that it 

828 


BOOK VI.| WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 1038 


was a wound which penetrated between the ribs, severing a portion of the 
membrane that covers them, and entering the region of the heart. 

§ 1037. It appeared that there had been chemical applications of strong 
alkalies made to these remains, as demonstrated by an accomplished chemist. 
The inference was, that these were not the remains of a subject for dissection 
in the medical college, for two reasons: one, that there was no injection of 
the veins with any preservative fluid, which is the invariable mode of treating 
such subjects there; and secondly, that all such subjects are accounted for in- 
dependently of this, by the Demonstrator of Anatomy, who keeps an accurate 
record of them. Evidence was then introduced to show the relations subsist- 
ing between the prisoner and the deceased: beginning mainly with a loan in 
1842 of money, made by Dr. Parkman to Dr. Webster. Since that time, Dr. 
Webster had been always embarrassed in his financial affairs, and often reduced 
to great straits for money. On the other hand, Dr. Parkman was a large 
property holder, accustomed to making loans to others. He was a liberal 
man in his donations, and kind, benevolent and considerate towards those 
whom misfortune rendered unable to meet their engagements with him. At 
the same time he was scrupulously just in all his business dealings, and severe 
in cases of any suspected imposition. 

§ 1038. In 1842 he loaned the prisoner $400, for which he took his note, 
secured by a mortgage on certain personal property. ‘This note was unpaid 
in 1847, at least not paid in full, when Dr. Parkman made one of a number 
to loan Dr. Webster a certain sum of money, to meet demands then pressing 
against him, arising out of, or connected with these transactions. Dr. Park- 
man, in January, 1847, took from Dr. Webster a note for $2,432, secured by 
a mortgage on all his personal property, including his household furniture 
and his cabinet of minerals. This note was for the amount of advances then 
made by Dr. Parkman and others, and embraced also a balance of $342 83, 
then due on the note of 1842. In April, 1849, a friend of Dr. Webster had 
an interview with Dr. Parkman, and subsequently furnished Dr. Webster a 
statement, showing that the amount then due to Parkman, on the mortgage 
note, was $456 27, while a further amount of about $600 was also due upon 
it to the other parties who had contributed in making the advances for which 
it was originally given. About this period Dr. Webster made an application 
to Robert G. Shaw, Esq., a brother-in-law of Dr. Parkman, to raise money, 
representing his necessities to be so great, that an officer was about entering 
his house to attach his household furniture, and offered to sell to Mr. Shaw 
those very minerals which were then under mortgage to Dr. Parkman. Mr. 
Shaw, commiserating his condition, and having no knowledge that his 
brother-in-law had a mortgage on the property, agreed. to advance Dr. Web- 
ster the sum of $1,200. He did advance this amount, partly in cash, and 
partly by his note, which was discounted for Dr. Webster at the Charles River 


Bank: and received from Dr. Webster a clear bill of sale of the cabinet of © 


minerals. Dr. Parkman, learning subsequently, that these minerals had been 
conveyed to Mr. Shaw, was greatly incensed at what he considered an act of 
fraud, on the part of Dr. Webster, and avowed his determination to compel 
him to pay his debt. 

829 


§ 1042] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


§ 1039. From this period it appeared that Dr. Parkman pursued Dr. Web- 
ster, as a creditor who felt that his confidence had been violated, and who 
regarded his debtor as a dishonest and fraudulent man. ‘The evidence was, 
that he not only entertained this opinion, but that very recently before his dis- 
appearance he had communicated it in a-message to Dr. Webster himself. It 
also appeared that Dr. Webster obtained further delay from Dr. Parkman, 
under a promise that he would pay him from the proceeds of the sales of 
tickets to the lectures at the Medical College. 

§ 1040. Dr. Webster’s connection with the Medical College was independent 
of his professorship in the University at Cambridge. He was a professor in 
both. His compensation for services in the Medical College depended upon 
the sale of his lecture tickets to the students. The professors had made an 
arrangement with a Mr. Pettee, a clerk in one of the banks in Boston, to col- 
lect for them the moneys paid for these lecture tickets. These lectures com- 
menced on the 7th of November. On the 9th, Dr. Parkman having in view 
the purpose he had avowed of compelling Dr. Webster to pay his debt, and 
having also in his memory the promise of the latter to pay it from the pro- 
ceeds of the sales of his tickets, called on Dr. Webster, and insisted on the 
payment. Dr. Webster stated that he had not then received the money for 
his tickets, and requested Dr. Parkman to wait a further period. At that 
time Dr. Webster had in fact received a considerable portion of his money, 
which had been appropriated to other purposes than the payment of his debt 
to Dr. Parkman. 

§ 1041. There were other debts hanging over him; one of which, a note to 
Dr. Bigelow, one of the medical professors, for about $230, was paid from 
this fund. Not satisfied with his statement, Dr. Parkman, on the 12th of 
November, called on Mr. Pettee, the collecting agent, to ascertain what was 
the condition of Dr. Webster’s funds in his hands. ‘Two days afterwards he 
again called, and threatened a trustee process, or spoke of one to Mr. Pettee, 
as the only mode of getting his pay from Dr. Webster, and then sent a mes- 
sage by Mr. Pettee to Dr. Webster, that he considered him a dishonorable and 
dishonest man. On Monday evening, the 19th, after these repeated subter- - 
fuges on the part of Dr. Webster, he called on him again, and declared with 
some asperity that “ to-morrow something must be done.’”’? On the next morn- 
ing, Dr. Webster sent to Dr. Parkman a note, the contents of which did not 
transpire. On Thursday, the day before his disappearance, the latter rode out 
to Cambridge to have another interview with Dr. Webster. 

§ 1042. Such were the relations of these parties on the morning of Friday 
the 23d of November. The one party being an incensed and, perhaps, re- 
morseless creditor, the other a fraudulent debtor, perfectly willing to evade and 
dupe, but unable to pay. At about eight o’clock on that morning, Dr. Web- 
ster called at the residence of Dr. Parkman in Walnut Street, and there made 
an appointment for Dr. Parkman to call at the Medical College to receive his 
pay at half past one o’clock. He did not call at Dr. Parkman’s house to pay 
him there, but to appoint a meeting at the Medical College at a time when his 
rooms would be vacated by the students, between the hours of one and two, 
his lecture terminating at one. About nine o’clock on that morning, Mr. 

830 


BOOK VI. | WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 1044 


Pettee, anxious to get out of his hands the balance of money due to Dr. Web- 
ster, in consequence of Dr. Parkman’s threats of a trustee process, which he 
wished to avoid, waited upon Dr. Webster and paid him a balance of ninety 
dollars, in a check on the Freeman’s Bank. He then informed Dr. Webster 
of Dr. Parkman’s repeated inquiries respecting the state of his funds, and his 
threats of a trustee process. Dr. Webster thereupon remarked to Mr. Pettee, 
“ You will have no further trouble with Dr. Parkman, for I have settled with 
him.” It appeared that not one dollar of that money could have gone to 
Dr. Parkman, the $90 check received on the morning of the day of the disap- 
pearance, was in the prisoner’s possession the next day, and was deposited by 
him to his own credit in the Charles River Bank. 

§ 1043. Dr. Webster’s lecture days were Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, 
and Friday; the longest interval during the week when his official engage- 
ments did not call him to the college, was between Friday and Tuesday.- It 
appeared that on Friday the 23d, he remained at the college until after 
candle-light; that he was there on Saturday, and again on Sunday, which was 
unusual; that all the doors of his rooms, which ordinarily had been left un- 
fastened when he was absent from the college, were fastened; and that the 
key of one door which he had kept deposited in a certain place up to that 
period, and to which one witness, who had occasion frequently to go to his 
rooms, had access, was carried away by Dr. Webster from the building; and 
that on Saturday, which is cleaning day in the college, the janitor who had 
charge of the rooms, went into Dr. Webster’s back rooms and attempted to 
go down into the laboratory for the purpose of cleaning, when Dr. Webster 
ordered him out through the lecture-room door. It appeared that Dr. Webster 
received one of the papers containing the advertisement which has been already 
noticed. His relations to certain members of the family of Dr. Parkman were 
somewhat intimate. 

§ 1044. He had been a parishioner of the Rev. Dr. Francis Parkman, a 
brother of the deceased. A short time previous to this event the latter visited 
Dr. Webster’s family to perform a pastoral office of friendship, and their 
families had been on terms of considerable intimacy. The first disclosure 
that an interview had taken place between Dr. Webster and Dr. George 
Parkman—the first intimation of that interview received by the family, al- 
though they had been in a state of intense anxiety from the Friday previous 
—was made by Dr. Webster to Dr. Francis Parkman, about four o’clock on 
the afternoon of Sunday. The manner of making that communication was 
such as to excite the surprise of Dr. Francis Parkman and his family. 

On the afternoon of Sunday, Dr. Webster made a similar communication, 
differing however in some particulars, to several other persons. Substantially 
his statement was, that Dr. Parkman came to the Medical College by appoint- 
ment at half past one o’clock on Friday, to receive payment of his debt; that 
he came into the lecture-room, where Dr. Webster paid him the money, stating 
the precise amount; that he received it and started immediately to go out, 
without leaving any evidence of the note having been paid, or that the mort- 
gage was cancelled; that, on Dr. Webster’s reminding him of this, he turned 
back and dashed his pen over the signature on the note, telling Dr. Webster 

) 831 


§ 1047] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


that he would see to the cancelling of the mortgage at Cambridge; that he 
then went out with the money in his hand, going up the stairway two steps 
at a time; and that he (Dr. Webster) had no recollection of the denomination 
or amounts of the bills which he paid him. Some evidence was then submitted 
showing contradictory statements by the defendant as to the character of the 
notes by which the payment was made. Thursday, the 29th of November, 
was Thanksgiving-day. It was a week of vacation at the college, no lectures 
having been given after Tuesday ; yet, during that week, Dr. Webster was at 
the college, locked into his rooms, daily, and at unusual hours. He directed 
that no fires should be made in his room that week, and yet he had fires kindled 
by himself, of a more intense heat than had ever been made there before. 

§ 1045. On Tuesday, he purchased several large fish-hooks, which were 
afterwards found upon the premises under circumstances which probably con- 
nected them, to some extent, with the remains ; they were made into a grapple, 
being fastened to a staff by a peculiar species of twine or marline, a ball of 
which was also found in one of his private drawers, and around the thigh-bone 
found in the tea-chest, was tied a piece of the same description of twine, the 
identity of which with that found upon the grapple was testified of by an 
expert in its manufacture. On Tuesday, Mr. Kingsley, the business agent of 
Dr. Parkman, went through Dr. Webster’s rooms with several police officers, 
and Mr. Littlefield, the janitor, accompanied by Dr. Webster. The officers, 
when asking about the privy, were replied to by Mr. Littlefield, in the presence 
of Dr. Webster, that it was the private privy of Dr. Webster’s, who had the 
key of it in his possession ; that thereupon they suffered themselves to be called 
off from the privy by Dr. Webster to another room, they entertaining no sus- 
picion of him, and having, indeed, already informed him that their examination 
was a mere matter of form. 

§ 1046. It was proved that there was a fire in the assay furnace at the time, 
and that the tea-chest, in which the remains were found imbedded in tan, was 
then observed by one of the witnesses, with the minerals upon it. On Monday, 
Dr. Webster gave instructions to the Cambridge express man, who had always 
before had free access to his apartments, and had been used to deposit all the 
packages which he brought ¢nszde of the laboratory, to carry certain fagots, 
a box, and a bag of tan, from Cambridge to the college, and leave them in 
the entry outside the door of the laboratory ; and on Wednesday the same ex- 
press man, Mr. Sarvin, carried two boxes to the college, and left them in like 
manner, outside the door, being unable to find the key in the place where Dr. 
Webster had usually kept it. 

§ 1047. In the course of that week, Dr. Webster, in conversation with seve- 
ral persons, endeavored to impress them with the belief that Dr. Parkman 
had been seen going over to Cambridge, after the time when it was stated by 
him that he had been at the Medical College, and went so far as to urge upon 
one of the witnesses, Mrs. Coleman, the declaration that she saw Dr. Parkman 
on the afternoon of Friday; she having stated to him that it was on Thursday. 
On Friday morning he went to a respectable mechanic in Boston, and ordered 
a tin box to be made very strong, in such a manner that he could solder it up 
himself perfectly tight ; and in the course of his interview with this mechanic, 

832 


BOOK VI.] WEBSTER’S CASE, [$ 1050 


he stated that it had been discovered by certain mesmeric agencies, that Dr. 
Parkman’s body had been carried off in a cab, and that the cab had been 
_ found saturated with blood. On Thursday, in consequence of suspicions 
which had been conceived in the mind of Mr. Littlefield, the janitor of the 
college, certain steps were taken by him to make an examination of the privy 
vault under the laboratory. 

§ 1048. During the previous examination of the Medical College by the 
police officers, on Tuesday, it had been ascertained that there was no mode of 
access to this vault, except through the privy above, of which Dr. Webster 
himself kept the key. On Thursday, Littlefield attempted to open that vault, 
which, with the exception of Dr. Webster’s private room, was the only part 
of the building that had not been examined, and to which there was no access 
save through the laboratory, where Dr. Webster himself was locked in a larger 
portion of the time. He commenced breaking through the wall on Thursday, and 
found it much more difficult than he had anticipated ; he continued it, however, 
till he had pénetrated through two or three courses of brick, there being five 
or six courses in all. On Friday morning he communicated his purpose to 
two of the professors, Drs. Jackson and Bigelow; and following up their sug- 
gestions, he continued his labor. While at work he set his wife to watch for 
Dr. Webster’s approach to the building, and to notify him of it by a certain 
signal ; but directed no one to disturb him if any of the professors came. 

§ 1049. At one time Mrs. Littlefield having mistaken another person for 
Dr. Webster, gave the appointed signal, and he suspended his operations. On 
discovering the mistake he resumed his work, and near the close of the day, on 
Friday, effected an opening into that vault, and there discovered a portion of 
the remains. That night and the following day the discovery was followed by 
others of more importance, made by the police, without the aid of Mr. Little- 
field ; namely, the bones and mineral teeth in the furnace, and the other por- 
tions of the remains in the tea-chest. In Dr. Webster’s private room were 
found a pair of pantaloons, marked with his name, and a pair of slippers, 
which, on examination by a scientific expert, were shown to have been spotted 
with blood. There were towels nearly new, marked with the initial letter of 
his name, found in the privy vault where the tide ebbed and flowed, which gave 
ingress to the sea, but not to any solid substance. 

§ 1050. A large number of skeleton keys were found in his laboratory, 
fitting nearly every door in the college, which he had stated he had found in 
the street, and carried to his own room. ‘There was found on his person at 
the time of his arrest the key of the privy ; though when asked by one of the 
officers where that key was, he pointed to one hanging upon a nail in his pri- 
vate room, saying, ‘‘ There it is ;’’ which, on being tried, did not fit the lock 
of the privy door. After his commitment by the Police Court, he wrote a 
note to a member of his family, which, according to the usage at the jail, 
could not be sent to its destination without inspection by the proper officers ; 
and which, upon examination, was found to contain an injunction to another 
member of his family, not to open a certain bundle which he had deposited 
with her, but to keep it just as she received it. This suggested to the police 
a suspicion that what he sought to conceal might be important; and a mes- 

D8 833 


§ 1051] CORPUS DELICTI, | [BOOK VI. 


senger was immediately dispatched to his residence at Cambridge, who obtained 
the package. It was found to contain the two notes given by Dr. Webster to 
Dr. Parkman, in 1842 and 1847, and the paper, showing the amount of Dr. 
Webster’s indebtment to Dr. Parkman, in April, 1849, with a statement of 
interest upon that amount in pencil, in Dr. Webster’s own handwriting, which 
made the aggregate amount of his indebtedness the sum of $483.64. 

There was also testimony tending to show that certain letters were written 
by the prisoner after the disappearance of Dr. Parkman, calculated to draw 
the public off from the Medical College to other places, and to divert public 
Opinion in other directions. 

The following passages from the medical testimony, as given to the jury, 
are of general interest :— 

Winslow Lewis, Jr., sworn. Haamined by Mr. Bemis.—I am a practising 
physician in this city. I was called on the Saturday afternoon succeeding 
Dr. Webster’s arrest, to the Medical College, to examine some portions of a 
human body which had been found there. I found Dr. Martin Gay and Dr. 
Charles O. Jackson there. I was sent for by Coroner Pratt. I think I had 
got there at three o’clock. I called on Dr. George H. Gay and Dr. James 
W. Stone, to aid me in the matter; and also advised the codperation of Pro- 
fessor Jeffries Wyman. We met next day, Sunday, in the morning. It was 
arranged that Drs. Gay and Jackson should make the necessary chemical inves- 
tigations ; Professor Wyman should take charge of the bones, and the articles 
supposed to have spots of blood on them; and Drs. Gay, Stone and myself 
should prepare a detailed report upon the fleshy portions of the body which 
we particularly examined. We accordingly drew up such a report, and made 
it in writing under oath, to the coroner’s jury. 

[The report was here produced, and read to the jury by Mr. Bemis, and 
explained by Dr. Lewis as he proceeded, by means of a diagram prepared by 
Professor Wyman. The same diagram was used in connection with Professor 
Wyman’s testimony. It was a drawing of the human skeleton, exhibiting, by 
means of various coloring, the parts of the body covered with flesh, the bones 
found in the furnace, and the absent parts not accounted for. Questions of 
explanation were also asked of Dr. Lewis, as he proceeded, by the counsel for 
the government, in connection with different parts of the report. | 

§ 1051. Report of the Medical Committee.—Winslow Lewis, Jr., George 
H. Gay, and James W. Stone, having been directed to make a post-mortem 
examination, at the Medical College in North Grove Street, attended to that 
duty December 2d, 1849, at ten o’clock A. M., and examined five portions of 
a human subject, viz: a thorax, a pelvis, two thighs, and a left leg. The 
thorax and thigh were discolored apparently with tan and some caustic sub- 
stance. The three remaining ones were white, fair, and appeared as if they 
had been soaked in water. The cartilage on the head of the left thigh-bone 
was colored black. . 

The following is a description of the five portions separately :— 

Ist. Remains of thorax, and parts attached to it: which consisted of all 
the bones, except the sternum or breast bone. Fracture of the fifth right rib, 
apparently recent, and about four inches from the junction of this rib with the 

834 


BOOK VI.] WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 1052 


sternum. Both clavicles and scapule present: the clavicles large. Both 
lungs present, but collapsed: left lung had pleural adhesion: structure of 
lungs apparently healthy. Anterior thoracic muscles, cut up from the ribs, 
about six inches from the centre, on each side, and with the skin thrown back; 
posterior portion of the integuments, from left scapula to right lumbar region, 
of a dark mahogany color, and hardened : remaining portions of integuments, 
generally of a natural appearance, except a little greenish under the right 
axilla (probably from commencing decomposition), and some blueness under 
the left axilla—tleaving the skin soft, and easily broken, through artificial 
action exerted upon the hair and skin, as far forward as the section in the 
median line. An opening slightly ragged, about one and a half inches in 
length, under the left nipple, between the sixth and seventh ribs, extending 
into the cavity of the chest. Remains of thoracic aorta and thoracic cesopha- 
gus, present. Heart and diaphragm wanting. ‘Trachea divided through 
cricoid cartilage. Spleen contracted, externally granulated, and internally 
red. Left kidney, in its natural position, and contracted. No liver, right 
kidney, pancreas, stomach or intestines. 

Nota bene.—The right kidney, much contracted and discolored, was disco- 
vered on the next day, and given to us. 

Sixteen vertebree present—consisting of three lumbar, twelve dorsal, and 
the greater portion of the seventh cervical, which appeared to have been sawed 
through the upper part. 

2d. Pelvic portion—consisting of the bones of the pelvis, two of the inferior 
lumbar vertebree, all the integuments, muscles, organs of generation, and the 
pelvic viscera, generally. All the intestines remaining were about six inches 
of the rectum, through the anterior and external portion of which a section 
had been made, and the mucous coat separated from it, four or five inches, 
throughout the whole circumference, but not cut off at the lower end. Hair 
upon this portion, of a sandy gray. Both thighs severed from it in a very 
irregular manner. Integuments and muscles divided down to the pubis, in the 
median line. On placing the pelvic portion in apposition with the thoracic, 
the third and fourth lumbar vertebre corresponded precisely. 

§ 1052. The spinous process of the third lumbar vertebra, with a portion 
of the transverse processes of the same, was absent from the thoracic portion, 
but was found attached to the fourth lumbar vertebra which was on the pelvic 
portion. | 

3d. Right thigh—on being placed in apposition to the pelvic portion, the 
bones, muscles, and skin corresponded perfectly. Good muscular development, 
with but little of fatty matter. Patella attached ; some ossification of femoral 
artery. 

4th. Left thigh—had a string about two and a half feet long, tied just 
above the condyle, leaving loose ends. Patella attached. On being placed in 
apposition with the pelvis, the bones corresponded ; but some portion of the 
skin and flesh appeared to have been removed, or contracted from artificial 
means. On the anterior surface of the thigh, and somewhat on outer parts, 
there were the appearances of the action of fire or some caustic matter. 


835 


§ 1054] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


§ 1053. 5th. Left leg—of natural appearance—fair size; and on being 
placed in apposition with the left thigh the articulation corresponded. 


MEASUREMENTS. 
Inches. Inches. 
Thoracic portion (length) 174 
‘ circumference below axilla 30 
Pelvic portion (length) 92 
A circumference below crest of ilium 304 
Both thighs (of the same length) 18 
# circumference of the largest part of each 182 
Left leg (length to outer malleolus) 16 
“circumference of largest part 123 
Total 61 
Deduct distance from bottom of pelvis to top of acetabulum 3 
oIe 
All the parts being placed in apposition, the distance from the top 
of the seventh cervical vertebra to the outer malleolus 5Tt 
Difference a 
Total length of parts discovered bTs 
Distance from sole of foot to the outer malleolus on another subject 3 
Distance from top of head to seventh cervical vertebra 10 


Total height—five feet, ten and a half inches, or 705 


The foregoing described portions appeared to belong to a person between fifty 
and sixty years of age. ‘The muscular system was well developed, and there 


was very little of adipose matter. 
Winstow Lewis, JR. 


GEORGE H. Gay. 


JAMES W. STONE. 
Attest: J. L. AnDREws, Secretary. 


§ 1054. Dr. Lewis, resumed.—The head had been separated from the trunk 
just below what is called Adam’s apple, by sawing through the upper vertebra. 
The external granulation or roughness of the spleen showed the application 
of some chemical agent; and the internal redness that the application had 
penetrated to the interior. All the bowels and stomach were gone. I should 
not think that the dissection of the thigh from the hip necessarily evinced 
the possession of anatomical knowledge on the part of the person dissecting 
this body ; but think that a degree of anatomical skill would have been requi- 
site to have separated the sternum (or breast-bone) from the collar-bone. The 
ossification of the artery would serve somewhat to designate the age of the 
subject, but not within ten years, with precision. 

I had known Dr. Parkman for many years. There was nothing in these 
remains dissimilar from what I should have expected to find in his body. 

836 


BOOK VI.] WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 1057 


There was nothing in the mode of separation of the parts, which indicated 
that it had been done for anatomical purposes ; nor was there anything in the 
condition of the bloodvessels, which showed that it had been a subject for dis- 
section. If it had been such a subject, I should have expected to find some of 
the preserving fluid, which anatomists use to inject them with. . These prepara- 
tions affect the color of the vessels ; and I saw in these parts no such altera- 
tion in color. There is not the least doubt, that the five parts belonged to 
one and the same human body. 

Coroner Pratt handed me a block of mineral teeth, perhaps two inches long. 
IT kept them at my house that night; and next day, when Dr. Keep, the 
dentist, my neighbor, returned to town, I handed them to him. 

§ 1055. Cross-examined by Mr. Sohier.—I had known Dr. Parkman 
thirty years, I should think, and quite intimately. If I had not been told 
that he was missing, I should not have spontaneously conceived the idea that 
this was his body. There were no peculiar marks, that I discovered, about 
the remains. The original height of the body in a case of this kind can be 
ascertained very nearly ;—within half an inch. I could not say that the hole 
in the left side was a stab. It was in the region of the heart; but the mus- 
cles and flesh had been much affected by some chemical application. It was 
in a friable state, easy to be torn, and the opening might have been made by 
pushing a finger through. I could not say whether it had been made before 
or after death. JI discovered no signs of the use of a knife: and we looked 
pretty carefully at the hole. 

A body of the size of Dr. Parkman might contain two gallons of blood 
when alive; after death, perhaps two quarts might be found in the cavities. 
I cannot say how long it would take to consume a human head by fire in 
such a furnace as that in the laboratory, where the bones were found :—per- 
haps two hours. But this would depend upon the kind and quantity of fuel 
used. As to the time requisite for consuming the remaining portions of the 
body, it would be impossible to tell with any accuracy. There were no marks 
to fix the age of the subject, any nearer than I have stated, within some ten 
years. There was more muscular development of the lower extremities of the 
body than I should have expected to find, from the size of the other portions. 
While the upper part of the body was thin and narrow, the lower limbs were 
full and round, and showed that they had been well developed by exercise. 

To the Attorney-General.—lIf the person had been stabbed through the 
hole in the side, he would have been mote likely to bleed internally than exter- 
nally. I make the statement in regard to the time requisite for burning up 
the head, with very great hesitation, and as worthy of but little reliance. The 
flow of blood from the arteries ceases very shortly after death : from the veins, 
in perhaps twenty-four hours. 

§ 1056. George H. Gay, sworn. Examined by Mr. Bemis.—I signed the 
report which has just been read, and concur in it, generally. 

§ 1057. Woodbridge Strong, sworn. Hxamined by Mr. Clifford.—I am 
a practising physician in this city, and have been such since 1820. 

I have always given a special attention to the subject of anatomy. 
When I was a student (with the late Dr. Nathan Smith), I took every oppor- 

837 


§ 1058] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


tunity to practise dissection ; and, after commencing practice for myself, when 
not much engaged, devoted a good deal of time to the pursuit of that branch 
of the profession. One winter, in particular, I occupied most of my time in 
dissecting, sometimes continuing at it from eight o’clock in the morning till 
twelve at night. I have had a subject on my table for three months together. 
For several years I attended the hospital; also other medical institutions ; 
have taken part in numerous post-mortem examinations; and, in general, I 
may say, have had a good deal of taste for the study of anatomy. In the 
pursuit of my anatomical studies, I have had considerable experience in burn- 
ing up, or getting rid of human remains by fire. When I had my office, at an 
early day, in Cornhill, I had poor accommodations for dissecting, and it was 
frequently necessary to burn up the remains of a subject. Once, in particular, 
I had a pirate given me by the United States Marshal for dissection ; and, it 
being warm weather, I wanted to get rid of the flesh and only preserve the 
bones. He was a muscular, stout man, and I began upon it one night, with 
a wood fire, in a large, old-fashioned fireplace. I built a rousing fire, and sat 
up all night piling on the wood and the flesh, and had not got it consumed by 
morning. I was afraid of a visit from the police, and by eleven o’clock they 
gave me a call, to know what made such a smell in the street. I finished it 
up, somehow, that forenoon; but I look upon it as no small operation, to 
burn up a body. It needs the right sort of fuel to begin with. Wood is bet- 
ter than coal; and the lighter the kind of wood the better. Pine kindlings 
would be good for the purpose. You need frequently to stir the fire up; and 
you must have something that the flesh will not quench or put out. There is 
always a difficulty in getting rid of human remains by fire, on account of at- 
tracting suspicion by the smell. I have been called upon by my neighbors or 


the police, several times, on this account. 
* * * * * * x * 


I never burned up a body in a furnace; but I think the intensity of the 
heat would be as great in a stove as in the furnace which I saw in Dr. Web- 
ster’s laboratory. That appeared to me the most inconvenient place for such 
a purpose. The stove which I saw in the same room would have answered 
better. I have used a common cylinder stove, with an anthracite coal-fire, to 
consume human flesh-when dissecting; but do not think that coal is so good a 
fuel as wood for that purpose. I have overloaded my fire, at times, with. 
pieces of flesh so as to extinguish it, and have been obliged on that account 
to rekindle it. 

Death might ensue immediately from such a wound as I supposed to have 
occasioned the hole, and the bleeding have been wholly internal. This might 
follow from the shape of the wound, which might collapse; and also by the 
sudden stopping of the circulation of the blood, such as would follow the 
cutting of the aorta. . 

§ 1058. Charles T. Jackson, sworn. Examined by Mr. Bemis.—I am a 
chemist by profession; have given attention to the science of chemistry and its 
practical application for many years. I was called to the Medical College 
after the discovery of the remains. I went there on Saturday afternoon, De- 
cember 1st, with the late Dr. Martin Gay, and met Dr. Winslow Lewis, Jr., 

838 


BOOK VI.] WEBSTER'S CASE, f$ 1059 


with whom we made an arrangement for conducting the examination. Dr. 
Gay and myself undertook the chemical part. There were shown to us parts 
of a human body, and the contents of a small assay-furnace, about ten inches 
square. The parts of the body were turned over to the other gentlemen. I 
am, myself, acquainted with anatomy, having had a medical education. I took 
some notice of the remains. I saw no indication of their having been used 
for anatomical purposes. I thought, also, that they indicated the possession 
of anatomical knowledge on the part of the person who had dissected them: 
The manner of opening the body, and the separation of the sternum, showed 
some skill on the part of the operator. The latter had been done by a clean 
eut. There was no hacking, also, about the thighs; they had been disarticu- 
lated neatly. I have heard the report made upon the remains by Dr. Lewis 
and others, and coincide generally with their conclusions. 
* *« x * * * ** * 

The time requisite for dissolving a human body by means of potash, if a 
suitable apparatus could be had, would depend upon circumstances. The flesh, 
if cut up into small pieces, and the potash boiled, might be dissolved in two 
or three hours. For this, it would.take of potash, half of the weight of the 
body, I should think; and, if the whole were done at once, a very large ketile. 
I examined Dr. Webster’s laboratory, when there, after his arrest, but with no 
special reference in seeing what vessels were there. The largest kettle which I 
saw was a tin boiler with a copper bottom, such as-is used for washing clothes 
—some twelve or fifteen inches square. I did not see this at first, but have 
taken notice of it more recently. I have seen nothing larger than this about 
the premises. That would not have been of sufficient size to hold a body, 
unless it were the mere flesh all cut off from the bones, and would not admit 
of a thorax, or even a thigh, in its original state. 

Potash would be the best substance to use in dissolving or disposing of a 
human body, because it could be used in common vessels. Next to this, I 
should think, would be nitric acid. This would require, however, a vessel of 
porcelain or glass, or some material which would not be acted upon by it. 
To dissolve a body—bones and all—ip this acid, I should think it would take 
about an equivalent weight of acid. ‘The difficulty or danger attendant upon 
such an operation, so far as the evolution of noxious vapor is concerned, 
would depend upon the degree of heat applied. If a gentle heat were used, 
very little nitrous acid gas would be given off; but if the acid were boiled, 
there would be a great deal. The dissolution of the body would be most rapid 
at a boiling temperature. The odor of this gas is very disagreeable, and 
noxious to health if inhaled in any quantity. I think an open vessel might 
be used for the purpose in question, if connected with a proper draught of a 
chimney. I saw no apparatus about the laboratory large enough to dissolve 
any considerable quantity of matter. I noticed some nitric acid, and also 
muriatic acid, in several bottles, by the window in the lower laboratory ; but 
think that, altogether, there was not more than ten pounds of nitric acid. 

§ 1059. I noticed when at the Doctor’s apartments, on the sides of the 
walls, particularly on the staircase leading to the lower laboratory, green drops 
of fluid, and spots. They were still liquid, and stood out from the wall. I 

839 


| § 1059] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


sent and got some filtering paper, and Dr. Gay absorbed into the paper, from 
the walls, a quantity of this green fluid, and carried it away. Since I have 
had the things in my possession which Dr. Gay took from the Medical Col- 
lege, I have examined this paper (which I recognize), and find the green fluid 
to be nitrate of copper. These spots were very abundant, and extended all 
down the staircase, from top to bottom. They have since dried, but when I 
saw them were fluid. 

There were also dark spots or stains on the stairs, and these green spots 
seemed to correspond to the stains. That is, wherever there was a spot there 
would be a spattering of this green fluid; and this was more abundant at the 
bottom, or towards the lower landing, than at the top. It had the appear- 
ance of having been spilt on each stair separately, and then of having spat- 
tered back upon the sides above; it did not seem to have been spilt at the top 
and then to have run down. [The witness pointed out, on the model, the 
locality of these spots, which had previously been called to the attention of the 
jury on the view. | 

The nitrate of copper is a deliquescent salt, contracting moisture from the 
air, and will remain moist and fluid a long time. The taste is astringent, like 
verdigris and caustic. I have been requested to make some observations on 
the effect of this salt upon human blood, but have referred the subject to Dr. 
Wyman. | 

I was at the college, on Sunday afternoon, I think, when a pair of panta- 
loons and a pair of slippers were discovered, with what seemed to be blood on 
them. I told the officer who found them to keep them and hand them over 
to Dr. Wyman, as I considered the microscope the best means of discovering 
the actual presence of blood. I was there afterwards, when Dr. Wyman cut 
pieces from the pantaloons and slippers, which had spots on them resembling 
blood, for the purpose of making the examination. The punch-pieces, or 
pieces of copper found in the ash-hole, which appear to have been originally 
refuse pieces, punched in making holes at the coppersmith’s, are the same arti- 
cle as those found new in the drawers of the back room up stairs. Those 
taken from the ash-hole have, undoubtedly, been used for the purpose of 
making nitrate of copper, as they show the action of the acid by their thin- 
ness, and still bear marks of its presence. [The witness here produced several 
of these pieces, of about the size of a quarter of a dollar, with the nitrate of 
copper still adhering to them. | 

I cannot now find the pearl shirt button, though I am positive of having 
once seen it before it went into Dr. Gay’s possession. 

The quantity of gold which I found in a portion of the con- 


tents of the furnace submitted to me, was 45.6 grains. 
Found by Dr. Gay AT an 
And in a piece brought to me by Mr. J. L. Andrews, Secre- 

tary of the Coroner’s inquest, 81.05 “ 
Total 172.65 ‘ 


The market value of this gold, at four cents a grain, would be $6.94. 
840 


BOOK VI.| WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 1060 | 


[The blocks of teeth afterwards testified of by Drs. Keep and Noble, were 
here exhibited to the witness.] The presence of fused gold is also visible in 
the melted mass of mineral teeth and cinders shown to me. There is a fur- 
ther quantity of gold to be obtained from the ashes, by a more careful sifting 
than I adopted. ['The attention of the witness was here called again to the 
blocks of teeth, and he was asked to point out any indications which he 
could detect of the proximity of gold to the teeth when both were in a state 
of great heat. ] ) 

There is a pink color about the teeth, resembling that noticeable in other 
parts of the slag and cinders where the globules of gold were found—show- 
ing the effect, as I think, of the oxide of gold. When the gold and teeth 
were fused together, this oxidation took place. The bones and cinders, in the 
state in which they were found, showed, in other respects, the application of 
great heat. I should think that a piece of the natural bone is now adhering 
to the block. 

[ The sheath-knife, with silver hilt, was here exhibited to the witness.] I 
recognize this knife as the one I have often seen in Dr. Webster’s possession, 
at his rooms at the old Medical College in Mason Street. I have known the 
Doctor for twenty-five years; attended his lectures when a medical student, 
and have since been in the habit of frequently calling on him. When this 
knife was first shown to me, at the Medical College, immediately after his 
arrest, it bore the appearance of having been recently cleaned. I scraped off 
some of the substance which had apparently been used for that purpose, and 
found it to be whiting, moistened with oil. The oil was still fresh, and the 
mixture was as soft as putty. 

Dr. Parkman was about my height; I should think a little taller. J am 
five feet eleven inches in height. 

The furnace in the laboratory would have carried off the odor of burning 
flesh if any had been consumed there. The draught is a strong one, and the 
soapstone cover fits tightly over the top. 

§ 1060. Cross-eramined by Mr. Sohier.—It was the nitrate, and not any 
other salt of copper, upon the wall. 

If I had not heard that Dr. Parkman was missing, I should not have been 
led to suppose that the parts of the body were his. The thorax had not the 
appearance of having been boiled, but had been singed by fire. Iam confident 
_ that it showed the action of fire. It did not appear to have been decomposed 
except where the potash had been applied ; and this was on the top, the bot- 
tom, and the left side; also on the back. It is impossible to tell how long 
it had been subjected to the potash. The thigh, found inside of the thorax, 
had been exposed to the heat of fire, and also to the potash, I think. The 
head of the bone was smoked and the skin softened, as if by the joint action 
of the two. 

The time it would take to dissolve a human body in nitric acid would 
depend on the mode in which it was cut up. If the bones were taken out 
and the flesh cut into fine pieces, I should think that, with the proper quantity 
of acid, it might be entirely dissolved in half a day, so as to become a dense, 
yellow liquid. The quantity of acid I should fix at the weight of the body. 

841 


§ 1061] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


We absorbed the green fluid from the walls spoken of, on Monday or Tuesday 
after the arrest. It was then liquid, but might have been there two weeks. 
The whiting which I saw on the yataghan, or sheath-knife, was close to the 
handle. The slag in the furnace was produced from anthracite coal. I saw 
a part of the ashes taken out. There were wood ashes and charcoal among 
them. 

Direct resumed.—I omitted to mention that I have tried the experiment of 
applying nitrate of copper to Norway pine, such as the stairs leading to the 
laboratory are made of, and find that it produces a stain similar to that noticed 
there. [Pieces of pine thus experimented on were here submitted by the wit- 
ness to the inspection of the court and jury. | 

§ 1061. The following passages from the charge of Curzr JusTIcE SHAw, 

are all which the limits of the present chapter will permit to be here tran- 
scribed. It may not be improper to state, however, that the law as here 
stated derives peculiar weight not only from the long experience and the great 
judicial ability of the judge by whom it was delivered, but from the fact that — 
it was assented to by the whole of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massa- 
chusetts, whose joint views it may be held to embrace: “But, in a case of 
circumstantial evidence, where no witnesses can testify directly to the fact to 
be proved, you arrive at it by a series of other facts, which by experience we 
have found so associated with the fact in question, as in the relation of cause 
and effect, that they lead to a satisfactory and certain conclusion ; as where 
foot-prints are discovered after a recent snow, it is certain that some animated 
being has passed over the snow since it fell; and from the form and number 
of the foot-prints it can be determined with equal certainty, whether it was a 
man, a bird, or a quadruped. Circumstantial evidence, therefore, is founded 
on experienced and observed facts and coincidences, establishing a connection 
between the known and proved facts, and the fact sought to be proved. The 
advantages are, that, as the evidence commonly comes from several witnesses, 
and different sources, a chain of circumstances is less likely to be falsely pre- 
pared and arranged, and falsehood and perjury are more likely to be detected, 
and fail of their purpose. The disadvantages are, that a jury has not only 
to weigh the evidence of facts, but to draw just conclusions from them; in 
doing which they may be led by prejudice or partiality, or by want of due 
deliberation and sobriety or judgment, to make hasty and false deductions; a 
source of error not existing in the consideration of positive evidence. 

‘From this view, it is manifest, that great care and caution ought to be 
used in drawing inferences from proved facts: it must be a fair and natural, 
and not a forced or artificial conclusion: as when a house is found to have 
been plundered and there are indications of force and violence upon the 
windows and shutters, the inference is that the house was broken open, and 
that the persons who broke open the house plundered the property. It has 
sometimes been enacted by positive law, that certain facts proved shall be held 
to be evidence of another fact; as where it was provided by statute, that if 
the mother of a bastard child give no notice of its expected birth, and be 
delivered in secret, and afterwards be found with the child dead, it shall be 
presumed that it was born alive and that she killed it. 

842 


BOOK VI] WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 1064 


“This is a forced and not a natural presumption, prescribed by positive law, 
and not conformable to the rule of common law. The common law appeals to 
the plain dictates of common experience and sound judgment; and the inference 
to be drawn from all the facts must be a reasonable and natural one, and, to a 
moral certainty, a certain one. It is not sufficient that it is probable only, it 
must be reasonably and morally certain. 

§ 1062. “Tt has been sometimes said by judges that a jury ought never to 
convict in a case of homicide unless the dead body be found and identified. 
This, as a general proposition, is undoubtedly true and correct, and disas- 
trous and lamentable consequences have resulted from disregarding the rule. 
But, like other general rules, it is to be taken with some qualification. It 
may sometimes happen that the dead body cannot be produced, although the 
proof of the death is clear and satisfactory. As in the case of a murder at 
sea, where the body is thrown overboard in a dark and stormy night, at a 
great distance from land or any vessel; although the body cannot be found, 
nobody can doubt that the author of that crime is chargeable with murder. 

§ 1063. ‘But if the body can be found and identified, it goes conclusively 
to one of the facts necessary to be proved—the death of the person alleged to 
have been killed. Such proof is relied on in the present case. It is for the 
jury to judge of it. 

“Tt appears, then, from the evidence, that after the disappearance of Dr. 
Parkman, and an extensive and unsuccessful search elsewhere, and after several 
examinations of other parts of the medical college by police officers and others, 
in a vault under a privy connected with the lower laboratory several limbs and 
a part of a human body were discovered on Friday, a week after such disap- . 
pearance; and that on the next day (Saturday), on a further search in the 
lower laboratory, other parts of a human body were found in the furnace, in 
the form of bones partly calcined, and still other parts in a tea-chest covered 
with tan, with a covering of minerals or fossils on top of the tan. I refer to 
places and parts of the building familiarly, because the jury, having taken a 
view of the building, will easily understand these references. They will recol- 
lect that what is ealled the vault of the privy is, in fact, a corner only of the 
section of the cellar of the building, and connected with the privy above by 
the aperture in the seat; the whole section being entirely separated from the 
residue of the cellar by a solid brick wall, and including within its limits the 
dissecting vault, which is also walled in with its own independent walls; the 
privy vault having thus no separate walls of its own. 

§ 1064. “Were these parts of one and the same human body, and were they 
so placed and disposed of as to indicate a studied or designed concealment? If 
they were, in fact, designedly concealed in order to keep them out of view, as 
the person who had a motive to conceal one part would have the same motive 
to conceal the others, the natural conclusion would be that all was done by the 
same person. If the parts did not correspond with each other, they could not 
have been parts of one body; they might perhaps have been the remains of 
anatomical subjects. Indeed, from finding parts of a dead body in or about a 
medical college, where the study of anatomy is pursued, a very natural im- 

843 


§ 1069] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


pression would be that they were parts of a body or of bodies used for dissec- 
tion. Is this, in your judgment, negatived by the evidence? 

§ 1065. “Two physicians, Dr. Wyman and Dr. Holmes, have testified as 
to the manner in which this body appears to have been dismembered, and are 
of opinion that the operation does not appear to have been performed in the 
manner in which it would have been by an anatomist for the purpose of demon- 
stration. Dr. Ainsworth says that it is his business to keep an account of all 
subjects brought to the college for anatomical purposes; and that the institu- 
tion having now the sanction of the law for being furnished with the means of 
obtaining subjects, it is necessary to keep an accurate record of them, and that 
they, in fact, do so. He also says that all subjects received at the college up 
to that time are accounted for without including these remains. He also testi- 
fies that it is a uniform custom, when a subject is first brought to the college, 
and before dissection, to prepare the body by injecting the vessels with some 
chemical fluid which will tend to preserve it. 

§ 1066. “With a view, therefore, of ascertaining whether these remains 
were parts of an anatomical subject, the attention of the medical witnesses 
who were called to examine them was turned to the inquiry whether the ves- 
sels had been so injected, because it was said this could be ascrtained by chemi- 
cal analysis. Portions of the bloodvessels were taken out and committed to 
the examination of Dr. C. T. Jackson, and that late eminent chemist, Dr. 
Gay, and to Dr. Crossley. In consequence of the lamented death of Dr. Gay, 
his examinations were not finished, but have since been concluded by Dr. 
Jackson and Dr. Crossley. They have testified that, in their opinion, the 
vessels of this body had not been so injected. Besides, there is evidence show- 
ing that there was a distinct vault, designed and adapted for the purpose, into 
which all remains of anatomical subjects were thrown, and in which these 
remains, if parts of an anatomical subject, would naturally have been placed. 

§ 1067. ‘Then as to their being parts of the same body. If those portions 
found in the cellar, those found in the tea-chest, and the calcined portions of 
bone in the furnace all coincided with each other as one body, although it 
would not be conclusive evidence of that fact, it would be consistent with it, 
and not repugnant to it. This leads to the more direct and material question 
whether these were, in fact, the remains of Dr. Parkman. 

§ 1068. ‘There was evidence tending to show that when these parts were 
brought together and laid in juxtaposition, measuring those which were found, 
and estimating the size of those which were missing, they corresponded in 
height and figure with those of Dr. Parkman. The results of this analysis 
and admeasurement are given in the testimony of the medical witnesses, espe- 
cially of Dr. Wyman, and the report which, without objection, was submitted 
to you. Mr. Shaw, a relative of Dr. Parkman, who had known him long and 
intimately, examined these remains, and says they very much resemble those of 
Dr. Parkman. They corresponded in height and size, and in the color of the 
hair on the breast and leg, and there was nothing dissimilar about them from 
what he knew of Dr. Parkman, and he took charge of them as his remains. 

§ 1069. ‘Here is one of those cases to which the rules of evidence apply, 
to which I called your attention in speaking of circumstantial evidence. If 

844 


BOOK VI.| WEBSTER’S CASE. [§ 1071 


this testimony had alone been relied on as proof of identity, though tending 
to create a strong probability, it would have left that fact still doubtful; be- 
cause parts of the body are wanting, such as the head, including the features 
and countenance—the parts by which the identity of the person is usually 
established. But certainly this is not the only mode in which identity may be 
proved; and in this case, had there been marks upon the portions of the body 
found, and they could have been shown to be natural or artificial marks, ex- 
isting upon the body of Dr. Parkman, they would have tended to make out 
that point. Then the evidence arising from the teeth is relied on; and if the 
proof derived from this source is of a more conclusive kind, to establish the 
identity of these remains, with those of Dr. Parkman, then the fact that the 
remains corresponded in height, figure, color, and general appearance, with 
the person of Dr. Parkman, though not specific and direct enough of itself to 
prove identity, yet being consistent with, and not repugnant to it, would, to 
that extent, tend to make out that point and corroborate the identification. 

§ 1070. “You are next called to consider the proof arising from the re- 
mains of a set of artificial teeth, found in the furnace, as bearing on this same 
matter of identity. 

‘“‘T have already turned your attention to the question, whether these dif- 
ferent remains were parts of one body, and whether their condition and their 
situation were such as to indicate designed concealment: and, if so, whether 
proof of the identity arising from one portion does not tend in an equal degree, 
to prove the identity of the others. The fleshy portions, as well as the bones 
of the head and other extremities, and the artificial teeth, which we are now 
about more particularly to consider, were all found, as you will recollect, in 
the same apartment, or in the appurtenances connected with it: I mean the 
lower laboratory. From the furnace standing in that apartment, the coroner 
and the police officers, as they have told you, took out portions of bone, some 
partially calcined, and chiefly belonging to the head, together with parts of 
certain blocks of artificial mineral teeth. In the same place, intermingled with 
the slag, ashes, and the calcined bones, they also found a quantity of gold, so 
far as separated from the other substances by chemical processes, amounting 
to about a hundred and fifty grains. 

§ 1071. ‘It is certainly an interesting inquiry, whether teeth under such 
circumstances can be identified by those who have constructed and fitted them. 
The investigation is, in some respects, like that of fossil remains, the study of 
which has led to such wonderful discoveries. Through the pursuit of com- 
parative anatomy, such a minute and exact knowledge of the peculiarities of 
the lower orders of animals has been attained, that persons are able, from the 
examination of a single bone, to determine the character of the animal to 
which it belonged. This is carried still further in human anatomy; and it has 
been testified to you by Dr. Wyman, who has a high reputation in this branch 
of science, that, from a small piece of bone, it is practicable to determine the 
part of the head or body to which it belonged. He has exemplified this by 
placing together and showing, in the manner which he has particularly de- 
scribed to you, the connection of many of the small pieces of bone, belonging 
to the human head, especially the parts of the jaw, found in the furnace. 

845 


§ 1074] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


g§ 1072. ‘In connection with a similar kind of inquiry, your attention may 
now be properly called to an examination of the evidence arising from the dis- 
covery of these mineral teeth. It comes mainly from Dr. Keep and Dr. Noble. 

“Dr. Keep testifies, that about three years ago, he made and fitted a set of 
teeth for Dr. Parkman, a set for each jaw, consisting of manufactured artificial 
teeth, formed in combinations of three blocks to each jaw, and set upon gold 
plates, fitted and adjusted to the jaws. He states that several natural teeth 
and stumps remained, to which, as well as to the natural shape and peculiari- 
ties of the jaws, it was necessary that the plates should be adjusted and fitted. 
The gold had melted away; but the teeth, composed of a material not easily 
, acted on by fire, remained, preserving more or less of their original shape. 
Dr. Keep had also retained, and has produced here, marked with Dr. Park- 
man’s name, the metallic moulds in which the plates were formed. 

‘But it, is not necessary to restate Dr. Keep’s testimony particularly. The 
question is, whether he is able, by these means, and by his own memory, to. 
identify them as the teeth which he fitted for Dr. Parkman. He is of opinion 
that he can; and he gives you the means which he used, and generally, the 
ground and reasons for his opinion that these are the teeth of Dr. Parkman. 
You will judge of their weight, and of the credit due to this testimony. If it 
satisfies you beyond reasonable doubt that they were the teeth worn by Dr. 
Parkman, it would have a strong tendency to prove the identity of the re- 
mains. You will recollect the fact that Dr. Keep saw him wearing them 
within a week or two of his. disappearance, and the evidence arising from the 
condition of the teeth when they were found, tending to show that they had 
not been exposed suddenly to the action of heat, but that they were placed in 
the fire surrounded by some other substance, and heated gradually; an infer- 
ence tending to prove, in connection with other circumstances, that the head 
was placed in the furnace with the teeth then in it. © 

§ 1073. “Dr. Noble was an assistant of Dr. Keep at that time, and worked 
on the teeth which he made for Dr. Parkman; and as far as he goes he con- 
firms Dr. Keep. Dr. Morton was called on the other side: and on the whole, 
is of opinion that there is not enough in these blocks of teeth to enable a den- 
tist who made them to identify them. Drs. Harwood, Codman, and Tucker, 
all dentists, are of a contrary opinion, and believe that the maker could iden- 
tify such teeth. They all respectively give you the reasons for their opinions, 
which you will duly weigh and consider. You are to determine from all the 
evidence whether those were the teeth of Dr. Parkman, worn by him at the — 
time when he entered the college, and whether they belonged to the same 
body, with the other remains. If you should be of opinion that they did so 
belong, it will have a strong tendency with the other evidence before you to 
prove the fact of the death of Dr. Parkman. 

§ 1074. “The other positions taken by the prosecution in regard to the 
proof of the corpus delicti are, that Dr. Parkman entered the college appa- 
rently well, intending to return immediately, and take the parcel at the 
grocery, on his way home to his dinner; and that, if he came to his death at 
the college, it was not by accident or the visitation of Providence, because 
there would have been no motive on the part of anybody to prevent an imme- 

846 


BOOK VI.] WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 1077 


diate knowledge of the fact, or to conceal the body. It appears to us, there- 
fore, that proof of the corpus delictt, or actual death of the party by an act of 
violence in the present case, must depend principally upon proof of the identity 
of these remains. If this is not made out to the satisfaction of the jury, beyond 
reasonable doubt, then there is no sufficient proof that the dead body found 
was that of Dr. Parkman, and the proof of the corpus delicti, as offered by 
the prosecution, fails.” 

§ 1075. The defence taken by the prisoner’s counsel—who, whatever may 
have been the popular feeling at the time among those who did not understand 
the difficulties of their position, have been shown by the subsequent develop- 
ments to have discharged their most arduous task with consummate ability— | 
was chiefly a denial of the efficiency of the commonwealth’s evidence to con- 
vict, coupled, however, with the alternative that if the jury should be against 
them on this point, there was such evidence of provocation as to raise the 
question of degrees between manslaughter and murder. The prisoner, how- 
ever, was convicted of murder, and immediately after conviction applied to the 
Executive. for a rehearing, accompanying the application by a statement, in 
his own handwriting, in which he asseverated his innocence under the most 
solemn sanctions. This being denied, and the motion for a writ of error before 
the court having been refused, he then presented a petition for a commutation 
of his sentence, in which he contented himself simply with averring that the 
necessary ingredients of the crime of murder, viz., malice and premeditation, 
had never been found against him by the jury. He then proceeded to lay 
before the governor and council the following statement, which is of interest, 
so far as it throws light on the circumstantial evidence on which the conviction 
was had. Beyond this, however, it is entitled to very little credit. 


§ 1076. Professor Webster’s Confessional Statement, as reported to the 
Council by Rev. Dr. Putnam. 


““On Tuesday, the 20th of November, I sent the note to Dr. Parkman, 
which, it appears, was carried by the boy Maxwell. I handed it to Littlefield, 
unsealed. It was to ask Dr. Parkman to call at my rooms on Friday the 23d, 
after my lecture. He had become of late very importunate for his pay. He 
had threatened me with a suit, to put an officer into my house, and to drive 
me from my Professorship, if I did not pay him. The purport of my note was 
simply to ask the conference. I did not tell him in it what I could do, or what 
T had to say about the payment. I wished to gain, for those few days, a release 
from his solicitations, to which I was liable every day, on occasions and in a 
manner very disagreeable and alarming to me, and also to avert, for so long 
a time at least, the fulfilment of recent threats of severe measures. I did not 
expect to be able to pay him when Friday should arrive. My purpose was, 
if he should accede to the proposed interview, to state to him my embarrass- 
ments and utter inability to pay him at present, to apologize for those things 
in my conduct which had offended him, to throw myself upon his mercy, to beg 
for further time and indulgence for the sake of my family, if not for my own, 
and to make as good promises to him as I could have any hope of keeping. 

§ 1077. “I did not hear from him on that day or the next (Wednesday) ; 

847 


§ 1079] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


but I found that on Thursday he had been abroad in pursuit of me, though 
without finding me. I feared that he had forgotten the appointment, or else 
did not mean to wait for it. Ifeared he would come in upon me at my lecture 
hour, or while I was preparing my experiments for it, therefore I called at his 
house on that morning (Friday) between eight and nine o’clock to remind him 
of my wish to see him at the college at half-past one—my lecture closing at 
one. I did not stop to talk with him then; for I expected the conversation 
would be a long one, and I had my lecture to prepare for. It was necessary for 
me to save my time, and also to keep my mind free from other exciting mat- 
ters. Dr. Parkman agreed to call on me, as I proposed. 

§ 1078. ‘He came, accordingly, between half-past one and two. He came 
in at the lecture-room door. I was engaged in removing some glasses from 
my lecture-room table into the room in the rear, called the upper laboratory. 
He came rapidly down the steps and followed me into the laboratory. He 
immediately addressed me with great energy: ‘Are you ready for me, sir? 
Have you got the money?’ I replied, ‘No, Dr. Parkman;’ and was then 
beginning to state my condition, and make my appeal to him. He would not 
listen to me, but interrupted me with much vehemence. He called me ‘ scoun- 
drel’ and ‘liar,’ and went on heaping upon me the most bitter taunts and op- 
probrious epithets. While he was talking, he drew a handful of papers from 
his pocket, and took from among them my two notes, and also an old letter 
from Dr. Hosack, written many years ago, and congratulating him (Dr. P.) on 
his success in getting me appointed professor of chemistry. ‘ You'see,’ he said, 
‘IT got you into your office, and now I will get you out of it.’ He put back 
into his pocket all the papers, except the letter and the notes. I cannot tell 
how long the torrent of threats and invectives continued, and I now can recall 
to memory but a small portion of what he said. At first I kept interposing, 
trying to pacify him, so that I might obtain the object for which I sought the 
interview. But I could not stop him, and soon my temper was up. _ I forgot 
everything. I felt nothing but the sting of his words. I was excited to the 
highest degree of passion, and while he was speaking and gesticulating in the 
most violent and menacing manner, thrusting the letter and his fist into my 
face, in my fury I seized whatever thing was handiest—it was a stick of wood 
—and dealt him an instantaneous blow with all the force that passion could 
give it. I did not know, nor think, nor care where I should hit him, nor how 
hard, nor what the effect would be. It was on the side of his head, and there 
was nothing to break the force of the blow. He fell instantly upon the pave- 
ment. There was no second blow. He did not move. I stooped down over 
him and he appeared to be lifeless. Blood flowed from his mouth, andI got 
a sponge and wiped it away. I got some ammonia and applied it to his nose, 
but without effect. Perhaps I spent ten minutes in attempts to resuscitate 
him; but I found he was absolutely dead. In my horror and consternation I 
ran instinctively to the doors, and bolted them—the doors of the lecture-room 
and of the laboratory below. And then, what was I to do? 

§ 1079. “It never occurred to me to go out and declare what had been done, 
and obtain assistance. I saw nothing but the alternative of a successful re- 
moval and concealment of the body, on the one hand, and of infamy and 

848 


ee aaa 


BOOK VI.] WEBSTER’'S CASE. [$ 1080 


destruction on the other. The first thing I did, as soon as I could do any- 
thing, was to drag the body into the private room adjoining. There I took 
off the clothes, and began putting them into the fire that was burning in the 
upper laboratory. They were all consumed there that afternoon—with papers, 
pocket-book, or whatever else they may have contained. I did not examine 
the pockets nor remove anything except the watch. I saw that, or the chain 
of it, hanging out; and I took it and threw it over the bridge as I went to 
Cambridge. My next move was to get the body into the sink, which stands 
in the small private room. By setting the body partially erect against the 
corner, and getting up into the sink myself, I succeeded in drawing it up. 
There it was entirely dismembered. It was quickly done, as a work of terrible 
and desperate necessity. The only instrnment used was the knife found by the 
officers in the tea-chest, and which I kept for cutting corks. I made use of no 
Turkish knife, as it was called at the trial. That had long been kept on my 
parlor mantlepiece, at Cambridge, as a curious ornament. My daughters fre- 
quently cleaned it; hence the marks of oil and whiting found on it. I had 
lately brought it into Boston to get the silver sheath repaired. 

§ 1080. “While dismembering the body, a stream of Cochituate was running 
through the sink, carrying off the blood in a pipe that passed down through 
the lower laboratory. There must have been a leak in the pipe, for the ceiling 
below was stained immediately around it. 

“There was a fire burning in the furnace of the lower laboratory. Little- 
field was mistaken in thinking there never had been a fire there. He had pro- 
bably never kindled one, but I had done it myself several times. I had done 
it that day for the purpose of making oxygen gas. The head and viscera were 
put into that furnace that day, and the fuel heaped on. I did not examine 
that night to see to what degree they were consumed. Some of the extremi- 
ties, I believe, were put in there on that day. The pelvis and some of the 
limbs, perhaps all, were put under the lid of the lecture-room table, in what is 
called the WELL, a deep sink lined with lead. A stream of Cochituate was 
turned into it and kept running all Friday night. The thorax was put into a 
similar well in the lower laboratory, which I filled with water, and threw in a | 
quantity of potash, which I found there. This disposition of the remains was 
not changed until after the visit of the officers on Monday. 

“When the body had been thus all disposed of, I cleared away all traces of 
what had been done. I took up the stick with which the fatal blow had been 
struck. It proved to be the stump of a large grape-vine, say two inches in 
diameter, and two feet long. It was one of two or more pieces which I had 
carried in from Cambridge, long before, for the purpose of showing the effect 
of certain chemical fluids in coloring wood, by being absorbed into the pores. 
The grape-vine being a very porous wood, was well suited to this purpose. 
Another longer stick had been used as intended, and exhibited to the students. 
This one had not been used. I put it into the fire. I took up the two notes 
either from the table or the floor—I think the table—close by where Dr. P. 
had fallen. I seized an old metallic pen lying on the table, dashed it across 
the face and through the signatures, and put them into my pocket. I do not 
know why I did this rather than put them into the fire; for I had not consi- 

54 849 


—-§ 1082] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK YI. 


dered for a moment what effect either mode of disposing of them would have on 
the mortgage, or my indebtedness to Dr. P. and the other persons interested; 
and I had not yet given a single thought to the question, as to what account 
I should give of the objects or results of my interview with Dr. Parkman. 

§ 1081. ‘I never saw the sledge-hammer spoken of by Littlefield, and never 
knew of its existence: at least, I have no recollection of it. 

‘“T left the college to go home, as late as six o’clock. I collected myself as 
well as I could, that I might meet my family and others with composure. On 
Saturday, I visited my rooms at the college, but made no change in the dis- 
position of the remains, and laid no plans as to my future course. 

‘‘On Saturday evening I read the notice in the Transcript, respecting the 
disappearance. J was then deeply impressed with the necessity of immedi- 
ately taking some ground as to the character of my interview with Dr. P., for 
I saw that it must become known that I had such an interview, as I had 
appointed it, first, by an unsealed note on Tuesday, and on Friday had myself 
called at his house, in open day, and ratified the arrangement, and had there 
been seen, and probably overheard, by the man-servant ; and I knew not by 
how many persons Dr. P. might have been seen entering my rooms, or how 
many persons he might have told, by the way, where he was going. The 
interview would, in all probability, be known ; and I must be ready to explain 
it. The question exercised me much ; but on Sunday my course was taken. 
I would go into Boston and would be the first to declare myself the person, as 
yet unknown, with whom Dr. P. had made the appointment. I would take 
the ground that I had invited him to the college to pay him money, and that 
I had paid him accordingly. I fixed upon the sum by taking the small note 
and adding interest, which it appears I cast erroneously. 

“Tf I had thought of this course earlier I should not have deposited Pet- 
tee’s check for $90 in the Charles River Bank on Saturday, but should have 
suppressed it, as going so far towards making up the sum which I was to pro- 
fess to have paid the day before, and which Pettee knew I had by me at the 
hour of the interview. It had not occurred to me that I should ever show 
the notes cancelled in proof of the payment. If it had, I should have destroyed 
the large note, and let it be inferred it was gone with the missing man; andI 
should have only kept the small one, which was all that I could pretend to 
have paid. My single thought was concealment and safety. Everything else 
was incidental to that. I was in no state to consider my ulterior pecuniary 
interest. Money, though I needed it so much, was of no account with me in 
that condition of mind. If I had designed and premeditated the homicide of 
Dr. P. in order to get possession of the notes and cancel my debt, I not only 
should not have deposited Pettee’s check the next day, but I should have made 
some show of getting and having the money the morning before. I should 
have drawn my money from the bank, and taken occasion to mention to the 
cashier that I had a sum to take out that day for Dr. P., and the same to 
Henchman, when I borrowed the $10. I should have remarked that I was so 
much short of a large sum I had to pay to Parkman. I borrowed the money 
of Henchman, as mere pocket money for the day. 

§ 1082. “If I had intended the homicide of Dr. P., I should not have made 

850 


BOOK VI.] WEBSTER’S CASE. [$ 1082 


the appointment with him twice, and each time in so open a manner that 
other persons would almost certainly know of it. And I should not have 
invited him to my room at an hour when the college would have been so 
full of students and others, and an hour when I was most likely to receive 
calls from others; for that was an hour—just after the lecture—at which 
persons having business with me, or in my rooms, were always directed to call. 

“T looked into my rooms on Sunday afternoon, but did nothing. 

‘After the first visit of the officers, I took the pelvis and some of the 
limbs from the upper well, and threw them into the vault under the privy. 
I took the thorax from the well below, and packed it in the tea-chest, as 
found. My own impression has been, that this was not done until after the 
second visit of the officers, which was on Tuesday; but Kingsley’s testimony 
shows that it must have been done sooner. The perforation of the thorax 
had been made by the knife at the time of removing the viscera. 

“On Wednesday, I put on kindlings and made a fire in the furnace below, 
having first poked down the ashes. Some of the limbs—I cannot remember 
what ones or how many—were consumed at that time. This was the last I 
had to do with the remains. The tin box was designed to receive the 
thorax, though I had not coneluded where I. should finally put the box. 
The fish-hooks, tied up as grapples, were to be used for drawing up the parts 
in the vault, whenever I should determine how to dispose of them. And yet, 
strange enough, I had a confused double object in ordering the box and 
making the grapples. I had before intended to send such things to Fayal; 
—the box to hold plants and other articles which I wished to protect from 
salt water and the sea air—and the hooks to be used in obtaining coralline 
plants from the sea. It was this previously intended use of them that sug- 
gested and mixed itself up with the idea of the other application. I doubt, 
even now, to which use they would have been applied. I had not used the 
hooks at the time of the discovery. The tan that was put into the tea-chest was 
taken from a barrel of it that had been in the laboratory some time. The bag 
of tan brought in on Monday, was not used nor intended to be used. It 
belonged to a quantity obtained by me a long time ago for experiments in 
tanning, and was sent in by the family to get it out of the way. Its being 
sent just at that time was accidental. 

“T was not aware that I had put the knife into the tea-chest. 

‘The stick found in the saucer of ink was for making coarse diagrams on 
cloth. 

“The bunch of ‘filed’ keys had been long ago picked up by me in Fruit 
Street, and thrown carelessly into a drawer. I never examined them, and do 
not know whether they would fit any of the locks of the college or not. If 
there were other keys fitting doors with which I had nothing to do, I suppose 
they must have been duplicates, or keys of former locks, left there by the me- 
chanics or janitor. I know nothing about them, and should never be likely 
to notice them amongst the multitude of articles large and small, and of all 
kinds, collected in my rooms. ‘The janitor had furnished me a key to the dis- 
secting rooms for the admission of medical friends visiting the college; but I 
had never used it. 


851 


~§ 1084] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


§ 1083. ‘The nitric acid on the stairs was not used to remove spots of 
blood, but dropped by accident. 

‘“‘ When the officers called for me on Friday, 30th, I was in doubt whether 
I was under arrest, or whether a more strict search of my rooms was to be 
had ; the latter hypothesis being hardly less appalling than the former. When 
I found that we went over Oragie’s Bridge, I thought the arrest most probable. 
When I found that the carriage was stopping at the jail, I was sure of my 
fate, and before leaving the carriage I took a dose of strychnine from my 
pocket, and swallowed it. I had prepared it in the form of a pill before I left 
my laboratory on the 23d. I thought I could not bear to survive detection. 
I thought it was a large dose. The state of my nervous system probably 
defeated its action, partially. The effects of the poison were terrible beyond 
description. It was in operation at the college, and before I went there; but 
more severely afterwards. 

‘“‘T wrote but one of the anonymous letters produced at the trial—the 
one mailed at Hast Cambridge. The little bundle referred to in the letter 
detained by the jailer, contained only a little bottle of citric acid for domestic 
use. I had seen it stated in a newspaper that I had purchased a quantity of 
oxalic acid which it was presumed was to be used in removing blood-stains. I 
wished the parcel to be kept untouched, that it might be shown, if there shoul 
be occasion, what it really was I had purchased. 

‘“‘T have drawn up in separate papers an explanation of the use I intended 
to make of the blood sent for on Thursday, the 22d, and of the conversation 
with Littlefield about the dissecting-vault. 

“T think that Pettee, in his testimony at the trial, put too strongly my 
words about having settled with Dr. Parkman. Whatever I did say, of the 
kind, was predicated on the hope I entertained that I should be able to pacify 
Dr. Parkman, and make some arrangement with him; and was said in order 
to quiet Pettee, who was becoming restive under the solicitation of Dr. Park- 
man.’ 

The petition was unsuccessful, and the defendant was executed on August 
30th, 1850. 


II. THAT THE DEATH WAS FROM VIOLENCE. 


Ist. PoIsoNING. 


§ 1084. (a.) Measures to be taken by the prosecution when poisoning is 
suspected.—There should be a careful observation of the condition of the 
corpse, and of the peculiar indications upon it. Here it is that the services of 
an experienced and capable physician are most needed.(a) 

HKverything in which the poison could have been brought to the deceased, or 
in which it could have been retained, must be examined. All parts of the 
dwelling should be searched, in reference to glasses, boxes, or papers, in which 
poison, or the refuse of poison, may have been placed. This search should 
include utensils in which medicines taken by the deceased were placed. 

(a) See ante, §§ 501, 503, 514, 522, 563, 582, 622, 646, 700, 772. 
852 


BOOK VI.] | POISONING. — -[§ 1086 


_ The evacuations of the deceased, whether through vomiting or the stool, 
and particularly his urine, should be carefully preserved and tested. Arsenic, 
as has already been shown, frequently passes into the urine, and its presence 
there is a proof that the poison has entered into the system. So, also, towels 
or linen on which these evacuations may have dried, should be examined. 

Those parts of the body through which the poison may have passed, e. g., 
the mouth or sexual organs, and those on which it may have acted directly or 
by resorption, e. g., the stomach or liver, should be the object of examination. 
Particular poisons should be looked for in the organs which they may pecu- 
liarly touch, e. g., the bones, into which quicksilver and arsenic pass. 

§ 1085. In view of the expected medical and chemical examination, it is 
necessary to carefully separate and preserve all parts of the body in which 
poison may be traced, so that when the chemical analysis takes place, the 
parts may be kept free from foreign admixtures. The stomach, liver, and 
spleen should be separated and kept in distinct vessels. Should this precaution 
not be observed, poison, which may have merely touched the moutb, may be 
imbibed after death by other members, e. g., the liver or spleen, so as to pro- 
duce the belief that the whole system was pervaded by the poison, and from 
this, that a very large quantity had been administered. 

The vessels in which these parts of the body are placed, preparatory to 
examination, should be carefully cleansed, and should be closed and sealed, so 
as to prevent the interference of third parties. The orifices should be carefully 
closed so as to prevent evaporation, or the disturbance consequent on the in- 
trusion of air. 

It is important that the parts retained for examination should be as large 
is practicable. If only small fragments are kept, the materials for a broad 
analysis are narrowed, and the opportunity for a second or third examination 
prevented. 

§ 1086. In respect to the examination several cautions should be kept in 
mind. 

It is desirable, in the choice of experts, by whom the examination is to be 
made, to avoid mere neophytes, and to confine the selection to those who have 
kept up with the advance of science, who have the proper instruments and 
materials at their command (e. g. utensils and pure tests which can act as 
reagents), and who possess competent experience and skill. It is peculiarly 
important that the chemical examination should be committed to one who has 
made that department his specialty. 

Much embarrassment has arisen from confusing the provinces of the physi- 
cian and the chemist. According to Barse,(6) the cases have been frequent 
where there is an apparent conflict of testimony produced by the fact that the 
chemist, when examined on the trial, speaks from one stand-point, and the 
physician from another. The first is to be asked— 

(1.) Whether the substance given to him to analyze contains an agent which 

belongs to the elass of poisons : 


(b) Manuel de la Cour d’Assizes, p. 224, as quoted by Mittermaier in his das Ver- 
brechen der Vergiftung, &Xc. 


853 


§ 1087] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


(2.) What kind of poison it is : 

(3.) In what quantity it exists, though it is difficult and heer to decide 
in what quantity it was originally administered : 

(4.) How it may have been administered, which chemical analysis may 
sometimes determine as in the prosecution against the priest Maineri, 
where the question was whether the crime could be effected through 
poisoned cigars : 

(5.) Whether the poison was administered purely, or in common with other 
agents : 

(6.) Whether the substance analyzed could have come into the body through 
natural causes (e. g., as phosphorus through food). 

§ 1087. The physician’s province includes more particularly the question, 
whether the poison in the particular case, could have produced death. With 
this are connected the presumptions to be drawn from the discovery of sub- 
stances in the body which are used sometimes for medical purposes, sometimes 
for poisoning.(c) 


(c) Each new examination bears out the important conclusion, that a substance 
whose poisonous properties are in themselves active, may, through contact with other sub- 
stances, either entirely, or in great part, lose its peculiar properties. This may happen in 
various ways: (1.) When, in the case of certain sorts of poison, the poisonous sub- 
stance becomes inactive by uniting with substances which either neutralize its 
strength or form with it insoluble compounds; though it is to be observed that some 
poisons become more intense upon uniting with other substances, those, for example, 
which, by being externally applied, facilitate the entrance of the poison into the body, 
or which increase the excitement of the tissues by which it is diffused through the 
system. (2.) When the poison, after being administered, meets with antidotal sub- 
stances. This may happen when the poisoned person, either a short time before or 
immediately after the administration of the poison, has taken, as is often the case in 
food, substances which may act upon the poison so as to render it inactive. All these 
principles are important, not only in the investigation of the fact of poisoning, as 
whether the poison was the cause of death, if it appears that the union of the poison 
with other substances must have rendered it inactive; but also in the settlement of 
the question how far criminal attempt is suppposable in the case. 

We subjoin a recent case which illustrates this point :— 

A girl of fifteen years of age was tried before the Criminal Court of Verona, for 
a malicious attempt to poison her servant-woman with sulphuric acid. She mixed 
the poison in a glass in which some brandy was standing, which the woman was in 
the habit of taking before going to bed. Although the altered color of the liquid in 
the glass arrested the woman’s attention, she nevertheless took a swallow of it, but 
immediately spit it out when she perceived its burning taste, as did also another 
woman who tried the mixture. The girl confessed her crime, at first with the declara- 
tion that she had intended to kill her servant, but afterwards that she had only 
wished to give her a pain in the stomach. It appeared that 83 grains of sulphuric 
acid and 241 grains of brandy were in the glass. According to the opinion of the 
experts (two chemists and two physicians), the concentrated sulphuric acid, by being 
mixed with the brandy, had considerably lost its strength, being in great measure 
converted into acidum Hallert, which is used as a medicine. The investigation in 
relation to the matter of fact hinged principally upon the inquiry how far, in the mix- 
ture of sulphuric acid with a much greater proportion of liquor, the poisonous proper- 
ties of the former would be destroyed or weakened through the influence of the essen- 
tial oil of the brandy. On this point there is great difference of opinion, but it is to 
be remarked that never before, perhaps, in the annals of medical jurisprudence, have 
these points been so thoroughly discussed. The effect of the time during which the 
poison was subjected to the action of the diluting mixture was also a point of dispute, 
as also the determination of the condition under which the health of the poisoned 
person might be injured notwithstanding that the detection of the poison was so easy, 
and that she must have been warned against the mixture by its offensive taste. We may 
notice here the importance of the zndividuality of the servant-woman, and especially 
whether her sense of smell was delicate; whether she was in the habit of swallowing 
the liquor at a draught or of drinking it with pauses ; also whether she took the liquor 


854 


BOOK VI.] POISONING. [$ 1089 


§ 1088. The chemical examination, to be satisfactory, must go to show that the 
reigents employed in the detection of the poison were pure, and contained no 
elements likely to deposit the poison they were employed to discover. Some- 
times the presence of the poison is produced by the reigent. It is important, 
also, to show that the examination was adapted to the particular kind of 
poison which was sought. Poisons are very various in their action, some 
working the most energetically when they come to the stomach, some when 
they touch a place where the skin is removed, some at the spot they first reach, 
others only upon the system generally. The local effect also greatly varies. 
Mineral acids so disorganize the part that its whole structure is destroyed. 
Metallic poisons inflame and irritate, without immediately destroying the 
texture. Others—e. g., nicotine—without perceptible changes of structure, 
merely operate upon the sensitive parts of the organs with which they come in 
contact. These points should be kept in mind in directing the examination of © 
a chemical witness. 

§ 1089. In the examination of medical witnesses, the points are more nume- 
rous. The main question is of course whether the derangement under con- 
sideration was caused by poison. This involves the consideration, (1) of the 
chemical examinations, (2) of the symptoms of the malady, and (3) the appear- 
ances on the corpse. 

The symptoms of the malady fall within the physician’s peculiar province, 
and have been already discussed (ante, § 493, &.). On the second of these 
points, the journal or note-book of the physician may be brought in as corro- 
borating evidence, though it should be remembered that a physician in large 
business, when he makes his notes at the close of a day in which he has made 
many visits, is very apt to fail in a delicate discrimination of symptoms, and 
is at all events, where he suspects no imposition, likely to be influenced by the 
talk of those surrounding the patient. 

The testimony of persons attending the patient, though not in themselves 
experts, may be introduced as supplementary to that of the physician. It 
should be observed, however, that such witnesses are very easily deceived, and 
are apt to take strong prejudices, sometimes against the hypothesis of poison- 
ing, either to avoid the disgrace falling on the family, or from false sympathy 
with the accused, sometimes from passion or excitement, or the desire to shift 
the blame, in favor of that hypothesis. 


oftener in the dark, or near a light where its changed appearance would put her on 
her guard. The theory was advanced that the attempt was made with absolutely 
unfit, not to say inadequate means, and hence should be classed under the head of 
criminal attempt in the second degree. The Criminal Court, however, laying aside 
this theory, took the matter-of-fact view of the case, and sentenced the accused 
to five years’ severe imprisonment for attempt at murder by poison. The Court of 
Appeals of Venice, on the contrary, held that from the circumstances, the possibility 
of death should not be assumed, since according to the testimony of the experts, it 
could not have followed unless the poisonous drink had been taken in greater quan- 
tity. In this view the court acquitted the accused of attempt at murder, but con- 
demned her to two years imprisonment, for an attempt to inflict severe bodily harm. 
It is to be remarked in connection with this case, how important it is in a trial for 
poisoning to attend to the circumstance that the original nature of the poison may 
become changed by the medium in which it is administered, and especially that the 
time during which it is subjected to the action of the substance used for the mixture, 
and of the atmospheric air, may materially alter its poisonous properties. 


855 


§ 1092] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


§ 1090. Other facts should be noticed in this connection, such as complaints 
of the patient as to burning in the intestines, redness of the face, sweating, 
which symptoms should be always noticed. 

According to Mittermaier, from whose essay on the Crime of Poisoning (das 
Verbrechen der Vergiftung) we have reduced some of the above points, inquiries 
on the following topics should be submitted to the medical witnesses :— 

(1.) The condition of health of the deceased at the time when the poison 
was administered, involving the absence of sickness or of constitutional disease 
capable of producing death, down to this period. 

(2.) The conditions preceding the alleged poisoning, as whether the patient 
was in the habit of taking strong drinks, whether this occurred on the day 
when the disease broke out, what food he had been taking, and how far the 
same indications would have been produced if he had been overheated or 
caught cold, or had fallen into a violent passion. 

(3.) Those peculiar circumstances which from their rarity and general 
association with poisoning are supposed to have produced the latter, e. g., the 
sudden illness after eating or drinking of a person previously in good health. 
Jt should be observed, however, that such attacks often follow meals when the 
food was perfectly healthy, and that on the other hand poison in many cases 
does not work until some time after it has been received into the frame. 

(4.) The medicines, which the patient had taken, and particularly the anti- 
dotes, must be inquired into, since poisonous substances are often introduced 
through the antidotes themselves. 

(5.) Such circumstances as tend to show the possible agency of a natural 
disease, e. g., cholera. 

(6.) There should be a jealous scrutiny of any facts tending to show that 
poison may have been introduced by means of prior external and innocent 
applications. Madame Lacoste’s case is cited by Mittermaier as an illustration 
of the importance of this caution. In that case the appearance of arsenic was 
explained by the fact that the deceased had been for some time in the habit of 
using externally a salve, through which it is possible the poison may have 
been worked in. 

§ 1091. (7.) Appearances at the time of death, and changes in the corpse. 
Those who lay out the dead are often more observant and accurate, so far as 
extraordinary appearances are concerned, than casual observers. But it is 
not enough, to raise a rational presumption of poisoning, that the signs here- 
tofore mentioned, e. g., blotches, perforations, &c., should be noticed. These 
are the accompaniments of several natural diseases. On the other hand, these 
features should not be neglected, since there are many of them which tend to 
individuate the poison, as in the case of strychnine, where there is an extra- 
ordinary rigidity and long continued contraction of the muscles. The absence 
of these signs argue the non-administration of the particular poison. 

The microscopic methods of discovering poison has been already discussed. 
It is not necessary to do more now than to call the practitioner’s attention to 
them, as an important test. 

§ 1092. (b.) Chemical proof of the existence of poison in the stomach in 
sufficient quantities to have caused death, though important, is not essential to 

856 


BOOK VI.] POISONING. [$ 1093 


conviction.(d)—If the indictment charges poisoning, the administering of 
_ poison must be shown, either directly or inferentially. It is true that proof of 
the existence of poison in the body is an important item in such proof, but inde- 
pendently of the fact that such existence can be proved in other ways than by 
the absolute detection of the ingredient itself (e. g. by moribund appearances 
and peculiar pathological symptoms), the fact that poison was administered 
can be satisfactorily shown by proof of the potion being given, though there 
be no post-mortem examination at all. The case may be likened to that of a 
gunshot wound, received by a party on board ship, who is knocked overboard 
by the shock and whose body is lost. If the gun is found to have been 
levelled—if it is shown to have been loaded—if upon the discharge the party 
falls—it is not necessary to show the ball in his body, or even to prove the 
wound. It is true that the non-production of this species of proof can only 
be excused by necessity: but such necessity occasionally exists in death by 
poisoning, as well as death from gunshot wounds. When therefore a chemi- 
cal analysis is unattainable, the rule is—as will be seen from an examination 
of the cases cited hereafter, particularly that of Tawell—that it is not indis- 
pensable to a conviction when there is satisfactory evidence of guilt aliwnde.(e) 
And this rule peculiarly applies where those charged with guilt are the agents 
by whom the prevention of a post-mortem was effected. Hitzig gives us a 
pregnant illustration of this in the case of a woman in Brussels, who, in order 
to cause the symptoms of the projected poison to create as little surprise as 
possible, gave out from time to time, beforehand, that her imbecile husband, 
who was the intended victim, was subject to “fits,” of very much the same 
nature as those which she expected the poison to produce. Her object, as it 
afterwards appeared, was to produce in his family, who saw him but rarely, 
the impression that this case, when it occurred, was merely a repetition of 
former attacks: and she followed this up by the attempt to prevent a post- 
mortem. Of course, such efforts as these, instead of protecting the criminal, 
expose him to a new and most formidable class of suspicions; for there is no 
item in indicatory evidence in cases of poisoning so strong as that which arises 
from an attempt to obliterate the indicia of guilt. 

§ 1093. On the other hand, if it is in the power of the prosecution to pro- 
duce before the court the opinion of experts as to the contents of the deceased’s 
stomach, an omission to do this is a culpable neglect, which becomes the more 
mischievous from the fact that it is a general rule of law, that secondary evi- 
dence is inadmissible when primary can be obtained. And even if this strict 
rule does not apply to cases where, instead of an examination of the stomach, 
which could have been had, less positive tests are offered—and the tendency 
of authority is, that as a technical bar it does not—yet the defendant, who 
has been excluded from this opportunity by the exclusive control of the law, 
can with great force ask the jury to infer that had this final test been referred 
to, it would have demonstrated his innocence. i 


(d) This position is fully sustained in Palmer’s case, to be hereafter considered, post, 
§ 1110. 
(e) See as to nature and character of post-mortem, ante, §§ 501-505, 515-523, 537, 
646-679, 748-772, 942-962. 
857 


§ 1095] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


§ 1094. ‘The moral evidence from the conduct of the accused,” says Mr. 
Wills,(/) from whose summary we have drawn the statement of several of the 
following cases, “his antipathies and other motives—his possession of the 
means of death, especially if unexplained by any circumstance to account for it 
upon an innocent hypothesis—his declarations—his falsehoods, subterfuges, 
and evasions to prevent examination of the body, or to induce premature 
interment—and many other suspicious circumstances, constitute very material 
parts of the ves gestee, and furnish a clue to the explanation of facts which 
would otherwise be inexplicable. It is perfectly clear that by the law of 
England all such facts afford a competent and relevant evidence, from which 
can be inferred the criminal administration of poison.”’ 

§ 1095. (c.) Summary of reported cases.—The first common law case in 
which the subject was minutely considered is that of John Donellan, an 
English gentleman of respectability, who was tried at Warwick Spring As- 
sizes in 1781, before Mr. Justice Butler, for the murder of Sir Theodosius 
Boughton, his brother-in-law, a young man possessed of an estate of about 
two thousand pounds per annum, which, on his death without issue, descended 
to the defendant’s wife. The evidence was, that the deceased, until the illness 
which resulted in his death, had been enjoying good health and spirits, his 
only complaint being a slight ailment, for which he occasionally took a laxa- 
tive draught. The family, including Mrs. Donellan, the deceased’s sister, and 
Lady Boughton, his mother, lived together at Lawford Hall, the family 
mansion. 

For some time before the death of Sir Theodosius, the prisoner had on 
several occasions falsely represented his health to be very bad, and his life to be 
precarious. On the 29th of August, the apothecary sent him a mild and 
harmless draught, to be taken the next morning. In the evening the deceased 
went out fishing, and the prisoner told his mother that he had been out with 
him, and that he had imprudently got his feet wet, both of which representa- 
tions were false. When he was called the following morning, he was in good 
health ; and about seven o’clock his mother went to his chamber for the pur- 
pose of giving him his draught, of the smell and nauseousness of which he 
immediately complained, and he remarked that it smelt like bitter almonds. 
In about two minutes he struggled very much, as if to keep the medicine down, 
and Lady Boughton observed a gurgling in his stomach; in ten minutes he 
seemed inclined to dose, but in five minutes afterwards she found him with his 
eyes fixed, his teeth clenched, and froth running out of his mouth; and within 
half an hour after taking the draught, he died. Lady Boughton ran down 
stairs to give orders to a servant to go for the apothecary, who lived about 
three miles distant: in less than five minutes the prisoner came into the bed- 
room, and after she had given him an account of the manner in which Sir 
Theodosius had been taken, he asked where the physic-bottle was, and she 
showed him the two bottles. The prisoner then took up one of them, and 
said, “Is this it ?”’ and being answered, ‘‘ Yes,”’ he poured out some water out 
of the water-bottle, which was near with the phial, and shook it, and then 


(/) Circumstantial Evidence, 187. 
858 


BOOK VI.] DONELLAN’S CASE, [$ 1095 


emptied it into some dirty water which was in a wash hand-basin. Lady 
Boughton said, ‘You should not meddle with the bottle ;”’ upon which the 
prisoner snatched up the other bottle and poured water into that also, and 
shook it, and then put his finger in and tasted it. Lady Boughton asked him 
what he was about, and said he ought not to meddle with the bottles; on 
which he replied that he did it to taste it, though he had not tasted the first 
bottle. The prisoner ordered a servant to take away the basin, the dirty things, 
and the bottles, and put the bottles in her hands for that purpose; she put 
them down again on being directed by Lady Boughton to do so, but subse- 
quently removed them, on the peremptory order of the prisoner. On the 
arrival of the apothecary, the prisoner said that the deceased had been out on 
the preceding evening, fishing, and had taken cold; but he said nothing of the 
draught which he had taken. ‘The prisoner had a still in his own room, 
which he had used for distilling roses; and a few days after the death of Sir 
Theodosius, he brought it, full of wet lime, to one of the servants to be cleaned. 
The prisoner made several false and inconsistent statements to the servants as 
to the cause of the young man’s death; and on the day of his death he wrote 
to Sir William Wheeler, his guardian, to inform him of the event, but made 
no reference to’ its suddenness. The coffin was soldered up on the fourth day 
after the death. Two days afterwards, Sir William Wheeler, in consequence 
of the rumors which had reached him of the manner of Sir Theodosius’s death, 
and that suspicions were entertained that he had died from the effect of poisons, 
wrote a letter to the prisoner requesting that an examination might take place, 
and mentioning the gentlemen by whom he wished it might be conducted. 
The prisoner accordingly sent for them, but did not exhibit Sir William 
Wheeler’s letter, alluding to the suspicion that the deceased had been poi- 
soned, nor did he mention to them that they were sent for at his request. 
Having been induced by the prisoner to suppose the case to be one of ordinary 
sudden death, and finding the body in an advanced state of putrefaction, the 
medical gentlemen declined to make the examination, on the ground that it 
might be attended with personal danger. On the following day, a medical 
man who had heard of their refusal to examine the body, offered to do so; but 
the prisoner declined the offer on the ground that he had not been directed to 
send for him. On the same day the prisoner wrote to Sir William Wheeler a 
letter, in which he stated that the medical men had fully satisfied the family ; 
and endeavored to account for the event by the ailment under which the 
deceased had been suffering : but he did not state that they had not made the 
examination. Three or four days afterwards, Sir William Wheeler having 
been informed that the body had not been examined, wrote to the prisoner, 
insisting that it should be done; which, however, he prevented by various dis- 
ingenuous contrivances, and the body was interred without examination. In 
the mean time, the circumstances having become known by the coroner, he 
caused the body to be disinterred and examined on the eleventh day after death. 
Putrefaction was found to be far advanced; and the head was not opened nor 
the bowels examined, and in other respects the examination was incomplete. 
When Lady Boughton, in giving evidence before the coroner’s inquest, related 
the circumstance of the prisoner having rinsed the bottles, he was observed to 
859 


§ 1097] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK IV. 


~ take hold of her sleeve, and endeavored to check her; and he afterwards told 
her that she had no occasion to have mentioned that circumstance, but only to 
answer such questions as were put to her; and in a letter to the coroner and 
jury, he endeavored to impress them with the belief that the deceased had 
inadvertently poisoned himself with arsenic, which he had purchased to kill 
fish. Upon the trial, four medical men——three physicians and an apothecary 
were examined on the part of the prosecution, and expressed a very decided 
opinion—mainly grounded upon the symptoms, the suddenness of the death, 
and the post-mortem appearances, the smell of the draught, as observed by 
Lady Boughton, and the similar effects produced by experiments upon ani- 
mals—that the deceased had been poisoned with laurel-water ; and one of 
them stated that, on opening the body, he had been affected with a biting, 
acrimonious taste, like that which affected him in all the subsequent experi- 
ments with laurel-water. An eminent surgeon and anatomist, examined on 
the part of the prisoner, stated a positive opinion that the symptoms did not 
necessarily lead to the conclusion that the deceased had been poisoned, and 
that the appearances presented upon dissection explained nothing but putre- 
faction. The prisoner was convicted and executed.(q) e 
§ 1097. A surgeon and apothecary, named Donnall, was tried at Launces- 
ton Spring Assizes, in 1817, before Mr. Justice Abbott, for the murder of 
Mrs. Elizabeth Downing, his mother-in-law. The terms on which the parties 
lived were such as to supply no presumption, and the only motive that could 
be assigned was, that the deceased was possessed of a little property, which 
the prisoner, who was in somewhat straitened circumstances, would receive 
on her death. On the 19th of October, the deceased drank tea at the pri- 
soner’s house, and returned home much indisposed, retching and vomiting, 
with a violent cramp in her legs, from which she did not recover for several 
days. On Sunday, the 3d of November, after returning from church, she 
dined at home on boiled rabbits, smothered with onions, and, upon the invita- 
tion of her daughter, drank tea in the evening at the prisoner’s house, with a 
family party. The prisoner handed to the deceased cocoa and bread and 
butter, proceeding towards her chair by a circuitous route; and while she was 
drinking the second cup, she complained of sickness and went home, where she 
was seized with retching and vomiting, and attended with frequent cramps ; 
and then a violent purging took place, and at eight o’clock the same morning 
she died. To a physician called in two or three hours before her death, he 
stated that she had an attack of cholera morbus. The nervous coat of the 
stomach was found to be partially inflamed, or stellated in several places, and 
the villous coat was softened by the action of some corrosive substance; the 
bloodvessels of the stomach were turgid; and the intestines, particularly near 
the stomach, inflamed. The contents of the stomach were placed in a jug, in 
a room to which the prisoner (to whom at that time no suspicion attached) 
had access; and it appeared that he had clandestinely tampered with those 
contents, by throwing them into another vessel containing a quantity of water. 
The prisoner proposed that the body should be interred the following Wednes- 


(g) Wills’ Circumstantial Evidence, 197. 
860 


BOOK VI.] DONNALL’S CASE. Beene F 


day, assigning as a reason, for so early an interment, that, from the state of 
the corpse, there would be danger in keeping it longer. This representation 
was entirely untrue. He also evinced much eagerness to accelerate the prepa- 
rations for the funeral, urging the person who had charge of it, and the men 
who were employed in making the vault, to unusual exertions. The physician 
called in to the deceased, concluded from the shortness of the illness, and the 
morbid appearances, that she had died from the effects of some active poison; 
and in order to discover the particular poison, supposed to have been used, he 
applied to the contents of the stomach the chemical tests of the ammoniacal 
sulphate of copper, or common blue vitriol and the ammoniacal nitrate of 
silver or lunar caustic in solution, which severally yielded the characteristic 
appearances of arsenic: the ammoniacal sulphate of copper producing a green 
precipitate, whereas a blue precipitate is formed if no arsenic be present; and 
the ammoniacal nitrate of silver producing a yellow precipitate, instead of a 
white precipitate resulting, if arsenic be not present. He stated that he con- 
sidered these tests infallible, and that he had used them because they would 
detect a minuter portion of arsenic; on which account he considered it to be 
more proper for the occasion, as, from the appearance of the tests, he found 
there could not be much. Concluding that bile had been taken into the sto- 
mach, he mixed some bile with water and applied some tests, but found no in- 
dication of the presence of arsenic: from which he inferred that the presence 
of bile would not alter the conclusion which he had previously drawn Hav- 
ing been informed that the deceased had been eating onions, he boiled some in 
water; and after pouring off the water in which they were boiled, he poured 
boiling water over them, and left them stand for some time, after which he 
applied the same tests to the solution thus procured, and ascertained that it 
did not produce the characteristic appearances of arsenic. The witness, upon 
his cross-examination, admitted that the symptoms and appearances were such 
as might have been occasioned by some other cause than poisoning ; that the 
reduction test would have been infallible; and that it might have been adopted 
in the first instance, and might also have been tried upon the matter which 
had been used for the other experiments. Upon his re-examination he ac- 
counted for his omission of the reduction test, by stating that the quantity of 
matter left after the frequent vomitings and the other experiments would have 
been too small, and that it would not have been so correct to use the matter 
which had been subjected to the preceding experiments, and that the tests he 
used would detect a more minute quantity of arsenic. It was clear, therefore, 
that no sufficient reason existed, why, if arsenic had been contained in the 
stomach, it had not been reproduced either by an original experiment, or ex- 
periments upon the matter to which the other tests had been applied, and that 
its dilution had not rendered the experiment by reduction impracticable, but 
only more dilatory and troublesome. It was deposed by several medical wit- 
nesses, called on the part of the prisoner, that the symptoms and morbid 
appearances, though they were such as might, and did commonly denote poi- 
-soning, did not exclude the possibility that death might have been occasioned 
by cholera morbus or some other disease; that the tests actually resorted to 
861 


§ 1097] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


were fallacious, and produced the same characteristic appearances upon their 
application to innocent matter, viz: the ammoniacal sulphate of copper pro- 
ducing the green, and the ammoniacal nitrate of silver producing the yellow 
precipitate, in being applied to an infusion of onions; and that the experi- 
ment with the bile was also fallacious, since, from the presence of phosphoric 
acid, which is contained in all fluids of the human body, the same colored pre- 
cipitate would be thrown down by putting lunar caustic into a solution of 
phosphate of soda. It was to no purpose to urge that a decoction of onions 
was not the same thing as that particular preparation of onions of which the 
deceased had partaken, and that in the hands of the witness for the prosecu- 
tion this experiment had been attended with a different result. The facts 
adduced by the prisoner’s witnesses conclusively proved that the appearances, 
produced by the tests employed, might have been produced by some other 
cause than the presence of arsenic, and therefore, that they were fallacious and 
inconclusive, while an infallible test might have been resorted to. Mr. Justice 
Abbott told the jury that ‘‘ these were two important questions ; first, did the 
deceased die of poison, and if they should be of opinion that she did, then, 
whether they were satisfied from the evidence, that the poison was administered 
by the prisoner or by his means ? There were some parts of the evidence which 
appeared to him equally applicable to both questions, and those parts were 
what related to the conduct of the prisoner during the time of the opening 
and inspection of the body ; his recommendation of a shell and the early burial ; 
to which might be added the circumstances, not much to be relied upon, rela- 
tive to his endeavors to evade his apprehension.’’ The learned judge also 
said, ‘‘ If the evidence as to the opinions of the learned persons who have been 
examined on both sides, should lead you to doubt whether you should attribute 
the death of the deceased to arsenic having been administered to her, or to the 
disease called cholera morbus—then, as to this question, as well as the other 
question, the conduct of the prisoner is most material to be taken into con- 
sideration ; for he being a medical man could not be ignorant of many things, 
as to which ignorance might be shown in other persons; he could hardly be 
ignorant of the proper mode of treating cholera morbus—he could not be 
ignorant that an early burial was not necessary ; and when an operation was 
to be performed, in order to discover the cause of the death, he should not 
have shown a backwardness to acquiesce in it; and when it was performing, 
and he attending, he could not surely be ignorant that it was material for the 
purposes of the investigation that the contents of the stomach should be pre- 
served for minute examination.’’ He continued, ‘‘ the conduct of the prisoner, 
his eagerness in causing the body to be put into a shell, and afterwards to be 
interred speedily, was a circumstance most material for their consideration 
with reference to both the questions he had stated ; for, although the examina- 
tion of the body in the way set forth, and the experiments that were made, 
might not lead to a certain conclusion as to the charge stated, that the deceased 
got her death by the poison administered to her by the prisoner, yet, if the 
prisoner as a medical man, had been so wicked as to administer that poison, - 
he must have known that the examination of the body would divulge it.” 
862 


BOOK VI.] ANONYMOUS CASE. r§ 1099 


§ 1098. In a ease reported by Mr. Wills(h), a woman whose name is not 
given by him, was tried in 1835, before the Recorder of Bristol, for the murder 
of a widow about 60 years of age, who was possessed of considerable property 
in money, and after living in lodgings in various places for several years went 
to live with the prisoner, who kept a lodging-house in Bristol. The evidence 
was, that in October, 1833, the deceased became indisposed from a cold, and in 
the evening of the 26th of that month, the prisoner gave her some gruel, into 
which she was observed by a young woman, hired to wait on the deceased, to 
put some pinches of yellow powder, which she stated to be to relieve her from 
pain, taking care, however, to afterwards twice wash her hands. She then 
told the servant not to take anything out of the vessels used by the deceased, 
falsely representing her to be dirty in her habits, and cautioned her not to tell 
the deceased that she had put anything in her gruel, representing that if she 
knew there was anything in it she would not take it. The prisoner carried 
away what was left of the gruel; and a few minutes after the deceased had 
taken it she complained of being poorly, and in half an hour became ill, vomit- 
ing, purging, and violent pain ensued, and in about two hours she expired. 
The prisoner had employed a man about six days previously to purchase 
arsenic to poison rats, a pretext which was proved to be groundless. The 
deceased was buried on the 28th of October, and her friends did not hear of her 
death until many months afterwards. From the change which took place in the 
prisoner’s habits and mode of living immediately afterwards, from her denial 
that the deceased had left any property, and from some other circumstances, 
suspicions were excited, and the corpse was disinterred and examined on the 
24th of December, 1834, and found to be in a remarkable state of preservation. 

§ 1099. “The mucous membrane of the stomach and duodenum,”’ says Mr. 
Wills, “‘ was smeared very thickly with a large quantity of yellow substance, 
which penetrated in patches the coats of the stomach and intestines; and 
where the spots had penetrated, the inside of the intestinal canal was stained 
to a much greater extent than the outside, so that it must have penetrated 
from the interior to the exterior, as would be the effect of the matter having 
been taken into the stomach. The yellow powder found in the stomach was 
submitted to various experiments. Having been dried, some of it was tritu- 
rated with carbonate of soda and charcoal, and introduced into a reducing tube, 
and immediately a volatile metallic body was formed, which was metallic 
arsenic; the metallic arsenic was then oxidized, when it sublimed into a white 
volatile oxide, which was characteristic of arsenious acid ; a solution was then 
made of the oxide in two drops of water and a small portion of ammoniacal 
nitrate of silver was added, when there was formed the characteristic lemon 
yellow precipitate. In another portion a minute quantity of ammoniacal sul- 
phate of copper was put, which immediately produced the green precipitate 
of Scheele. Afterwards a larger quantity was reduced, and a stream of sul- 
phuretted hydrogen gas passed through it, and the original orpiment or sul- 
phurate of arsenic reproduced. These various experiments were repeated five 
or six times, and uniformly with the same results. The stomach was then 


(h) Circumstantial Evidence, 196. 
863 


§$ 1100] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING, [BOOK VI. 


washed in water, and the substance allowed to precipitate and dried up, was 
weighed and found to contain seventeen grains. Lastly, the animal matter 
was destroyed and the arsenic dissolved, and the sulphur turned into sulphuric 
acid and precipitated by sulphuretted hydrogen gas, which reproduced sul- 
phuret of arsenic. From thirteen grains of the mixed matter were obtained 
four grains of sulphuret of the arsenic; and there was still some portions ad-, 
hering to the stomach which could not be washed off; and some had been 
evacuated by vomiting,’’(z) The prisoner was convicted and executed. 

§ 1100. In 1831, Lucretia Chapman, otherwise called Lucretia Espos y 
Mina, and Lino Amalie Espos y Mina, were tried in Bucks County, Pennsyl- 
vania, before Judge Fox, the county judge, for the murder, by poisoning, of 
William Chapman, the former husband of the female defendant. Mrs. Chap- 
man, which was the name that she continued to bear during the trial, notwith- 
standing her intermediate marriage with Mina, her co-defendant, was a woman 
about forty years of age, of respectable family and acquirements, a native of 
Massachusetts, and for many years a resident of Pennsylvania. In her earlier 
life she had been engaged as a teacher in one or two vrivate schools in Phila- 
delphia, but marrying the deceased, who was an Englishman, and who was 
possessed of a very successful method of curing persons having obstructions of 
the speech, they opened together in that city a school for this purpose, which 
they afterwards removed to a place called Andalusia, near the Delaware, about 
twelve miles north of Philadelphia. For several years before her husband’s 
death she had assumed the main management of the institution; and the 
evidence showed that she had been accustomed to domineer over him with 
some asperity. He was then approaching sixty years of age, of good charac- 
ter and good habits, and possessed of generally good health. They had seve- 
ral children, the oldest of whom was a girl, about fifteen years old. The 
remaining defendant, Lino Espos y Mina, as he called himself at the time, 
though he had borne one or two aliases, was scarcely more than twenty-two, 
and made his first appearance in America, as far as could be traced, in the 
Philadelphia County prison, where he had been sent in 1830 for some small 
larcenies. After remaining there nearly a year, he was pardoned by the 
Governor, on a recommendation from the inspectors, chiefly induced by his 
own representations ; and he proceeded at once—it was the month of May— 
to take up his journey northward on foot. Late in the evening he arrived at 
Mr. Chapman’s house, where he knocked and begged food and lodging. Mr. 
Chapman at first refused to receive him, but Mrs. Chapman, who appeared to 
be a woman of kindly disposition so far as relieving the distressed was con- 
cerned, obtained permission for him to remain during the night. In the mean 
time, by a most absurd and yet showy system of lies, he succeeded in gaining the 
confidence of both husband and wife, and in due season the passionate attach- 
ment of both. Had his hosts possessed any discernment, or made any inquiry, 
they would soon have discovered the fraud ; but so easy was the temper of the 
husband, and so infatuated was the wife, that they fell at once into toils which 
certainly were neither strong nor subtle. He told them that his father was 


(2) Wills on Circumstantial Evidence, 198. 


864 


BOOK VI.] CHAPMAN'S CASE. [$ 1100 


General Mina, Governor of California—that he had been educated in the city 
of Mexico, by a grandfather—that his mother was immensely rich, owning a 
gold mine—that he had been sent to Europe to travel with a physician, a 
friend of the family, who had died suddenly, leaving him without the means 
to find his way back—that he was reduced in this way to the greatest straits— 
that his want of education was to be attributed to the manner of his bringing 
up, having been over-indulged by a grandfather, himself illiterate—and that 
immense means were at his command, if he could only obtain a temporary 
home to remain at until he could hear from his friends. The cupidity of Mrs. 
Chapman was first appealed to by a promise of several thousand dollars, as a 
consideration for her teaching him English; and then, when an unnatural 
passion was excited in her, her duty to her husband gave way before a deter- 
mination to surrender herself to the object of her infatuated desires, cost what 
it may. Among other tricks to enforce upon her credulity and that of her 
husband, he resorted to the following: He induced Mrs. Chapman to drive 
him to the city, for the purpose of visiting the Mexican Consul, Colonel 
‘Cuesta, a gentleman of undoubted character. He managed matters so as to. 
obtain an invitation to dinner from the latter, using his attendance on Mrs.. 
Chapman as a pledge of his respectability, and using his invitation to dinner: 
to impress on Mrs. Chapman a continued belief in the accuracy of his story. 
Stepping into a drug store, he persuaded a gentleman there, who spoke Spanish, 
to write a letter for him, and giving his own name as Cuesta, he dictated, in 
the latter character, a letter to Mr. and Mrs. Chapman, thanking them for 
their kindness to his “unfortunate countryman’? Don Lino y Mina. The 
result was, if the usual presumptions to be drawn from this species of cireum-. 
stantial evidence were to be applied, and if Mina’s subsequent declarations are 
to be credited, a sexual intimacy between Mina and Mrs. Chapman, which was 
accompanied by a change in her feelings to her husband from love to disgust 
and hatred. On the 16th of June, in the same year, scarcely six weeks after 
his first acquaintance with the family, Mina proceeded to Philadelphia, nomi- 
nally on other business, but when there bought a quarter of a pound of arsenic, 
the object avowed by him being the preparation of birds. ‘The next day after 
his return, Mr. Chapman was taken sick. At first the illness was so slight 
that the physician who was called in did not at the time deem it necessary to 
visit him again. He grew better, and on the 20th, Mrs. Chapman prepared 
for him some chicken soup, which she took from the kitchen to the parlor; for 
he purpose, as she said, of seasoning it. When the soup was taken to the 
parlor she and Mina were the only persons left in the room. Mr. Chapman 
took a small quantity, and the remainder was thrown into the yard. It was 
a remarkable feature in the case, that it appeared in evidence that a party of 
about forty ducks belonging to a neighbor, visited Mr. Chapman’s yard on 
that day, and with the exception of four, who could not get over the fence, all 
died. Immediately after taking the soup Mr. Chapman grew worse, com- 
plaining of burning heat in the stomach. A friend calling and seeing him in 
this distressed situation, advised the calling in of a physician, which the wife 
resisted. On the 22d he seemed much worse, and on the evening of that day 
a physician was called in, but ineffectually. The next day he died. On July 
5d 865 


§ 1100] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


5th his wife and Mina were married, though privately. The fact, however, 
having leaked out, and other circumstances attracting suspicion, the body was 
disinterred, and a chemical examination had, under the direction of Dr. J. K. 
Mitchell, who thus stated the result :— 

“On the 22d of September, 1831, Dr. Hopkinson brought to my library, in 
Philadelphia, a jar containing a stomach, and about six inches of the intestine 
nearest the stomach, called the duodenum, which he told me was the stomach 
of Mr. Chapman, which he had disinterred somewhere on the Bristol road. 
In his and Mr. Clemson’s presence, an examination of this stomach and intes- 
tine was made. The exterior appearance of the stomach differed much from 
that of the duodenum. The duodenum was nearly that of a white color, such 
as a healthy duodenum appears. The stomach was much darker, and had a 
reddish tint—it might be said to be a dark gray, tinged with red. The larger 
vessels of the stomach could be traced by a stronger red color, but of the same 
description of color. The smell of the whole was very peculiar, such as I 
have never before perceived. Upon consultation, we came to the conclusion 
that it most resembled the smell of dried Scotch herring. We proceeded then” 
to open the stomach, which was tied at its upper orifice, a string being ap- 
plied likewise to the other end of the intestine, so as to include the contents 
of the stomach. Upon laying open the stomach and intestines, we found 
them empty; there being nothing in them but a thin layer of matter, which 
was attached to the sides of the stomach. Through this adhesive mucus, 
which lined the stomach, we could, in many places, perceive the color of the 
lining coat, or the internal membrane of the stomach, which, wherever it 
showed itself, appeared of a red color. In some places the course of larger 
vessels than those that give the general color could be traced by a more dis- 
tinct redness. It appeared as if the blood had spread from the sides of these 
vessels, the deepest color being in the middle line, gradually fading until the 
color became that of the walls of the stomach generally. Nothing appeared 
remarkable in the duodenum, except the pale straw-yellow color of its internal 
surfaces. As Mr. ©. had been said to be poisoned by arsenic, and as the most 
usual arsenical preparation used in poisoning is not very soluble in water, I 
passed my finger over the whole in ternal lining, feeling the mucus which lined 
it, for the purpose of ascertaining if anything gritty could there be found. In 
this manner and by examination with the eye, we failed to discover any solid 
body or particle, in any part of the stomach or attached duodenum. As the 
stomach contained nothing, and as no particles of any sort could be discovered 
in it, the detection of arsenic or of any other poison presented a probable dif- 
ficulty. It was, therefore, thought best to scrape off from the internal walls 
of the stomach, the viscid mucus, with which it was lined; to subject that to 
one method of analysis, and the solid stomach and intestines to another. In 
the attempt to remove the mucus, which was done with a smooth edged bone 
spoon, it was found in some places to be so much attached, as to bring with it 
the internal coat of the stomach, which appeared in some places to have been 
loosened from its cellular attachments to the muscular coat, by a very thin 
plate of what appeared to be effused blood. A little water was passed 
over the inner surface of the stomach after scraping, for the purpose of the 

866 ; 


BOOK VI.] CHAPMAN'S CASE. [$ 1100 


better observing its condition ; that water was added to the mucus which had 
been scraped off. Then the stomach appeared to be less regularly red than 
might have been inferred from the examination before the mucus was re- 
moved. Then there appeared many red spots, especially around the first open- 
ing of the stomach, next to the gullet, and in various parts of the stomach 
could be perceived dark brown patches. None of these seemed to be the 
effect of putrefaction, for there was no smell indicative of that process. I 
do not recollect anything further in the appearances of the stomach and 
duodenum worthy of notice. To the mucus and water already mentioned, some 
clear water was added, and the whole boiled in a clean Florence flask for a 
considerable time—everything thus treated was then thrown upon a filter. 
After filtration, there was left on the filter a dark brown substance, which was 
thrown into nitric acid (filter and all) in which the stomach and intestines 
were undergoing solution. The liquid which had been filtered was trans- 
parent, with a very faint amber color. Very small portions of this liquid, 
taken separately, were subjected to liquid tests. Sulphate of copper in 
solution, changed the color of that portion to which it was applied to an 
undecided grass green. Nitrate of silver in solution, gave brownish-yellow 
flocculent precipitate, which grew darker and soon lost its yellowishness. 
Sulphuretted hydrogen in its gaseous state, was passed through another por- 
tion, and deepened its yellow tint just perceptibly. Nearly the whole of the 
liquid was then subjected to the action of sulphuretted hydrogen, thrown into 
a capsule, heated until its yellowishness became distinctly marked, and its 
transparency was gone. ‘The whole liquid was then thrown upon a filter, and 
from necessity left for several hours. When it was again looked at, a trans- 
parent fluid was found in the vessel beneath the filter, and on the filter was 
discovered a yellow substance which could not be separated from it, being 
in too small a quantity, and the paper not being smooth. As the quantity 
was too small to look for any decided result from heating it alone, it was 
thrown (filter and all) into the vessel in which the stomach and intestines 
were in a State of solution. Everything, then, which might be supposed to 
contain poison, remained to be looked for in the nitric acid solution. It was 
evaporated nearly to dryness ; heated again by nitric acid, and so on, until it 
was thought that the animal matter was destroyed. Water was also added to 
the residue, and boiled on it, until it was supposed that everything soluble had 
been taken up. That liquid was filtered, evaporated to dryness (I have on 
this point rather an indistinct recollection) and treated with lime-water. This 
matter was evaporated to dryness after using the lime-water, and it was pre- 
sumable that if any arsenic were present, it existed in the dried mass as a salt 
called arseniate of lime. This was divided into three portions, each placed in 
the closed end of a glass tube, open at the other end. The sealed end of a 
tube was then placed over the flame of a spirit lamp (the dried mass was mixed 
with powdered charcoal, before being placed in the tubes), with a view to sub- 
lime metallic arsenic, if any there should be. The tube which was held by 
Mr. Clemson became covered on its internal surface for some distance above 
the material employed in the tube, with a black-looking matter, which an 
unpractised eye might readily mistake for a metal; for, although black, it was 
867 


§ 1101] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


glistening. In conducting this experiment, and after these appearances had 
been observed, the sealed end cracked and opened, under the action of the 
spirit lamp; when Mr. Clemson, who was holding it, turned round and said, 
Is any one subliming arsenic in the room? ‘The reply was, No ;—and he 
called me to examine what the odor of the tube was, and I distinctly recog- 
nized what I believe to be the smell of the fumes of arsenic. The tube 
was subsequently heated where the shining black matter had lodged, and as 
the tube was open at both ends, a current of air was passing through it, and 
the arsenical smell was perceptible at the upper end. The other tubes were 
subsequently, and at different times, treated in the same manner, and, with the 
exception of the breaking, presented similar results—a black matter covering 
the arsenical ring, if any was there. ‘There was no evidence to the eye that 
there was any arsenic there. This is a succinct history of the proceedings 
in my laboratory for the detection of arsenic. Previously to entering upon 
the search for arsenic, some tests were used for the purpose of ascertaining 
whether it would be proper to search for any other poison. Corrosive sub- 
limate and tartar emetic were thus looked for, but no indication of their pre- 
sence, however slight, could be discovered. That was all that was done with 
Mr. C.’s stomach as far as I can recollect.” 

Mrs. Chapman was acquitted, but Mina, who was tried separately and subs 
sequently, was convicted and executed. 

§ 1101. In 1845, a man named John Tawell, about sixty years of age, was 
tried at Aylesbury Spring Assizes, before Mr. Baron Parke, for the poisoning 
of a woman who, at a prior period, had lived as servant with him for several 
years, and borne him two children. Upon his desiring, however, at a subse- 
quent period to marry, she had gone into seclusion, and had ever since received 
from him a regular allowance. ‘The prisoner was seen by a neighbor,”’ to 
take Mr. Will’s statement, ‘‘ to enter the deceased’s house, near Slough, between 
four and five o’clock in the afternoon of the lst of January preceding. Between 
six and seven o’clock she heard a stifled scream in the deceased’s house; she 
took a candle, and going to her own door saw the prisoner coming out of it. 
Fearing that her neighbor was ill, she went to the gate of a small garden 
which led to her house, where she met the prisoner, who seemed agitated, and 
could not open it, which she did for him. On getting up to the house, she 
found the deceased lying motionless upon the floor, her eyes fixed, foaming at 
the mouth, and breathing convulsively. On the table there was a bottle 
partly filled with porter, two tumblers, one of them half filled with porter, and 
the other with only a little froth in it. Medical assistance was immediately 
procured, and a vein was opened in the arm, from which about an ounce of 
blood flowed; but life was extinct. The deceased, previous to the prisoner’s 
visit, had been in good health, and had intimated to her neighbors that she 
expected to see her ‘old master’ in the course of the day, and between six and 
seven o’clock she went to a neighboring tavern to procure a bottle of porter. 
After leaving the deceased’s house, the prisoner was seen, about seven o’clock, 
running towards Slough, where he got into an omnibus which was proceeding 
towards Eaton: at some distance from that place he alighted, desiring to be 
set down at Hershel House, where, however, he did not call. At forty minutes 

868 


BOOK VI.] TAWELL’S CASE. [$ 1101 


past seven the prisoner had again returned to Slough, and in two or three 
minutes afterwards proceeded by railway back to London. Jn consequence of 
this suspicious circumstance a communication was made from Slough, soon 
after the prisoner left, by means of the electric telegraph to the Paddington 
Station, where upon his arrival he got into an omnibus, and was watched by 
a police officer in plain ‘clothes, who got up behind and acted as conductor, 
and traced him to the Jerusalem Coffee-house, on Cornhill, where he called 
about half-past nine, and from thence to a lodging-house, where he slept. On 
the following morning the prisoner was taken into custody, and on being told 
by the officer of the cause of his apprehension, declared that he had not been at 
Slough the preceding day. It was discovered that on the day of the deceased’s 
death the prisoner had purchased a bottle of Scheele’s prussic acid at a drug- 
gist’s shop in London; that about three o’clock in the afternoon he had 
called at the Jerusalem Coffee-house for the purpose of leaving a great coat 
and parcels, for which he said he would call about half-past nine, stating that 
he was going to dine at the west end; that instead of doing so, however, he 
went by railway at four o’clock from the Paddington Station, to Slough; and 
that on the following morning, before his apprehension, he had purchased at 
the same shop where he had obtained the first quantity, a further supply of 
prussic acid—having, as he said, lost that which he had obtained the day 
before. ‘To the officer in whose custody he was placed during the sitting of 
the coroner’s inquest the prisoner stated that the deceased had formerly lived 
with him as a servant, and was a very good servant, but a very bad, unprincipled 
woman; that he had been in the habit of sending her money; that she had 
pestered him with letters, in which she had threatened to destroy herself if he 
did not send her some; that on the evening in question they had an alterca- 
tion, in the course of which he had told her he would not allow her any more 
money; that she then asked him for some porter, which she went for and pro- 
cured from a neighboring tavern; that she poured something into it from a 
phial and drank of it, and then began to throw herself about; and that he 
left, thinking her illness feigned, or else would have called some one. The 
prisoner attempted to explain his possession of prussic acid by stating that he 
had been in the habit of using it on account of varicose veins; but no proof 
was adduced that he had suffered from that cause. It was proved that the 
deceased had been extremely ill after drinking a part of a bottle of porter, for 
which the prisoner had sent her out on a preceding visit about thiee months 
before, when he paid to her her allowance. On examination of the body the 
day after death, the brain and viscera were found to be healthy. The odor of 
prussic acid was perceptible as soon as the body was opened, although no such 
odor had been remarked upon smelling at the mouth. No deleterious ingre- 
dients were found in the porter which remained in the bottle and glass. After 
a portion of the contents of the stomach had been tested for several other 
poisons, another portion was put into a tubulated retort, to which was added 
a very small quantity of dilute sulphuric acid; the retort was then placed in 
a sand-bath, and a portion distilled off and collected, about two drachms of 
which were put into a test-glass, to which a grain of green sulphate of iron 
was added, and when this was dissolved, a small quantity of potassa. Muriatic 
869 


§ 1101] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


acid being added to this mixture, Prussian blue instantly appeared, showing 
the presence of cyanogen in some form. It was stated that the presence of 
this fluid would prevent the sand-bath from decomposing the animal matters 
present in the contents ; but to exclude all possibility of referring the poisonous 
matters to such decomposition, another portion of the contents of the stomach 
was distilled at a lower temperature by the water-bath, to which salt was 
added for the purpose of increasing the temperature, which, by that means, 
can be raised from 212° to 226°; when, on applying the same tests as before, 
Prussian blue was again found in considerable quantity. Nitrate of silver 
was then added to a portion of the fluid, for the purpose of separating the 
cyanogen it contained, when it threw down an insoluble, white precipitate, 
forming cyanide of silver, which being put into a small retort with a very 
small quantity of muriatic acid, and carefully distilled over into a cool receiver, 
yielded rather more than a drachm of diluted prussic acid, which, on being 
again treated with nitrate of silver, yielded the cyanide of silver. This pre- 
cipitate could not be dissolved in cold nitric acid, but was dissolved by boiling 
nitric acid; and the gas produced by heating the cyanide of silver was then 
collected and burnt, producing a peculiar purple-colored flame, characteristic 
of the presence of cyanide of silver. The quantity of cyanide of silver actually 
obtained was 1.455 grains, very slightly contaminated with chloride of silver, 
amounting to a quantity which could not be collected and weighed, for which 
allowing .025 grain, the cyanide of silver was 1.43; and as the quantity of 
matter operated upon was to the contents of the stomach as 51 to 180, the 
latter must have contained 5.047 grains of cyanide of silver, whieh are 
equivalent to 1.042 grains of hydrocyanic or prussic acid, or 50 grains of the 
strength of the London Pharmacopceia—a quantity more than sufficient to 
destroy life. It was urged for the prisoner that the poison might have been 
generated from apples, of which some pulp was found in the stomach; but 
this subterfuge was disproved by the circumstance that prussic acid is con- 
tained only in the pips, and could not be obtained except by distillation ; 
whereas it had been smelt on opening the body, when it was not possible that 
it could have been produced by distillation; and by a satisfactory experiment 
it was shown that from the pips of 15 apples there was obtained only an inap- 
preciable quantity. Slight evidence was adduced of pecuniary embarrassment, 
and a desire to absolve himself from the burden of his allowance to the deceased 
was suggested as the prisoner’s motive for the commission of so horrid a crime. 
The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and the prisoner was executed, having 
before his execution made a full confession of his guilt, as also that he had, 
as had been suspected, made a former attempt to poison the deceased by 
means of morphia, which he had mixed with the porter of which his unsuspect- 
ing victim had partaken, stating his motive to have been to prevent his erimi- 
nal connection from becoming known to his wife, of which he lived in appre- 
hension. The reports of criminal justice present no more satisfactory case of 
circumstantial evidence, whether as regards the scientific testimony or the 
moral facts; and all the circumstances conclusively rebutted the prisoner’s 
crafty attempt to account for the catastrophe by self-destruction.’’(v) 


(v) Wills’ Circumstantial Evidence, §§ 180-198. 
870 


BOOK VI.] TAWELL’S CASE. [§ 1108 


§ 1102. The prisoner’s counsel pressed in this case, with great earnestness, 
the position that it was a rule of law, that there should be positive proof of 
the mode of death, and also that such a quantity of poison was found in the 
body of the deceased as would necessarily occasion death. Mr. Baron Parke, 
however, in accordance with the views already given, told the jury, that “if 
the evidence satisfied them that the death was occasioned by poison, and that 
the poison was administered by the prisoner—if that,” said his lordship, “is 
proved by circumstantial evidence, it is not necessary to give direct and posi- 
tive proof what is the quantity which would destroy life, nor is it necessary to 
prove that such a quantity was found in the body of-the deceased, if the other 
facts lead you to the conclusion that the death was occasioned by poison, and 
that it was knowingly administered by the prisoner. You must take this fact, 
just the same as all the other facts of the case, and see if you are satisfied, as 
reasonable men, whether the prisoner is guilty or not. The only fact which 
the law requires to be proved by direct and positive evidence, is the death of 
the party by finding the body: or when such proof is absolutely impossible, by 
circumstantial evidence leading closely to that result—as where a body was 
thrown overboard far from land—when it is quite enough to prove that fact 
without producing the body.” In a subsequent part of his charge, the learned 
judge also said, ‘There is very reasonable evidence, supposing that to be re- 
quired, which I tell you is not, that the quantity of prussic acid in the stomach 
amounted to one grain ; and although that is not necessary to be proved, the 
scientific evidence shows that one grain may be enough to destroy life.’ In 
reference to the argument urged by the prisoner’s counsel, that the deceased 
might have died from some sudden emotion, the learned judge said, that ‘it 
was within the range of possibility that a person might so die without leaving 
any trace on the brain; they were to judge whether they could attribute death 
to that cause, if they found strong evidence of the presence of poison, because 
they were not to have recourse to mere conjecture; that where the result of 
the evidence gave them the existence of a cause to which death might be law- 
fully attributed, they were not to suppose it was to be attributed to any other 
cause.’”’?’ The importance of circumstantial evidence drawn from conduct, was 
then recognized, and the jury were told that in considering the question, 
“whether or not the death was caused by prussic acid, they were not to ab- 
stain from looking at the conduct of the prisoner as part of that question; 
that they must look at all the circumstances in the case, and see whether the 
prisoner’s conduct, and the thing that was in his possession would not 
strengthen them in the conclusion, that the scientific witnesses had properly 
arrived at the conclusion, that beyond all doubt in their minds, prussic acid 
was the cause of death;’’ and he added that, “‘when they had the fact proved 
beyond all mistake that prussic acid was in the stomach, they could not forget 
to take into consideration that this was after a violent and sudden death, for 
which prussic acid would account.” “You must judge,’ said the learned 
baron, “of the truth of the case against a person by all his conduct taken 
together.” 

§ 1103. On the trial, in 1845, of a man named Graham, for poisoning his 

871 


§ 1104] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK Vi. 


‘+ wife, Mr. Baron Rolf, in his charge to the jury, dwelt with much emphasis on 
the indicatory evidence to be drawn from the fact that the accused was proved 
to have had possession of poison of the same kind with that by which the 
murder was effected. ‘Had the prisoner,’ said the learned judge, “the op- 
portunity of administering the poison? that was one thing; had he any mo- 
tive to do so? that was another. There was also another question, which 
was most important; it was, whether the party who had the opportunity of 
administering poison, had poison to administer? If he had not the poison, 
the having the opportunity became unimportant. If he had the poison, then 
another question arose, did he get it under circumstances to show that it was 
for a guilty or improper object ?’’ The evidence by which it was attempted 
to trace poison to the possession of the prisoner, was, that on a certain occa- 
sion after the death of the wife, and after he himself was apprehended, the 
contents of the pockets of a coat, waistcoat, and trowsers, on being tested by 
medical witnesses, were found to contain arsenic; and that a week afterwards, 
another waistcoat which came into the possession of the policeman, on being 
examined, was also found to contain arsenic. Did that bring home to the 
prisoner the fact that he had arsenic in his possession in November? It was 
not conclusive that, because he had it in June, he had it in November. He 
(the learned judge) inferred from what had been stated by the medical men, 
that the quantity of arsenic found in the pockets of the clothes was very small. 
Now, if he had it in a larger quantity in November, and had used it for some 
purpose, being a mineral substance, such particles were likely to remain in the 
pockets, and finding it there in June was certainly evidence that it might have 
been there in larger quantity in November; but obviously, by no means con- 
clusive, as it might have been put in afterwards. But connected with the ar- 
senic being found in the clothes, there were other considerations which he 
thought were worthy to be attended to. 

§ 1104. The prisoner was apprehended on the 9th of June, and he knew, 
long before that time, that an inquiry was going on. He was taken up, not 
in the clothes in which the arsenic was found, and a fortnight afterwards a 
batch of clothes was given up, in which arsenic was detected. Now if arsenic 
had been found in the clothes he was wearing, it would be perfectly certain, in 
the ordinary sense, that he had arsenic in his possession. But it was going a 
step further to say that, because arsenic was discovered in clothes of his, ac- 
cessible to so many people between the time of his apprehension and their 
giving up, it was there when he was apprehended, and in all probability he 
thought it was, but that was by no means the necessary consequence. That 
observation was entitled to still more-weight, with regard to the waistcoat last 
given up to the police, because it was not given up till three weeks after the 
prisoner was apprehended, and had been hanging in the kitchen accessible to 
a variety of persons. If any one had a diabolical motive or wish to’ excite 
prejudice against the prisoner, and to create a piece of evidence against hin, 
which did not in truth exist, he had the opportunity ; and the learned counsel 
for the defence had pointed to the fact of three pockets containing arsenic, as 
one which tended to show that the poison must have been placed there by some 
one who had overdone the thing, in trying to bring into court too much eyvi- 

872 


BOOK VI.| HARTUNG’S CASE, [§ 1105 


dence. These were matters which the jury must weigh very carefully. It was 
urged also that arsenic was used for cattle. It might be so, and it might be 
that the prisoner might innocently have had the arsenic. The circumstance of 
there being arsenic in so many pockets ought not to be lost sight of, for it 
could scarcely be conceived that a guilty person should be so utterly reckless 
as to put the poison he used into every pocket he had. One would have 
thought that he would have kept it concealed, or put it only in some safe 
place, for the immediate purpose of being used; and it was worthy of obser- 
vation that it did not appear to have been put into the clothes in such a way as 
it would have been put had the prisoner been desirous to conceal it. The 
prisoner was acquitted. 

§ 1105. Bernarp HARTUNG was a merchant at Magdeburg, in the begin- 
ning of 1853, and was well known for his cultivation and his apparent. busi- 
ness success. He had been three times married, and was now living in much 
comfort—though, in point of fact, laboring under great pecuniary embarrass- 
ment—with a wife to whom he was undoubtedly much attached. Coming 
one evening home, he found his aunt (his mother’s sister), Emma Schroder, 
an unmarried woman of about forty, spending the evening with his wife. Tea 
was over, and after a little pleasant and cheerful conversation, in which they 
urged him to sit down to the table and eat, he got up, saying he had to go 
out for a few minutes but would soon be back. He returned with some cakes 
in his hand (baisers), of a kind which he knew his aunt was particularly fond. 
With a smile on his face he called for two dessert plates, and put a cake on 
each, one of which he placed directly opposite to his wife, and the other to his 
aunt. The latter tasted hers first, and remarked upon something gritty, when 
the wife offered to change with her, which, however, she laughingly declined. 
At ten o’clock the aunt returned home, and at midnight was seized with 
violent pains. At dawn a physician was called in, who could do nothing more 
than speak of the improbabilities of recovery. Hartung was sent for, but 
- apparently questioning the reality of the danger, he went down to his count- 
ing-room, making his partner’s absence the ground of excuse. At three 
o’clock in the afternoon, however, the condition of the sufferer was much 
worse—her breath became lighter; she had fallen into a comatose condition 
from which it was impossible to arouse her—and this news being sent to him, 
he at last hastened to her bedside. She was dead, having sank away in per- 
fect calmness. He at first was overcome with a paroxysm of grief, and it was 
for some time before he recovered sufficiently to enable him to inquire into the 
circumstances of her illness. The nurse mentioned casually the cake which 
the deceased had eaten the previous night, which, during her illness, she had 
said she feared was not entirely right. Hartung did not move a single muscle. 
The nurse repeated the entire remark of the deceased: ‘‘ Perhaps that cake 
was not quite right—perhaps it was poisoned.”” Hartung smiled compassion- 
ately, and said, ‘‘She was raving.’’ So, indeed, all the by-standers thought. 
He then proceeded to examine into her effects. She was in poor circumstances, 
supporting herself in part by music teaching, and but a few hundred dollars 
were found, which were divided equally between Hartung and his two sisters, 
they being the heirs at law. The funeral was ordered in some haste, but this 

873 


§ 1107] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


was attributed by Hartung to the illness of a daughter of a lady lodging in the 
same house. In the mean time the dying statements of the deceased began to 
be noised about, and public suspicion rose so high, that in a few days Hartung 
was arrested. He opposed a bold and determined front to the officers, and 
indignantly demanded his discharge. He fell into the hands of a police magis- 
trate, distinguished for his tact and experience, and it was then that a scene 
took place so characteristic of the present method of German procedure, that 
we translate it in full from the official report :— 

§ 1106. It was evening. Two lights, standing in the centre of the green- 
covered table, lighted the office sufficiently to enable everything in it to be seen. 
Hartung did not know the magistrate. They saluted each other, and the 
magistrate, looking at him calmly but firmly in the eye, stated to him the 
nature of the charge as to which he was about to be examined. Hartung was 


unacquainted with the searching nature of the process to which he was about: 


to be subjected, and found its solemnity and pointedness not a little oppressive. 
The quiet calmness with which the magistrate enumerated to him the several 
grounds of suspicion, threw him at last into a confusion from which he was 
unable to rally. The magistrate watched him narrowly, and then laid before 
him in a very few words the only means by which he could escape from the 
distressing uncertitude in which he was placed—viz: by a free and open con- 
fession to place himself right before God and man. Hartung sank under this 
new appeal. He could no longer retain his former threatening bearing, and he 
suddenly turned and asked, ‘‘'To whom have I the honor to speak?” The 
answer paralyzed him still more, for it gave the name of an officer famous in 
the detection of crime and for his skilful treatment of the accused. He asked 
for a private interview, when the magistrate continued to inquire whether he 
was conscious of guilt. ‘In part, in part,’’ was the agonized reply. ‘“ A 
partial guilt is impossible here,” said the magistrate calmly. ‘Are you 
guilty of your aunt’s death, or are you not guilty?” The reply was “ Guilty,”’ 


and the magistrate seized this moment of paroxysm to draw forth a full con- — 


fession. ‘If you confess that you poisoned your aunt, you must give your 
reasons.’? Hartung shuddered ; his pride could hardly bear this strain. ‘‘Was 
it your intention to have destroyed your aunt by poison?”’ “ Yes, this was 
my view.’? ‘Was your motive hatred??? “No.” ‘Did you expect to gain 
anything ?”? Hartung shuddered again, and it was with difficulty that at last 
he replied, ‘‘ Whatever money my aunt left, I have secured—it fell to me as 
rightful heir.” He then went on to excuse himself on the ground that his 
aunt was about to make a match with a person far her junior in years, whose 
object, evidently, was to obtain the little property of which she was possessed. 
He then went on to explain how he had effected the poisoning, which was 
by mixing arsenic with the sugar on the cake. ' 

§ 1107. The next step was to fortify this confession by the examination of 
the corpse. The body seemed entirely unchanged, and all expression of pain 
was drawn from the countenance by the calm which succeeds death. Hartung 
was brought to view the body, and with the exception of a slight recoil, 
retained entire composure. The post-mortem gave the most unmistakable 
evidence of the presence of arsenic. In the examination of Hartung’s house, 

874 


BOOK VI.] HARTUNG’S CASE. [$ 1109 


similar traces were discovered. An amount of pure arsenic was found which 
was enough to have poisoned half a city. Of this, however, Hartung denied 
all knowledge. The only answer he would give was that it was the refuse of 
what he had wanted in the store, and that it had been cast away there and 
forgotten. And at the close of the primary hearings, he solemnly purged 
himself of having been concerned in any prior similar violations of the law. 

The suspicions, however, that had been excited against him now began to 
extend over a wider field. Cases of prior sudden death were enumerated 
within the circle of his immediate influence, and the following remarkable facts 
were brought to light, connecting him unmistakably with the poisoning of his 
second wife, under the following circumstances :— 

§ 1108. In 1850, Marie Braconier, to whom he had been shortly before 
married, and who was then in the freshness and fulness of early womanhood, 
told one of her own female friends that she was troubled with an anxious pre- 
sentiment arising from her husband, who was then much embarrassed in his 
circumstances, pressing her to consent to have her life insured. Her feelings 
of dread arose, not from suspicion, but from an unwillingness to unite in a 
step which she could scarcely understand, and which was necessarily beset with 
gloomy associations. She yielded, however, but scarcely had she done so, 
when, on a visit to her mother, she was attacked, immediately upon leaving 
her husband’s house, with symptoms which were attributed to the then pre- 
vailing epidemic of cholera. Her strong constitution, however, surmounted 
the attack, and after a few days she returned home. Scarcely had she got 
there, when Hartung was seized, or pretended to be seized, with the premoni- 
tories of the epidemic, manifesting great fear, resorting to every palliative in © 
his power, and finally yielding to her anxious entreaties to be put to bed. His 
wife devoted herself to him, never leaving his side, and it consequently fell to 
her lot to administer to him a broth which he induced her to join with him in 
drinking. Of what took place then there was no evidence, as they were alone, 
except that a few hours afterwards she was seized with violent pains, which 
shortly after ended in her death. At first, no suspicion arose. The attending 
physician, Dr. Niemann, signed the usual certificate that the death was occa- 
sioned by Asiatic cholera. The Insurance Company, however, whom her 
death so closely affected, began naturally enough to feel some curiosity when 
they were called upon to pay. This was increased by the extraordinary 
activity with which Hartung pressed for the payment. A voluminous cor- 
respondence ensued, in which they called for a post-mortem examination, 
which, however, he very artfully succeeded in avoiding. At last, by threats 
on the one hand of exposing them as a corporation which was willing to 
receive premiums, but not to pay losses, and partly by an appeal to his own 
desolate situation after all the great losses, he succeeded in obtaining a pay- 
ment in full. 

§ 1109. The examination into the causes of the aunt’s death, however, led 
to a reconsideration of that of the wife. The exhumation of her remains was 
at last determined on. A commission was constructed for the purposes of a 
post-mortem examination, on which was placed eminent medical experts, among 
whom was the physician who had attended the deceased in her last moments. 

875 


§ 1111] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


Twenty months had elapsed since death, but the degree of preservation was 
such as to leave no question of identity. The result of the chemical examina- 
tion was decisive. An amount of arsenic was found in the stomach abundantly 
enough to have caused her death. Strong circumstantial evidence also existed, 
showing the cause of the wife’s first sickness to have been the same as her last. 
When these facts were mentioned to Hartung, he replied merely by protesting 
against the prejudice that had been excited against him, but denying all agency 
in his wife’s death. 

In March, 1853, his trial came on in Magdeburg, when, to the surprise of 
all, he pleaded not guilty to his aunt’s murder, and maintained that his con- 
fession to the police-magistrate was dictated by the desire only to get rid of a 
harassing and protracted examination, and to bring on a speedy trial. ‘The 
result was, however, unavoidable. He was convicted of his aunt’s murder, and 
was finally executed, having made a final confession of having saree both 
his aunt and his wife.(«) 

§ 1110. Witt1AM PALMER, who was convicted in May, 1856, for hs mur- 
der of John Parsons Cook, was a medical man by profession, though for 
several years his reputation was that of a sporting character. He was not 
over thirty-one years of age, and had been originally possessed of property. 
Gambling and horse-racing, however, had absorbed this, and in 1853, he was 
in such necessities as to throw himself in the market for loans on the most 
usurious terms. ‘To meet these debts he had recourse to desperate expedients. 
His mother was a woman of considerable property. Her indorsement he 
forged on hisnotes. He insured the life of his wife for £13,000, which amount, 
upon her dying shortly afterwards, he obtained. Two other similar insurances 
were sought to be consummated by him. The first was on his brother Walter, 
who in like manner died shortly after the policy was secured; though here, 
however, the company refused to pay. The third was on a man named Bates, 
a sort of groom in Palmer’s employment. In this case the final arrangement 
of the policy was intercepted by the explosion which we will now narrate. 

§ 1111. Atthe Shrewsbury races, in November, 1855, appeared with Palmer 
a young man of about twenty-eight, named John Parsons Cook. Both had 
large stakes involved, but with different results. The ‘ Polestar,’”? Cook’s 
horse, won, by which Cook received £2,000. ‘‘ Chicken,’’? Palmer’s horse, 
was beaten, by which Palmer was utterly wrecked. He had taken immense 
bets, with the hope of winning enough to pay the suits on the £13,000 forged 
notes then pressing upon him. These bets turned against him, and exposure 
became imminent. 

But this was not the only difficulty. Palmer had borrowed largely of Cook, 
who, besides his late winnings, was possessed of a fortune of about £12,000. 
By fair or foul means, he had obtained what purported to be Cook’s signature 
to notes to a very large amount. Cook’s sudden death could not be other 
than advantageous to him, in the circumstances under which he was placed. 
It was then, according to the prosecution, that he took measures to bring this 
death about. 


(x) Der Neue Pitaval, Bd. xxi. S. 105. 
876 


BOOK VI.] PALMER'S CASE. [§ 111s 


§ 1112. On the 5th of November, Cook took lodgings at Rugely, the town 
where Palmer lived. His life had been previously dissipated, and he had been 
suffering much from sores in the throat, the result of venereal excesses. On 
the 14th of November, the day after the races, Cook and Palmer were drink- 
ing together at the inn at Shrewsbury, where, according to Palmer’s state- 
ments at the time, Cook was more or less affected by liquor. Palmer, towards 
the end of the evening, was seen mixing some colorless liquid in the passage 
leading to his room, and shortly afterwards gave some brandy and water, 
mixed by himself, to Cook, who drank it, and immediately cried out that there 
was something in it—that “it burned his throat dreadfully.”’ Palmer imme- 
diately took the glass, drank what remained, and handed it to a third person 
to try, who found, however, nothing left. Cook was taken soon after very 
sick, vomiting largely. He recovered, however, enough to be on the race- 
course the next day. The day after (Thursday, the 15th), he arrived at 
Rugely with Palmer. He continued unwell throughout that and the next 
day (Saturday), when Palmer gave him some coffee, after which he vomited. 
On Sunday, Palmer caused some broth to be made, which was given to Cook. 
This broth was tasted by the chambermaid at the inn, who was made by it 
very ill. On Saturday, Palmer sent for Mr. Bamford, a practitioner at Rugely, 
to give his attendance to Cook, and on Monday, he wrote to Mr. Jones, who 
practised at Lutterworth, telling him that Cook was sick with a bilious attack, 
and asking his medical services also. Certain pills, of an anti-bilious charac- 
ter, were given by Mr. Bamford to Palmer to be administered to Cook. 

After sending for Mr. Jones, Palmer went to London on business, and 
returned on the evening of the same day (Monday) to Rugeiy. On his return, 
he went to a druggist, with whom he had not been in the habit of dealing, 
and bought three grains of strychnine. When he saw Qook, he administered 
to him pills which purported to have been those prescribed by Bamford. 
Cook had, during the day, been much better, and had been talking with his 
jockey and trainer. But an hour after he had taken the pills, the inn was 
roused by the violent ringing of his bell, and by his screams—‘“ Murder ! 
Christ, have mercy on my soul!’ At once the servants gathered in his room, 
and he was found in extreme agony on his bed, beating around him with his 
hands, and in the highest muscular tension. His cry was that he would be 
suffocated, he was agonized with convulsions, and when a composing drink 
was given to him, he grit his teeth, and snapped at the glass and spoon. His 
first call, when the servants came in, was to send for Palmer. Palmer came, 
and remained with him until six o’clock the next morning. 

§ 1113. Between eleven and twelve on that day (Tuesday) Palmer went to 
another druggist, and bought six grains of strychnine and a small amount of 
opium. At three o’clock, arrived Mr. Jones, the physician from Lutterworth, 
who was a personal friend of Cook’s, whom he found much better. That 
evening, the two physicians had a consultation with Palmer, Mr. Jones de- 
claring that the symptoms were different from those described to him by 
Palmer. Mr. Bamford prepared some additional pills, which were given by 
him to Palmer, who at night administered pills from the same box to Cook. 
Within an hour after taking the pills, Cook was attacked in the same way as 

817 


§ 1114] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


on the previous evening. “He was in violent spasms; his breathing was 
almost entirely suspended; his muscular system was strung to the highest 
tension ; and he was so rigid that when he cried to be lifted up in bed, this 
was found to be impossible. So great was this stiffness, that when lying with 
his face upwards, his back arched inwards, and only his head and heels touched 
the bed, they bearing his whole weight. He cried to be turned over on his 
side, which was done, when in a few moments he died quietly. Palmer, who 
was sent for immediately on the attack, arrived at once, and remained until 
the death. 

Two days afterwards, Mr. Stevens, Cook’s stepfather, came to Rugely to 
inquire into the circumstances. He found the body still unburied, and a cer- 
tificate from Mr. Bamford was given him, to the effect that the death was by 
apoplexy. His suspicions were excited by his inability to find Cook’s betting 
book; by a claim set up by Palmer against Cook’s estate for £4000; by the 
anxiety which Palmer showed to make it appear that Cook had lately squan- 
~ dered away all his available funds ; and by his efforts to have the body buried 
at the earliest moment. Mr. Stevens went at once to London, and made 
arrangements for a post-mortem examination. This took place at Rugely, in 
the presence of several medical men, Palmer being in attendance. No symp- 
toms of disease were discovered, except the sores on the tongue which have 
been already mentioned, and some white granules on the lower part of the 
spine. With some carelessness the stomach and intestines were taken out and 
placed in a jar; and it was noticed, 1st, that while the operator was at work 
he received a push, communicated, apparently, through Palmer, which pro- 
duced some disarrangement ; and 2d, that the jar was afterwards removed by 
Palmer towards the door, ostensibly for the purpose of greater convenience, 
and was then found with two cuts through the parchment which had been 
placed over its mouth. It is clear, however, that its contents had not been 
tampered with, though it was in evidence that Palmer told the boy who was 
employed to drive Mr. Stevens and the jar to the station, that he would give 
£10 to see the jar upset. Such was the evidence of the prosecution, though 
on cross-examination the witness who testified to the last point seemed to 
leave it uncertain whether it was Stevens or the jar whom Palmer so much 
desired to see thus disposed of. 

§ 1114. The stomach and intestines were analyzed by Dr. Taylor, an eminent 
toxicologist of London, and the author of a work on medical jurisprudence 
frequently cited in this volume. The result was that a little antimony was 
discovered, but no strychnine or prussic acid. Dr. Taylor and Mr. G. Owen 
Rees certified accordingly, adding that it was “now impossible to say whether 
any strychnine had or had not been given just before death, but that it is quite 
possible for tartar emetic to destroy life if given in repeated doses; and so far 
as we can at present form an opinion, in the absence of any natural cause of 
death, the deceased may have died from the effects of antimony, in this or some 
other form.”” When Dr. Taylor, however, became acquainted with the symp- 
toms, he changed his opinion, holding, as subsequently advised, that thesdeath 
was produced by strychnine. 

So great was the local excitement, that Parliament, at Lord Campbell’s 

878 


BOOK VI] PALMER’S CASE. [$ 1115 


suggestion, passed a bill transferring the venue to the Metropolitan Court of 
the Old Bailey, in London. The case came on for trial on May 14th, 1856, 
before Lord Campbell, C. J., Mr. Baron Alderson, and Mr. Justice Cresswell. 
For the crown appeared Sir Alexander Cockburn, Attorney-General, and Mr. 
E. James, Q. C. The leading counsel for the defence was Mr. Sergeant Shee, 
who managed his case with remarkable boldness and skill, though, owing to 
the English practice, which forbids a personal conference between counsel and 
witnesses, with an occasional inaccuracy of statement which produced the 
appearance of a want of reality, very damaging to the prisoner. The main 
strain of the trial was on the question whether the non-detection of strychnine 
in the remains was to be conclusive. Testimony, though not of the highest 
order, was adduced by the prisoner to prove that it was. On the other hand, 
the crown produced very high authorities to show that strychnine acts by 
absorption into the blood, from whence it passes into the nervous system; that 
it exhibits itself peculiarly and distinctively by a violent spasmodic convulsion 
and rigidity of the muscles, particularly those of the chest; that death is 
finally produced by suffocation ; and that as only the excess of poison beyond 
what is necessary to produce death remains in the stomach, no trace is to be 
found when only the minimum dose is given. That Palmer was acquainted 
with the way in which the poison acts was evident from the fact of a note- 
book of his being found in which the page was turned down at a point con- 
taining a description of death by strychnine. 

§ 1115. From Lord Campbell’s charge to the jury we extract the following 
important passages :-— 

“The next witness is Charles Newton.’”’ Having read the evidence of this 
witness, and his deposition before the coroner, his lordship said: ‘This is the 
evidence of Newton, a most important witness. It certainly might be urged 
that he did not mention the furnishing of strychnia to Palmer on the Monday 
night before the coroner; he did not mention it until Tuesday morning, when 
he was coming up to London. That certainly requires consideration at your 
hands; but then you will observe that in his deposition, which has been read 
to you, although there is an omission of that, which is always to be borne in 
mind, there is no contradiction of anything which he has said here. Well, 
then, you are to consider what is the probability of his inventing this wicked 
lie—a most important lie, if lie it be. He had no ill-will towards the prisoner 
at the bar; he had never quarrelled with him, and had nothing to gain by 
injuring him, much less by betraying him to the scaffold. I cannot see any 
motive that he could have for inventing a lie to take away the life of the 
prisoner. No inducement was held out to him by the crown; he says himself 
that no inducement was held out to him, and that at last he disclosed this 
circumstance from a sense of duty. If you believe him, his evidence is very 
strong against the prisoner at the bar. But we will now turn to the next 
witness, Charles Joseph Roberts, whose evidence is closely connected with that 
of Newton.’”? Having read the evidence of Roberts, Mr. Hawkins’s assistant, 
who stated that on the Tuesday he sold to the prisoner, at his master’s shop, 
six grains of strychnia, his lordship continued: “This witness was not cross- 
examined as to the veracity of his testimony, nor is he contradicted in any 

879 


§ 1116] CORPUS DELICTI.— POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


way. It is not denied that on this Tuesday morning the prisoner at the bar 
got six grains of strychnia from Roberts. If you couple that with the state- 
ment of Newton—believing that statement—you have evidence of strychnia 
having been procured by the prisoner on the Monday night before the symp- 
toms of strychnia were exhibited by Cook, and, by the evidence of Roberts, 
undenied and unquestioned, that on the Tuesday six grains of strychnia were 
supplied to him. Supposing you should come to the conclusion that the 
symptoms of Cook were inconsistent with death by strychnia—if you think 
that his symptoms are accounted for by merely natural disease—of course the 
strychnia obtained by the prisoner on the Monday evening and the Tuesday 
morning would have no effect; but if you should think that the symptoms 
which Cook exhibited on the Monday and Tuesday nights are consistent with 
strychnia, then a case is made out on the part of the crown. After the most 
anxious consideration, I can suggest no possible solution of the purchase of 
this strychnia. ‘The learned counsel for the prisoner told us in his speech that 
there was nothing for which he would not account. The learned counsel did 
not favor us with the theory which he had formed in his own mind with respect 
to that strychnia. There is no evidence, there is no suggestion, how it was 
applied, what became of it. That must not influence your verdict, unless you 
come to the conclusion that the symptoms of Cook were consistent with death 
by strychnia. If you come to that conclusion, I should shrink from my duty, 
I should be unworthy to sit here, if I did not call your attention to the infer- 
ence that if Cook did die from strychnia, that strychnia was administered by 
the prisoner at the bar.” 

§ 1116. “It appeared that, in the middle of November, Palmer was involved 
in pecuniary difficulties of the most formidable nature ; that Cook, the deceased, 
by winning a race, became master of at least £1,000; and there is evidence 
from which the inference may be drawn that the prisoner formed the design of 
appropriating that money to his own use. That he did appropriate the money 
to the payment of debts for which he alone was liable, and, if Cook had sur-, 
vived, the fraud must have been exposed. Upon the important question of 
whether Cook died from natural disease or from poison we have the evidence 
of Sir B. Brodie, and of other most honorable and skilful men, who say that 
in their opinion he did not die from natural disease, as they know of no natural 
disease which will account for the symptoms attending his death, and many 
say that they believe the symptoms exhibited by him were the symptoms of 
strychnine. All we know respecting strychnine not being in the body is that 
in that part of the body which was analyzed by Dr. Taylor and Dr. Rees they 
found none. Witnesses of great reputation, Dr. Christison amongst the num- 
ber, have said where strychnine has been administered under certain circum- 
stances they should not expect that it would be found; and you have the 
evidence of Dr. Taylor and Dr. Rees that, having experimented upon animals 
certainly killed by strychnine, no strychnine was to be discovered. It is as- 
serted, too, that there are instances in which a greater space of time elapsed 
than in this case between the administration of the poison, if poison was 
administered, and the appearance of the symptoms.” 

880 


BOOK VI.] PALMER'S CASE. [$ 1117 


Mr. Sergeant Shee.—“I do not think those instances were proved, my 
lord.” 

§ 1117. Lord Campbell.—“There are instances in the books which, it has 
been agreed on both sides, should be referred to in the course of the trial ; 
there are instances recorded by medical writers, and spoken of in the evidence 
I have read, in which a longer time has elapsed. With regard to no blood 
having been found in the heart, the result of the evidence seems to be, when 
death is produced by contraction of the respiratory organs, causing asphyxia, 
blood is found in the heart; but when it is produced by a spasm in the heart 
itself, the heart contracts, and the blood is expelled, so that after death no 
blood is found in it. He then drew attention to the evidence that the de- 
ceased had been tampered with by having something put into his brandy and 
water, broth, &c., the absence of any satisfactory explanation for his having 
bought strychnine, and the behavior of the prisoner after the death. He 
said, the answer consists of two parts, first, the medical evidence, and, secondly, 
the evidence as to facts. With regard to the medical witnesses on the part of 
the prisoner, I must observe that, although there were amongst them gentle- 
men of high honor, consummate integrity, and profound scientific knowledge, 
who came here with a sincere wish to speak the truth, there were also gentle- 
men whose object was to procure an acquittal for the prisoner. On the evi- 
dence of Dr. Nunneley, he said, you recollect the manner in which he gave it, 
and you must form your own opinion as to the weight to be attached to it. 
Certainly he seemed to display an interest not quite becoming a witness in a 
court of justice, but you will give every attention to the facts to which he 
refers, and to the evidence he gives. He differs very materially in general 
Opinion from several of the witnesses examined on the part of the prosecution, 
especially in the statement that there is no extraordinary rigidity of body after 
death from tetanus, a point which is clearly of considerable importance in 
coming to a conclusion as to the cause of Cook’s death.’? His lordship next 
read Mr. Herapath’s evidence, and, at the close of it, remarked: ‘Mr. Hera- 
path is a very distinguished chemist, and, no doubt, says what he sincerely 
thinks. He is of opinion that where there has been death by strychnine, 
strychnine ought to be discovered. But he seems to have intimated an opinion 
that the deceased in this very case died by strychnine, and Dr. Taylor did not 
use proper means to discover it.”” The learned judge then read the evidence of 
Mr. Rogers, who agreed with Dr. Herapath as to the possibility of detecting 
the poison. ‘‘There is no reason to doubt,” his lordship continued, “that this 
witness does sincerely entertain the opinion he expresses. According to these 
witnesses, where strychnine exists, even mixed with impure matter, it should 
be discovered by skilful experimenters using the proper tests. Dr. Letheby 
also speaks sincerely, according to his experience; but I must say that cases 
of this kind seem to vary very much. ‘There are cases which are, as this wit- 
ness says, exceptional, and among them he mentions that of the lady at 
Romsey. The fair result would, probably, be that enough is not known of 
eases of this kind for us to be aware of all their varieties, and where there is a 
strong probability that strychnine has been administered, any peculiarity in 
the symptoms would not be anything like conclusive evidence to rebut that 

56 881 


‘§ 1119] CORPUS DELICTI.— POISONING. [BOOK VI. 


probability. The evidence of Mr. Ross, on a case that occurred in the London 
Hospital, proved that case to be one of tetanus from wounds, of which there 
was no appearances on the body of Cook. We now come to the evidence of 
Dr. Wrightson, who, you will remember, had been a pupil of Liebig, at Gies- 
sen, and is at present a teacher of chemistry in a medical school at Birming- 
ham. This witness, who, I have do doubt, is a most scientific and honorable 
man, has stated that, assuming a man to have been poisoned by strychnine, he 
should expect to find traces of the poison in the stomach within five or six 
days after death; but he gave his testimony with that caution which is never 
so proper and becoming as in treating on questions of science.” 'The evidence 
of Professor Partridge and of Mr. Gay was then read; and the case described 
by the last witness, the judge characterized as clearly one of traumatic tetanus. 
‘‘Dr, Macdonald had gone the length of introducing a new term of disease, 
‘epilepsy with tetanic complications,’ and the jury would have to determine 
what weight they would attach to this evidence as compared with the medical 
testimony adduced by the Crown. Dr. Robinson thought that, putting aside 
the assumption of death by strychnia, Cook may have died of epilepsy ; but, 
on being asked by the Attorney-General, whether all the symptoms spoken to 
by Mr. Jones were not indicative of death by strychnia, he at once replied : 
‘They certainly are.? Dr. Richardson, who appears,’’ said the judge, “a very 
respectable witness, was next examined, and was the first to suggest the theory 
that Cook may have died of angina pectoris. You will have to determine 
whether Cook’s symptoms were or were not consistent with death by stryehnia. 
I do not say that on that fact alone you should find a verdict against him ; 
but this I say, that it will be your duty to consider the fact in connection with 
other evidence that has been brought before you, in order that you may come 
to a clear conclusion as to whether this was a death by strychnia, and, if so, 
whether the prisoner at the bar was the man who administered it to the de- 
eeased. After Dr. Richardson had given his evidence, Dr. Wrightson was 
recalled, and, in reply to a question put to him by the counsel for the Crown, 
stated, that if a minimum dose to destroy life were given, and a long interval 
elapsed before death, the more complete would be the absorption and the less 
the chance of finding the poison in the stomach.” 

§ 1118. Mr. Sergeant Shee.—‘‘He added, my lord, that he should still 
expect to find it in the spleen, liver, and blood.” 

Lord Campbell.—‘‘ You are quite right; he certainly did say so, and you 
have done well in calling attention to the statement.’ The learned judge 
then read, without comment, his notes of the evidence given by Catherine 
Watson and Oliver Pemberton, and added: ‘This is the close of the medical 
testimony adduced on behalf of the prisoner.”’ 

§ 1119. The evidence of Matthews, Myatt, Sergeant, and Jeremiah Smith, 
was then recalled to the attention of the jury, and the facts of the proposal 
to insure the life of Bates for £10,000; Bates being at that time superintend- 
ing the stables of the prisoner, and living in lodgings for which he paid only 
6s. 6d. a week. Referring to Smith, the learned lord remarked: ‘Of his 
eredit you are the judges. His evidence would be material as to what took 
place on the evening of Monday, because it would show that the pills which 

$82 


BE in 
<< er 


BOOK VI.] PALMER'S CASE, [$ 1119 


Cook took that night were taken as they were prepared by Bamford, and 
before the prisoner at the bar could have had any opportunity of substituting 
others for them. The evidence as to what took place on the Tuesday night, 
remains exactly as it stood at the conclusion of the case for the Crown.” 

At the close of the charge— 

Mr. Sergeant Shee interposed: ‘‘The question which your lordship has 
submitted to the jury, is, whether Cook’s symptoms were consistent with 
death by strychnia. I submit—” 

Lord Campbell.—‘‘ That is not the question which I have submitted to the 
jury ; it is a question, I have told them, that, unless they consider the symp- 
toms consistent with death by strychnia, they ought to acquit the prisoner.” 

Mr. Sergeant Shee.—‘“‘It is my duty not to be deterred by any expression of 
displeasure; it is my duty toa much higher tribunal than even your lord- 
ships’, to submit what occurs to-me to be the proper question. I submit to 
your lordships that the question, whether Cook’s symptoms are consistent with 
death by strychnia, is a wrong question, unless it be followed by this—‘ and 
inconsistent with death by other and natural causes,’ and that the question 
should be, whether the medical evidence establishes, beyond all reasonable 
doubt, the death of Cook by strychnia. It is my duty to submit that. It is 
your lordships’ duty, if I am wrong, to overrule it.” 

Mr, Baron Alderson.—“It is done already. You have done it in your 
speech.’? 

Lord Campbell (addressing the jury).—‘‘Gentlemen: I did not submit to 
you that the question, upon which alone your verdict was to turn, was, whe- 
ther the symptoms of Cook were those of strychnia, but I said that that was 
a most material question, and I desired you to consider it. I said, that, if 
you thought he died from natural disease—that he did not die from poisoning 
by strychnia—you should acquit the prisoner ; but then I went on to say, that 
if you were of opinion that the symptoms were consistent with death from 
strychnia, you should consider the other evidence given in the case, to see 
whether strychnia had been administered to him, and whether it had been 
administered by the prisoner at the bar. These are the questions I again put 
to you. If you come to the conclusion that these symptoms were consistent 
with death from strychnia, do you believe that death actually resulted from 
the administration of strychnia, and that that strychnia was administered by 
the prisoner at the bar? Do not find a verdict of ‘guilty,’ unless you believe 
that the strychnia was administered by the prisoner at the bar; but if you 
believe that, it is your duty to God and man to find the prisoner ‘ guilty.’ ”’ 

At the conclusion of this address from the Lord Chief Justice, the jury 
retired from the court at eighteen minutes after two o’clock. 

The jury re-entered their box at twenty-five minutes to four, after an absence 
of one hour and seventeen minutes; and the prisoner, who had been removed 
upon the retirement of the jury, was placed in the dock at the same moment. 

The Clerk of the Arraigns asked: ‘Gentlemen of the jury, are you all 
unanimous in your verdict ?” 

The Foreman.—‘‘ We are.” 


883 


§ 1121] CORPUS DELICTI.—POISONING. [BOOK YI. 


The Clerk of the Arraigns.—‘‘How say you, gentlemen, do you find the 
prisoner at the bar ‘guilty,’ or ‘not guilty ?’” 

The Foreman (rising, and in a distinct and firm tone).—‘ We find the pri- 
soner guilty.”’(y) 

The prisoner was subsequently executed, and, though the question was 
greatly agitated, both medical and legal opinion has settled down into the 
belief that the conviction was right. (z) 

§ 1120. (d.) Facts on which a verdict of guilty can be supported.—Un- 
der this head we propose to touch merely the technical relations of this topic. 
Those bearing on medicine and surgery have been already fully discussed. 

According to Mittermaier, in his monograph on the legal bearings of poi- 
oe two points must be established to sustain a conviction :— 

. That poison was administered to the person whose homicide is the sub- 
jt of inquiry. 
. That the death was the consequence of the poisoning. 

ia the first of these heads it may be observed :— 

a2. The drug administered must be legally considered a poison. 

b2. It must be of such a character that after being taken it acts on the sys- 
tem as a poison. It should be observed that the term poison is relative, and 
that it is qualified by the means which the defendant used to administer it; 
by the part of the body within which it is introduced; by the method of ad- 
ministration; by the quantity administered; by the circumstances of the 
administration in reference to the time in which it is brought into the system; 
and by the mixture of the poison with other drugs. 

§ 1121. The proof of the administration of the poison falls under the fol- 
lowing heads :— 

a‘. Report of the chemical examination. 

b'. Symptoms of the sickness. 

c'. Appearances at death and on the corpse. 

d‘, Physical observations. 

e', Presumptions of the particular case. 

a’. Report of the chemical examination.—Formerly, chemical proof of the 
existence of poison was considered essential to conviction. But this, as has 
just been seen,(a) is based on two erroneous suppositions: 1st. That in all 
cases of poisoning, the poison may be discovered within the deceased, or in his 
evacuations; and, 2d. That the results of chemical analysis exclude all doubt. 
It is true that when mineral poisons, e. g., arsenic, are administered, they could 
be detected chemically. But the inadequacy of the presumption drawn from 
the non-discovery of poison is shown from the following points :— 

a?. Many poisons, particularly alkaloids, can only with great difficulty, and 
under the most favorable circumstances, be chemically detected when internally 
applied. 

b?. In other cases, where the poison is capable of chemical detection, the 


(y) The report in the text is reduced from the London Lancet, for May, 1856, Xe. 

(z) See a series of articles in the Lancet in 1856, and one in the Boston Law Re- 
porter for July, 1856. 

(a) Ante, § 1093. 


834 


BOOK VI.] PROSECUTION AND DEFENCE. [$ 1125 


veracity of the rendering is destroyed by the rapid evacuations, e. g., vomit- 
ings, that the poison induces ; by the evaporation of the poison from the body 
after death in the shape of gas; by a protracted sickness after administering 
it, which produces absorption of the poison; by long delay after death, which 
destroys its traces; and by the eradication of counter agents. 

§ 1122. b.. The symptoms of sickness.—The disturbing influence of poison 
on the human frame produces certain signs, which are the peculiar accompani- 
ments of this action. Great prudence, however, is requisite in the use of this 
kind of evidence, on account of the difficulty in securing certainty in the wit- 
nesses; of the fact that other sicknesses may have produced these symptoms ; 
of the difficulty in getting at the prior health of the patient; and of the ina- 
bility of the physician to form an opinion without a survey of ald the facts, 
which in many cases is impossible. 

§ 1123. ct. The appearances at death and on the corpse.—In the great ma- 
jority of poisons there is a danger of deception arising from the fact that many 
changes in the corpse are misunderstood, while other signs, such as inflamma- 
tion in the stomach, are the consequences of other diseases. The difficulty in 
such cases is aggravated by delay in dissection, by which the organs become 
putrid. 

d'. Among physicai peculiarities may be mentioned a particular color of 
the affected parts; or a specific odor or taste; the finding in the stomach seeds 
or berries, which were taken as poison; the illumination of poisoned food, as 
in the case of phosphorus, or the smell of bitter almonds, as in the case of 
prussic acid. 

e'. The combination of facts showing preparation or motive. Thus in a 
preliminary inquiry we may look for the offender among those who obtained 
the materials appropriate for the commission of the offence, or who would be 
benefited by the death of the deceased. 

§ 1124. The guilt of the defendant may be considered established notwith- 
standing— 

1. That if proper means had been used, death might have been averted. (b) 

2. That a peculiar constitutional susceptibility increased the liability to 
death. (c) 

3. Mismanagement on the part of the medical attendants, by which the 
symptoms were aggravated, if, in point of fact, the poison was lethal. 

On the other hand, as is correctly stated by Mittermaier, the offence will 
not be complete when the poison is administered in such a small quantity, or 
in such admixtures, as to destroy its deadly qualities, or when the death is to 
be traced to an entirely independent cause. In the latter case, however, the 
crime is consummated if it appear that the death was accelerated by the 
poison. (d) 

§ 1125. (e.) Duties of counsel for prosecution and defence.—In America, 
and England, the counsel for the prosecution is limited, in his opening, to a 
statement (1) of the facts showing the corpus delictz, and the defendant’s con- 
nection with it; and (2) of the law of the land bearing on the particular issue. 


(b) Whart. C. L. § 941. (c) Ibid. (d) Ibid. 
885 


§ 1127] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


~ It is not only illegal, but highly unbecoming, to refer to the defendant’s cha- 
racter and antecedents as acting on the issue in any other way than as afford- 
ing a presumption of innocence. 

In collecting and developing the evidence of the medical and scientific wit- 
nesses, however, the prosecuting officer’s task is far more difficult. He must 
' first take care that the witnesses so called by him should be of unquestioned 
skill and standing in their respective branches of study. In the preliminary 
bearings it is best for him to give full scope to the investigation, calling even 
such experts as may be suggested by the defence, so as to produce greater fair- 
ness, to form a wider base for induction, and to avoid surprise on trial. It is 
peculiarly important for him to familiarize himself not merely with the law in 
reference to the crime, but with that portion of the science of medicine with 
which the particular case comes in contact. Not merely does he have to ad- 
dress the jury on these topics, but he must so master them as to be able to 
direct his own witnesses, and sift those called on the opposite side. 

§ 1126. The counsel for the defence, in preparing his case, will first turn 
his attention to collecting information as to the prior state of the deceased’s 
health, so as to explain on natural grounds, if possible, the symptoms of the 
alleged poisoning. He will particularly examine the medical testimony at 
the preliminary hearing, seeking to contradict it when in error, and at all 
events, by bringing out all legitimate conflicting opinions, enable the question 
to be thoroughly canvassed. 

On the trial, in addition to those duties in the examination and cross-exam- 
ination of witnesses, which he shares with the prosecuting officer, it lies upon 
him to require that public justice, as well as justice to his client, should be 
furthered by satisfactory proof on the following points :— 

The integrity, impartiality, experience, and skill of the experts, on whose 
testimony the case of the prosecution hangs. 

The careful preservation of the parts or substances which were the subject 
of chemical or other analysis, and the adoption of due precautions to prevent 
an erroneous result. 

The connection of the fatal disease with the poisoning. 

The practicability of the method of poisoning alleged. 

The connection of the defendant with the administration of the poison. 


2d. WouNDS AND BLOWS. 


§ 1127. a. Legal definition of wounds.—The medical definition has been 
already given. Under the English statutes making “wounding” indictable, a 
breaking of the continuity of the skin is essential to the legal offence. Thus 
it has been decided that it is not enough “to show a separation of the cuticle 
only,’”? and hence, where a medical man said that there was a slight abrasion 
of the skin, from which blood would issue, but in a different manner if the 
whole skin were cut, the King’s Bench held that there was no wound.(e) So 
a scratch, even though death ensue through inflammation, is no wound.(/) 


(e) R. v. McLaughlin, 8 C. & P. 635. 
(f) R. v. Beckett, 1 M. & Rob. 526; Moriarty v. Brooks, 6 C. & P. 684. 


886 


BOOK VI.] WOUNDS AND BLOWS. [$ 1130 


Where, however, there is an internal breaking of the skin, as where the lower 
jaw was broken in two places, and there was an internal bleeding, this was 
held a wound. (q) : 

§ 1128. The mere breaking of bones, however,(h) or their dislocation, (7) 
is not wounding under the statute. 

The wound must be effected by an instrument, and hence, biting a nose, or 
a finger, is not wounding;(j) and it is clear that throwing sulphuric acid on 
the face is not.(%) It is otherwise, however, with a blow from or kick with 
a shoe.(/) 

§ 1129. It should be observed that questions of this kind cannot arise in 
indictments for homicide, unless it be in cases where the indictment is so inar- 
tificially drawn as to present but the single alternation of “wound.” And even 
then it is not clear but that the term would be sufficiently comprehensive, in the 
way that it is ordinarily used (‘‘ giving unto the deceased one mortal wound,”’ 
&c.), to cover cases of biting.(m) In other cases, where there is no breaking 
of the skin, the word “‘ bruise’? should be used. But even this would seem not 
to be now necessary. In an English case tried before Mr. Baron Alderson in 
1846, the indictment charged that the defendant “with a certain instrument 
called a swingle, made of wood, iron, and leather, * * * did then and 
there give unto her the said E. W. one mortal wound of the length of one 
inch, and the depth of half an inch, of which said mortal wound the said E. 
W. then and there instantly died.” The surgeon who took the post-mortem, 
stated on his examination as follows: ‘I found, on examining the head, no 
external breach of the skin. I found a collection of blood on the back part 
of the head. The deceased died from extravasation of blood, which pressed on 
the brain. On examining and cutting the scalp, I found a collection of blood 
between the scalp and the cranium, just above the spot where, within the cra- 
nium, I found the pressure on the brain. I called that a contused wound, with 
effusion of blood; that is the same thing as a bruise. The internal part of the 
skin was broken. Medically we call the breaking of the skin, whether exter- 
nally or internally, a wound.’”’ The defendant was convicted, the learned Baron 
holding it was unimportant whether the injuries were external or internal, and 
the conviction was sustained by the fifteen judges. (7) 

b. Under what circumstances wounds imply criminal agency. 

§ 1130. a’. Character of the wounds themselves.—a?. Adaptation to a 
particular instrument. In Burdell’s case, the effort was to show the similarity 
of a bruise on the deceased’s person with a blunt instrument in the defendant’s 
possession ; in Webster’s (though erroneously, as it turned out), to connect 
the mortal blow with a sledge-hammer; in Boynton’s, to establish a connection . 
between the orifice of the wound and the bore of the defendant’s pistol. So 
convictions have been had from the peculiar jagged character of the wound 
indicating a saw, from the delicacy of a puncture indicating a needle, from the 


(7) Biv. Smith, 8 C. & P. 173. (h) R. v. Wood, 1 R. & M.,C.C. R. 381. 
(4) Anonymous, cited Elwell on Malpractice, 316. 

(j) R. v. Stevens, R. & M.,C. C. R. 409; R. v. Harris, 7 C. & P. 456. 

(k) R. v. Murrow, R. & M., C. R. 456; Henshell’s case, 2 Lewin C. C. 135. 

(1) R. v. Briggs, M. C. C. 318. (m) See Wh. Prec. 114. 

(n) R. v. Warman, 2C. & R. 195. 


887 


§ 1180] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


heaviness and breadth of a bruise the flat side of a spade. When the weapon | 
is found bloody or covered with hair, this strengthens the chain. 

The character of the wound may indicate that the charge was by gunpowder 
alone, fired at a very short distance,() or by very small shot,(q) or by rifle 
shot.(7) So also the distance of the murderer may be thus inferred. (s) 


(p) Ante, § 815. (q) 3 812. (rv) § 818. 

(s) Ibid. Among the many questions which arise under this head, are, 

1. Could the injury have been really produced by the weapon which is supposed to 
have been used ? 

The following facts will be of service in answering this question :— 

a. Blunt instruments produce their effect partly by pressure, and occasion \ oraabinke 
tearing, and breaking of the parts struck, according to the greater or less force of the 
blow and of the resistance offered. <A smooth and blunt instrument may be recognized 
by the suggillation and swelling which will follow upon the blow. Cornered, rough, 
blunt instruments produce, besides the crushing, holes, and often torn and cracked 
places. Blunt instruments with smooth broad sides often produce deep-seated internal 
injuries of which no trace is seen upon the surface of the body. 

Wounds caused by these instruments have, generally, broken, irregular edges, bleed 
comparatively little, and fester in healing. 

b. Sharp instruments. Where the wound was produced by stabbing, its size and 
depth must be compared with that of the instrument. Where the wound is by a 
plow or cut, its edges will often show mutilations answering to gaps or defects in the 
instrument. Around and conical instrument produces wounds similar to those which 
a table-knife would occasion. The form of the instrument may often be recognized 
from the shape of the wound. 

c. Shooting instruments. If the weapon be heavily loaded with powder, which is 
confined with a paper-wad, and be fired at the distance of one or two inches from the 
body, it will bore a hole similar to that produced by a ball, and leave no traces of 
paper in the opening. If the weapon be heavily loaded with small shot and fired at 
a distance of from one to twelve inches, it will produce one single wound at the sur- 
face, while the shot will afterwards separate and take different directions within the . 
body. Ata distance of one and a half feet there will be separate wounds on the sur- 
face. At a distance of three feet the shot will all enter separately, but may be 
included within a diameter of three or four inches. This diameter increases in pro- 
portion to the distance, so that at fifteen steps the load will scatter over the whole 
back. If a weapon loaded merely with powder be fired at a distance of five or six 
inches from the body, the paper wad, together with grains of powder, may form a 
wound very similar to that produced by small shot when fired in close contact with 
the body. If the weapon is fired at a less distance, but owing to the small charge 
the contents do not penetrate the skin, the surface from one and a half to two inches 
in circumference will be uniformly burned, while small black specks, produced by 
single grains of powder, will be found at further intervals. Where the weapon is 
fired at a distance of four feet, this burned place will not be seen, and the grains of 
powder will scatter over a surface of six inches in diameter. Balls often pursue a 
very inexplicable course in the body. When the ball is found and its shape has not 
been injured, it should be compared with the weapon used; if the shape has been 
destroyed, its weight may be compared with that of a similar ball which has not been 
injured. 

The wound made by the egress of a ball from the body is either similar to that 
made at the entrance, or smaller. In the majority of cases no contents of the body 
will be forced out at this opening, but the skin will be torn and exhibit a wound of 
different shapes, sometimes like a split, sometimes three cornered, Xc. 

Pure shot-wounds.—These resemble a wound made by a round cutting instrument, 
and are alike at the ingress and egress of the ball. Such wounds will only be found 
where the weapon has been fired at a distance of from ten to sixty or eighty steps’ from 
the body. Nearer than this shreds of paper and grains of powder will accompany 
the shot. But not all shots made within this distance produce such wounds ; there 
may be some defect in the weapon, or some peculiar condition of the tissues through 
which the ball must penetrate, or its force may be diminished by striking against a 
bone, and so the wound resemble ordinary shot wounds. 

If the ball splinters a bone and carries pieces out with it, or if it enters the body 
obliquely, the wound made by its egress may, in such cases, be absolutely larger than 
that made by its entrance into the body. 

For how long a time are the marks given eves for distinguishing between the 
wound made by the entrance and that made by the egress of:the ball visible? The 


888 


BOOK VI.] WOUNDS AND BLOWS. [$ 11381 


Thé general presumptions to be drawn from this instrument of death will 
be hereafter noticed. (¢) 

§ 1131. The physician, as Dr. Casper seaniae us,(w) is a bien called to an- 
swer the question whether the injuries found upon the body could have been 
inflicted with some specified instrument. This is generally easy to answer, as, 
for instance, where the skull is broken, it might have been done with almost 
any heavy weapon. ‘The further question, whether the injury was probably 
inflicted with the specified instrument, cannot, commonly, be so positively an- 
swered. ‘The most that can be said ordinarily is, that the wound might have 
been inflicted with the instrument in question, and that either it or some simi- 
lar one was probably employed. A more positive answer in the negative 
can generally be given, as the cases where the wound could not have been 
caused by the specified instrument admit of little doubt. Much often depends 
upon this answer in questions of guilt and innocence. 

A more difficult question is, whether any conclusion can be drawn from the 
position and extent of the injury as to the manner in which it was inflicted— 


edges of the skin, standing out in the one case, and pressing in in the other, lose this 
peculiarity after a few hours. In other respects the condition of the wound remains 
unchanged until festering begins to take place. 

The scar left in healing often indicates the direction of the ball as surely as the 
fresh wound. The scar formed at the place where the ball entered is circular and 
concave ; the skin is drawn in creases from the circumference to the centre; and the 
scar is white and hard. The scar which forms over the wound made by the egress of 
the body is, generally, smaller, and of irregular shapes, and often scarcely visible, 
while the other scar remains distinctly marked. 

Contusion, with ecchymosis and extravasation about the wound, are indications of 
a nearly spent ball. The less the force of the ball the greater injuries of this sort will 
it produce. The following is an average of the distances within which the several 
varieties of shot-wounds may be found :— 

1. Pure shot-wounds at a distance of from ten to eighty steps. 

2. Ordinary shot-wounds at a distance of from fifty to five hundred steps. 

3. Contusion and extravasation at a distance of from fifty to five hundred steps and 
more. 

The hole made by the ball answers to its circumference. 

In pure shot-wounds this hole is just the size of the ball. 

In ordinary shot-wounds the diameter of the hole is never greater, and seldom any 
less than the circumference of the projectile. Incase the outer skin is torn away, the 
wound at the entrance and egress of the ball may be somewhat larger than the ball 
would seem to require. 

Where the ball strikes obliquely, the opening made is not round, but oval, and gives 
no data for determining the size of the ball. 

2. Can any conclusion be drawn from the extent and position of the wound as to 
the bodily strength of the person who inflicted it ? 

The instrument used as well as the injury must be looked to in answering this 
question. It requires, generally, only sufficient strength to wield a heavy blunt 
instrument in order to produce with it serious injuries, while greater strength is neces- 
sary to effect the same with lighter instruments. Sharp instruments require less 
strength in proportion to the keenness of their edge. 

3. The question whether any conclusion can be drawn from the position and extent 
of the wound as to the manner in which it was inflicted, can only be answered in 
special cases. 

The easiest way of testing whether a given instrument produced the injury is to 
place it in the wound, but this is commonly to be avoided as apt to change the original 
appearance and size of the wound. 

The question whether a given instrument is a dangerous one or not belongs not to 
the province of the physician, and depends altogether upon circumstances. 

See Bécker’s Med. Jur. 1857, from which the above is translated and reduced, and 
see fully ante, § 807, &c. 

(t) Post, § 1164. 

(u) Gericht. Med. ed. 1857, § 40, &c. 

889 


§ 1182] CORPUS DELIOTI. [BOOK VI. 


whether the victim was lying, standing, &c., and as to the bodily strength 
employed in producing it. A.close inspection of the position of the wounds, 
their depth, breadth, number, and correspondence with the specified instrument, 
will often furnish strong evidence against the evasive statements of the accused. 

§ 1132. 6% Shape and direction.—Whether the wound was skilfully in- 
flicted, or done roughly and brutally, may indicate, (1) the skill, and (2) the 
temper of the supposed assassin. A rough and ignorant assassin will multiply 
wounds, so as to make sure of his victim; a man acquainted with surgery will 
economize them, and direct them to the most fatal part. Whether the defend- 
ant acted coolly, from the mere determination to take life, or passionately, 
from the purpose to inflict injury, and to satisfy revenge and hatred, may be 
thus gathered. In this way premeditation, and a specific interest to take life, 
may be inferred, and a test given by which the juries may distinguish between 
the several degrees of murder. 

So, too, by the shape and direction of wounds, the presumption of suicide 
may be made or refuted. The direction of the wound may show, (1) whether 
a shot was fired from within or without a house; (2) what was the position 
and distance of the assailant; and (3) sometimes what was the force used.(v) 
Thus, where a farmer was found dead on the highroad, with his throat cut, 
‘the wound was found to have been made, not, as is usual in suicides, by 
carrying the cutting instrument from before backwards, but as the throats of 
sheep are cut when slaughtered by a butcher. The knife had been passed in 

_deeply under and behind the ear, and had been brought out by a semicircular 
sweep in front; all the great vessels of the neck, with the esophagus and 
trachea, having been divided from behind forwards.” The prisoner, who was 
proved to have been a butcher, was subsequently tried and executed for the 
crime.(w) Similar questions, arising from a hemorrhage from the pudenda, 
have been already noticed. (x) 

§ 1132(a.) Was the injury found upon a dead body the real cause of 
death, or of the changes which the body has undergone ?—In answering these 
questions we must look to the reactions which have taken place.’ Where the 
following evidences of reaction are manifest, it may be concluded with great 
probability that the injury was inflicted during life :— 

a. Inflammation and its attendants, festering, traces of healing, recent 
granulation and scars. 

b. A filling of the small bloodvessels around the wound with blood, so as to 
produce red stripes about the edges of the wound. This appearance, however, 
may also be observed in cases where the injury was produced after death. 

c. Changes of color, red, brown, blue, greenish, yellow, produced by extra- 
vasation. These will not be observed until some time after the injury has been 
inflicted. 

d. Hxudation of curdled blood from broken bloodvessels. That the blood 
is curdled is no evidence that it must have exuded after death. 

e. Vesications from burning, the appearance of a red inflamed ring around 


(v) See ante, § 817. (w) Taylor’s Med. Jur. 191. 
(x) Ante, § 810. 


890 


BOOK VI. | WOUNDS AND BLOWS. [$ 1183 


the burnt place. Blisters, although they may expose, when laid open, a red 
skin, yet indicate nothing as to whether the burning occurred before or after 
death, since the same appearances may be produced by intense heat in this 
case as are observed upon the living body. Scalding never produces vesication 
upon a dead body, but causes the epidermis to fall off in shreds. Flame 
applied to the skull-bone of a dead body will cause it to crack open, and the 
lamellee to fall off in layers. 

f. A cracking open of the edges of the swollen wound. The wound made 
by a shot when it enters a living body is at the surface swollen, blackened, and 
cracked open around the edges; the passage made by the ball is narrow, and 
filled with clotted blood, while infiltration of blood will be observed in the sur- 
rounding parts. In the case of dead bodies the ball draws the skin into a 
funnel shape. 

It is possible that all the above marks may be wanting, and yet the injury 
have been inflicted during life, especially in cases where death follows imme- 
diately upon the injury; but such cases are only exceptional. 

Whether the changes which the body has undergone are to be ascribed to 
the injuries inflicted upon it, or to some previous cause, as disease, can only 
be decided by a careful examination of all the circumstances bearing on the 
case in hand. The constitution of the person, his predisposition to disease, 
the locality in which he found his death, the species of injury and its extent, 
together with other circumstances, must be considered in weighing the pro- 
babilities of the case. 

§ 1133. c?. Particular class of weapon.—a®. Gunshot. As has been shown, 
“near’’ wounds are shown from the blackening and burning of the skin, and 
the width and laceration of the wound. From this the presumption of self- 
infliction may be drawn, though homicidal wounds, in a close conflict, may 
have the same characteristics. (y) 

In wounds produced by a shot, it is sometimes the case, as is stated by Dr. 
Casper,(z) that different organs are bored through, and death caused by bleed- 
ing; while in others the organ is utterly torn to pieces, and death produced in 
this way. The instrument used in any given case is rarely a subject of exa- 
mination on the part of the physician. When this is the case, the question 
occurs, whether the instrament has been discharged; and if so, when. Bou- 
tigny has answered this question by describing minutely the changes which 
take place, within given periods, upon the powder which remains in the piece 
after it is discharged. Much weight, however, should not be allowed to these 
results, given by a man unknown to science, especially in cases where the life 
of an accused person may be depending. Besides, the correctness of the results 
deserves to be questioned, from the fact that no allowance is made for different 
qualities of powder, different states of the atmosphere, &c. In questions of 
this kind, gunsmiths, huntsmen, &c., are generally much better qualified to 
answer than the physician, and their testimony should be preferred. 

In reference to the effect produced by the shot upon the body, the condition 
of the parts where the ball entered and where it emerged, the course which it 
followed, the resistances with which it met, &c., must be noted. 


(y) See ante, § 811, Ke. (z) Gericht. Med., ed. 1859, p. 146. 
891 


) 


§ 1135] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


§ 1134. b%. Punctured wounds. The inferences to be drawn from this spe- 
cies of wound have been already noticed.(a) 

§ 1135. c3. Inctsed wounds. Here the question may arise between acci- 
dental injuries, through the falling upon or striking against glass or crockery, 
or voluntary, when the wound is intentionally inflicted. It is also to be 
observed that in suicide an incised wound on the throat is often preferred, 
though it is sometimes inflicted by an assassin, in which case it may have been 
inflicted in order the better to conceal the crime.(b) These points have been 
considered under prior heads.(c) 

Wounds inflicted by a blow with sharp instruments, such as a razor, knife, 
dagger, sword, bayonet, scythe, &c.—we here translate from Dr. Casper(d)— 
may be either shallow or deep. Where the instrument used was sharp, the 
outer edge of the wound will, of course, be smooth, but the surface somewhat 
flattened. The appearances resulting from reaction differ according to the 
portion of the body on which the injury is made, and the length of time 
intervening between the infliction of the wound and the examination of the 
same. If the instrument presses to the bone, it will either break this into 
pieces or else divide it; this latter is more apt to occur with the bones of the 
fingers or arm. Both effects are often seen where the blow falls upon the 
skull. The size of the instrument by which such a wound was inflicted cannot 
be determined from the appearance of the wound. Where the muscles are cut 
crosswise, they contract and leave a gaping wound, which by no means answers 
to the instrument with which it was inflicted. 

(a.) Where the wound is produced by a cut with a sharp instrument, 
the sides are smooth and not flattened, and converge to a sharp angle at 
either end. The same appearances from reaction will be seen as in the case 
of wounds produced by a blow. Outs which do not penetrate much beneath 
the skin may yet open large bloodvessels, and cause the person to bleed to 
death. In such cases it will often be impossible to determine which is the 
beginning and which the end of the wound. Surrounding circumstances, such 
as blood upon one hand and not upon the other, the rent made in the clothing, 
&e., will sometimes throw light upon this point. When the wound is made 
upon a neck where the skin is very much wrinkled, the appearance will be that 
of several separate cuts. ‘ 

Wounds made by a thrust with a sharp instrument produce little bleeding 
externally, except where they pierce some large bloodvessel lying near the sur- 
face of the skin; and where the instrument is small, they exhibit scarcely any 
appearances of reaction. If, however, the instrument penetrates to the internal 
organs, gushes of blood, or urine, or food in process of digestion, will follow. 
It deserves to be mentioned in this connection that it is often very unjust to 
blame the examining physician for not tracing out the original source of the 
bleeding, or the very bloodvessel penetrated by the instrument. Such an exa- 
mination would in many cases prove very tedious and laborious, and throw no 
additional light upon the cause of death. 


(a) Ante, §§ 808, 819. (b) Taylor’s Med. Jur. 192. 
(c) Ante, §§ 808, 817, 819. (d) Gericht. Med. 1857, p. 139. 


892 


BOOK VI.] WOUNDS AND BLOWS. [$ 1187 


Wounds produced by cutting afford no means of determining the size of the 
instrument. 

(b.) Dull instruments, as is noticed by Dr. Casper,(e) produce very different 
results, according to the strength with which the blow is given, and the part 
of the body struck. Sometimes instant death is produced by the crushing of 
some organ; or death, more or less speedy, may result from rupture of a 
bloodvessel, owing to concussion. Bones may be injured in various degrees, 
from a slight fracture to entire crushing. Organs may be torn apart in such 
a way that the wound will not at all correspond with the instrument by which 
it was made. The appearance of the person may be entirely changed by the 
breaking of certain bones in the face, by the swelling of the lips and eyelids, 
&c. Several of these effects may be combined, either by the use of several 
different instruments, or by the use of one which has several different sides, 
adapted to different purposes. 

Rupture of the internal organs frequently results from the use of such instru- 
ments. Spontaneous rupture never occurs with sound organs; and whenever 
the basts crantt, the liver, the lungs, &c., are ruptured, it may safely be sup- 
posed the effect of considerable violence. 

§ 1136. d*. Contused wounds. This involves the inquiry whether the wound 
came from a fall from a height, or against a hard surface, or from a blow from 
a heavy body falling upon the deceased, or by voluntary or involuntary shocks 
against a hard substance when in rapid motion, or by a blunt weapon in the 
hand of the assailant, or, in rare cases, of the deceased himself.(/) These 
points have already been noticed.(g) In Stirling’s case (Cleveland, Ohio, 
1860), where the deceased was found at the bottom of a flight of stairs, with 
a contused wound on his head, which shortly caused his death, the verdict of 
the jury followed the weight of medical evidence, that the death was from a 
fall. (h) 

§ 1137. d?. Number of wounds.—In suicides a legal presumption of self- 
agency has been strengthened from the wound being single,(z) though such 
presumption can be but weak, since an assassin may often dispatch his victim 
with a single blow, and, on the other hand, suicides have struck themselves 
repeatedly before the blow took effect.(7) Recent wounds on the back of the 
hands, and wounds the result of a struggle, give a strong homicidal presump- 
tion.(z) 

§ 1137(a.) Injuries by violence.—In cases where there are no external 
marks of violence whatever upon the body, it is by no means to be concluded 
simply from that reason that death was not produced by violent means. So 
far is this from being the case, no external traces of violence, as we are 
reminded by Dr. Casper,(/) are to be expected in such injuries as are followed 
by immediate or very speedy death ; as, for instance, in ruptures of the organs, 
&e. The following remarkable case is cited by him in this connection :— 


(e) Gericht. Med. p. 143. (f) Ante, § 816. 
(g) Ante, § 809, &c. (Ah) See ante, § 846, &c. 
(7) Burrill, Circum. Ev. 695. (j) See ante, §§ 809, 816, 846, Ke. 


(k) Ante, §§ 816, 846; Taylor’s Med. Jur. 201. 
(/) Handb. Gericht. Med. 1857, p. 122. 


893 


§ 1140] © CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


A driver who, upon a cold winter night, was descending the hill from 
Spandau with a heavily-loaded wagon, and had dismounted in order to relieve 
his horses, was overtaken by the wagon and thrown with violence against a 
tree by the road-side, where he was found next morning lying dead. The only 
external marks of violence were a slight abrasure of the skin upon the left 
shoulder and on the right jaw. There was nothing remarkable about the 
appearance of the head except that the sinus transversus seemed more full 
of blood than usual. On opening the spine at the neck about a quart of dark 
blood ran out. The muscles of the back were suggillated through the whole 
length of the spine, but the marrow was uninjured. Thirty ounces of dark 
blood were found in the left breast. The heart had been torn from its proper 
position, was entirely separated from the large bloodvessels, and was lying 
almost loose in the cavity of the breast. The pericardium had been torn 
throughout its entire diameter. The ends of large bloodvessels, as of the 
pulmonary artery and of the aorta, were distinctly traceable in the cavity of the 
breast. The skin of the heart was sound and firm, and the heart still con- 
tained much dark, clotted blood. The left lung also was torn throughout its 
middle segment, and a wound two inches long and a half inch deep was found 
on the liver. Yet there was nothing remarkable in the external appearance 
of the body ! 

§ 1138. e% Situation of wounds.—The presumptions falling under this 
head have been already noticed. (m) 

§ 1139. b'. Hapression of countenance.—“ In cases of suicide,’’ says M. 
Burrill,(n) “death being desired and determined on, there is no expression of 
fear on the countenance, though it may be haggard from the influence of other 
passions; the eyes being usually closed and sunken. In cases of assassination, 
on the contrary, where death is strnggled against and shrunk from, there is 
always a degree of fear, amounting sometimes to the extremity of terror, 
imprinted on the visage, the eyes being open or staring. The countenance in 
these cases is also usually pale, although sometimes there may be the opposite 
appearance of redness or suffusion. The latter circumstance is considered 
important, as it may indicate the use of violence in order to stop the cries of 
the subject of the crime.”’ 

In suicides produced by despair, however, it has been observed that the 
expression of the countenance is often more agonizing than that produced in 
any kind of death. (0) 

§ 1140. ct. Inferences from surrounding objects.—a?. Clothing.—This, 
in reference to the kindred presumption of premeditation, will be considered 
under a subsequent head. In Courvoisier’s case, it was held that a cutting 
through a cravat or portion of a dress was indicative of homicide, since it 
was not likely that a suicide would strike the blow without first removing such 
obstacles. 

The effect of blood on clothing has been already examined. (p) 


(m) Ante, § 816, &c. (n) Circumstantial Evidence, 686. (0) Post, § 1151. 

(p) Ante, §§ 821-31. The following is from the N. Y. Observer, of Aug. 3, 1860: 
“Tn 1825, a youth resided in a small town in Loudon Co., Va., who was a barkeeper of 
a tavern; he became a confirmed gambler. He set off one day on horseback on a 


894 


BOOK VI.] WOUNDS AND BLOWS. [$ 1141 


Rifling of the pockets, tearing of the dress, its being put on in a manner 
unusual for the deceased, incisions or perforations, dirt clinging to the texture, 
all afford grounds for a legal presumption of homicide. (q) 

In rape, the condition of the clothing forms one of the main points from 
which a presumption of violence may be drawn. 

§ 1141. 6% Agent commensurate to the effect.—If no weapon be found by 
which the offence could have been committed, the presumption of homicide, as 
distinguished from suicide, ig very strong.(7) ‘If a weapon be found near 
the body,’’ says Mr. Burrill,(s) “ or within a short distance from it, its nature 
and the degree of its sharpness, as corresponding with the appearance of the 
wound, are important considerations. Its appearance, also, and relative posi- 
tion of the body (that is, as lying on the right or left side of it), require to 
be most accurately examined and considered, as the appearances of suicide are 
sometimes attempted to be given to murder, by the perpetrator, in order to 
escape suspicion and discovery. The instrument with which a suicidal wound 
of the throat is most commonly made is a razor, and it is frequently found 
either grasped in the hand or lying by the side of the deceased. Where the 
wound must have produced almost instant death, if the razor is found closed, 
there is fair ground to suspect the interference of another person; although 
the circumstance also has happened in cases of suicide. If the instrument 
be found still firmly grasped in the hand of the deceased, no better cir- 
cumstantial evidence of suicide can perhaps be offered, it being impossible 
that any murderer could imitate such a state and position. But where the 


travelling tour, with a person whom he knew to have in his possession a large sum of 
money, and before he started armed himself secretly with a pistol, at the muzzle of 
which was a small dagger attached. On Saturday night they arrived at Centreville, 
in Fairfax County. After supper they left the house, and in a short time the young 
man returned without his companion. When the landlord asked for him, the answer 
was, ‘Am I his keeper ?’—the ominous reply of the first murderer! About daylight 
next morning he was seen crossing a field where the corpse was found perhaps a day 
or two afterwards. He returned to his residence on Sunday, and I conversed with 
him within thirty hours after his hands were reeking with blood ; he seemed gay and 
cheerful as ever. He was arrested on suspicion, and in his trunk was found the 
pistol, which, to the naked eye, displayed no marks of blood. When, however, the 
microscope was applied it was clearly discoverable, and also a very small portion of 
one of the hairs of the dead man’s whisker, which was of red color. He was taken off, 
accompanied by a lawyer, who was unsurpassed in physical and moral courage by any 
other man I ever knew. When they arrived at Centreville the excitement was tre- 
mendous. All were clearthat he was guilty; some said that if the accused would 
touch the corpse it would bleed. On hearing this prognostication his counsel com- 
pelled him to come up stairs and touch the cold body, in order to do away the sus- 
picion. He nowappealed to the crowd in eloquent terms that his client was innocent, 
because no blood issued from either of eighteen wounds. Long after this his trial 
came on at the county town of Fairfax, before Judge Dade and an impartial jury of 
his. own selection. The testimony was entirely circumstantial and indirect. But 
when the different links of the chain were put together it pointed with fatal certainty. 
tothe prisoner. The microscope helped greatly in tightening the rope around his neck. 
That little fraction of a hair, mixed with blood, connected with some of the identified 
money of the deceased, and other circumstances not now recollected, brought the 
guilty youth to the galiows. Afterwards it appeared that the murdered man lay on 
the ground through the whole night mortally wounded, but was able to implore and 
beg his pursuer on Sunday morning to spare his life; but acting on the principle 
‘that the dead tell no tales,’ he stabbed him seventeen times, until death closed the 
scene.” 
(q) See 1 Taylor’s Med. Jur. 188. 
(r) See ante, § 819, &c. (s) Circumstantial Evidence, 690. 


895 


§ 1143] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


razor is held loosely in the hand, or with no compression of the fingers upon 
it, there is room for the supposition of homicide, which may become a 
presumptive, especially if no blood appear upon the hand.”’ 

§ 1142. c% Place where found.—Was the ground marked by struggling, 
and does it show that a body was dragged over it? These indications, par- 
ticularly the latter, are much relied on by the courts as showing violence.(¢) 
So of the prints of feet, though here there is great danger that, by a change 
of shoes, a crafty assassin may throw a false suspicion on an innocent person. 
So as to blood; but here, also, there is great danger of fraud. The cases have 
not been unfrequent, where adroit assassins, by smearing blood on weapons 
belonging to others, or by making false tracks, have baffled inquiry. 

§ 1143. William Peterson, a young man of about twenty, was tried in 
Raleigh, Shelby County, Tennessee, in 1852, for the murder of William Merri- 
weather, of Mississippi. In appearance—we condense from a report by the then 
Attorney-General of the Memphis District—the prisoner more resembled a fair 
young girl than the common ideal of a highwayman—of light and buoyant 
figure, small of stature, of fair and beautiful complexion, but of an expression 
of countenance as if chiselled in marble—cold, saturnine, and indifferent to the 
last degree. The deceased was a young planter of Mississippi, of very noble 
character and great popularity, then but recently married.(u) 

He left his home in Mississippi in the spring of 1851, to traverse on horse- 
back the wilds of Arkansas, in quest of anew home. He took with him about - 
one hundred and eighty dollars in money to pay his travelling expenses. The 
horse upon which the journey was to be performed, whose astonishing instincts 
afterwards became such an important and indispensable link in the chain of 
testimony by which the murderer of his master was detected, was a dark 
blood-bay, of great beauty and sagacity, and of wonderful affection for his 
master. On taking leave of his family, Mr. Merriweather observed that he 
would take Memphis in his route, some hundred and twenty miles distant, 
where he intended to purchase a pocket Bible, and a small map of Arkansas. 
His wife placed in his vest pocket a package of needles wrapped in brown 
paper, with some buttons, thread, and such other little articles of the kind as 
might be needed during his journey. He also purchased two pocket knives 
precisely alike, one of which he presented to his brother, William Merri- 
weather, and then took his departure. Some five or six weeks after he left 
his home—nothing having been heard from him in the interval—there ap- 
peared in the Memphis Inquirer, a startling account of the finding of the dead 
body of a man in the forest some eight miles south of Memphis, some forty 
feet east of the Hernando Road, and in the Twelfth Civil District of Shelby 
County, with every appearance upon it and about it of having been murdered. 
The body was found at the root of a tree, denuded of flesh by decomposition, 
and by having been eaten by the hogs, and the head, which had been severed 


(t) State v. McCann, 13 Smedes & Marshall, 478. 

(u) I have thought it best, instead of dividing the several points in this case under 
their respective heads, to place them together at this point. The interest of the case— 
and I know none more interesting—is derived as much from the inter-dependence of 
the several items of proof, as from their individual value. 


896 


BOOK VI.] WOUNDS AND BLOWS. [$ 1144 


from the body, lying some ten feet off. Upon the forehead there was an 
indentation, apparently produced by a blow from an octagon hammer, or other 
instrument. The account contained a description of the person as well as it 
could be identified, and the color and quality of the clothing left upon the 
body. The color of the hair was described, the teeth also, and two notable 
plugs in the same, and the contents of the vest pocket, being, among other 
things of little value, a package of needles, thread and buttons, wrapped in 
brown paper, together with some manuscripts much defaced by exposure to 
the rain. This account, answering so well the description of Thomas Merri- 
weather, in a few days reached his family, who were plunged in grief, and star- 
tled by the suspicion that he had been murdered. William Merriweather, his 
brother, went up immediately to the vicinity of Memphis to investigate the 
matter. The body, in the mean time, had been buried. He had it exhumed, 
and at once thought he recognized it as the mutilated corpse of his lost bro- 
ther. After re-interring the body, he went into the city to make further 
inquiry. This Mr. Merriweather was almost the exact counterpart of his 
deceased brother in personal appearance. Remembering that his brother 
intended to purchase a pocket Bible and pocket map of Arkansas, in passing 
through Memphis, he inquired of a book merchant if a gentleman had pur- 
chased such articles of him some five or six weeks before, who replied, 
“Yes, sir, and you are the very man.” Upon being informed of his sad mis- 
sion, the merchant told him that his brother, or a gentleman much resembling 
himself, had called about the time specified and purchased the articles referred 
to, about three o’clock in the afternoon, and while in the store, had remarked 
that he had visited Memphis en route to Arkansas, where he intended pur- 
chasing lands, but upon learning that the cholera was raging upon the river, 
and in a portion of the country through which he intended to pass, he had 
concluded to return home; that he would start out that evening, and go some 
five or six miles on his journey home, and postpone his trip westward until a 
more auspicious time. 

§ 1144. There were several persons in the store at the time of this conver- 
sation, some of whom were unknown to the merchant. Upon receiving this 
information, Mr. Merriweather took the road his brother had taken home- 
ward, and after a ride of six miles he reached the house of Mr. Hammel, the 
only public house in that vicinity, where he thought it likely his brother had 
spent the night on his journey toward home. Mr. Hammel, upon inquiry, 
told him that his brother had spent the night with him about the time speci- 
fied, and that on the same night a young man but poorly clad, whose name 
he did not learn, had spent the night there also. The young man came in, 
he said, from the direction of Memphis, a short time after dark, and seemed 
to be travelling on foot. Upon the trial, Mr. Hammel recognized the pri- 
soner as the same person. He was going toward Hernando, as he said, and 
from his appearance, was in feeble health. The young man and the deceased 
had conversed much during the evening, and he had heard the deceased giving 
the young man much kindly advice. They seemed, however, to be strangers 
to each other. The next morning the young man arose, paid for his lodging 
and supper, and left very early before breakfast, going on his journey toward 

57 897 


§ 1144] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


Hernando. He seemed to have but little money. When the deceased came 
down to his breakfast about seven o’clock, he inquired for the young man, and 
upon being told that he had gone, he expressed some regret, stating that 
the youth appeared to be frail and feeble, and that he intended to give him a 
ride during much of the journey to Hernando. The deceased left Mr. Hammel’s 
and took the road toward Hernando immediately after breakfast. The body 
was afterward found about two miles from Mr. Hammel’s, upon that road. 
After getting this information, Mr. Merriweather resumed his journey toward 
his home in Mississippi. In passing through a village some hundred miles 
from Memphis, he instituted further inquiry, and was informed that some five 
weeks before, a young man rode into the village on a fine blood-bay horse, and 
offered him for sale at much less than he was supposed to be worth. A gentle- 
man present suspected from this and other circumstances that the horse had 
been stolen, and upon catechizing the youth pretty closely, he suddenly put 
spurs to the horse and galloped him off. The young man’s name was given 
as William Peterson; and the horse had been sold by him to a gentleman a 
few miles from the village. Mr. Merriweather then went in quest of the horse, 
which proved upon inspection to be the noble animal referred to, of his lost 
brother. The father of Peterson lived not far distant, who is said to be a very 
respectable and worthy citizen. Mr. Merriweather had confidence in the old 
man’s truth and integrity, and fearing that he might do injustice to the family 
and to Peterson, by prematurely denouncing him as the murderer, he visited 
the father and unfolded to him all the circumstances of suspicion by which his 
son was complicated. The story fell upon the ears of the father and devoted 
young sisters of Peterson like a bombshell. The young man had returned 
home, after a long absence, riding the fine horse in question—well dressed and 
well supplied with money. He had told them that the horse was purchased 
by him in Holly Springs, at auction upon the streets. This they believed, and 
were still hopeful of his innocence, and assured that he would be able to dissi- 
pate the cloud of suspicion which enveloped him. Mr. Merriweather informed 
them of the circumstance of his brother’s having purchased a pocket Bible and 
small map of Arkansas, in Memphis. At this announcement the father was 
still more startled and wholly subdued, and the sisters in an agony of tears 
admitted that the brother had brought home and presented to them such 
articles as Mr. Merriweather described. The little Bible and pocket map were 
at once produced and delivered to Mr. Merriweather, and upon the trial were 
identified by the merchant as the same that he had sold the deceased. William 
Peterson was ascertained to be at that time sojourning in the town of Grenada. 
Mr. Merriweather, accompanied by a few friends, went in search of him. In 
the conflict of mind between his commiseration for the father and sisters of 
Peterson, and his eagerness to bring to punishment the murderer of his brother, 
he determined still further to investigate the matter before he had Peterson 
arrested ; and the purpose of his seeking him was to examine his wardrobe, 
and if possible still further to satisfy himself of his guilt. About eleven o’clock 
at night, the party alighted at the hotel in Grenada, where Peterson was said 
to be sojourning. Peterson had retired to bed, and they were shown to his 
room; the light shone instantly upon his face as the party entered, and he was 
898 


iirc . 


BOOK VI. ] WOUNDS AND BLOWS, [§ 1145 


discovered to be apparently asleep—this, however, upon closer inspection of 
his half-closed eyes and trembling eyelids, was evidently feigned. He was 
touched by one of the party, and told that they had come to arrest him on a 
charge of murder, committed in the city of St. Louis. He instantly arose and 
replied that he was ready to answer the charge. His eyes, in glancing upon 
the faces of the party, fell upon the pallid and excited face of William Merri- 
weather, whom he had never seen before, upon which his gaze for a moment 
was fixed—then his head dropped upon his breast, and he sighed deeply. Mr. 
Merriweather asked him for the key of his trunk, which he gave him; the 
trunk was opened, and Mr. Merriweather proceeded to inspect the articles it 
contained. He recognized at once a pair of pantaloons of rare texture, and 
some shirts and a vest which he believed to be his brother’s. But fearing still 
that he might peradventure be mistaken in opinion, he determined still further 
to look into the contents of the trunk, when he found a pair of socks resem- 
bling a pair his brother had taken with him, one of which was marked with 
his own initials, and the other with those of his brother. Upon this discovery 
he was overwhelmed with the conviction that he was in the presence of the 
murderer of his brother—actuated by a sudden and natural impulse of resent- 
ment, he drew a pistol from his bosom and placed the muzzle at the heart of 
Peterson, exclaiming, “‘ You, sir, have murdered my poor brother,” but in- 
stantly collecting himself, he observed, ‘but no, vengeance belongs to God and 
to the law; your blood shall not be upon my skirts’? William Peterson was 
then arrested upon the charge of murder. The person and the trunk of the 
prisoner were carefully searched for the knife of the deceased, but it could no- 
where be found. Nothing was said to him, however, in reference to the knife 
—and it was at no time intimated to him that the deceased had a knife when 
he left his home. Upon the person of the prisoner was found about one hun- 
dred dollars in money, and a promissory note for twenty-five dollars, executed 
to him in part payment for the horse by the gentleman who had purchased 
him. Some pistols were also found in his possession, one of which had an 
octagon barrel. The prisoner stoutly denied the killing of Merriweather, but 
said he knew who did do it; and although he was indirectly concerned in it, yet 
he was eight miles from the scene of the murder when it was committed. 
About two days after his arrest, William Merriweather took out his own knife 
in the presence of the prisoner, and held it up by the blade before him, in 
silence. The prisoner gazed earnestly at it for a moment, and observed, ‘‘'That 
is not your brother’s knife, sir.’ Soon afterward he was taken to Shelby 
County to be lodged in jail to await his trial. In passing by the scene of the 
murder he was observed to turn deadly pale, and to gaze fixedly in an oppo- 
site direction from that in which the body had been found. He was indicted 
in the Circuit Court at Raleigh, not as accessary, but as the actual murderer 
of Thomas Merriweather. The bill of indictment contains but one count, 
alleging the homicide to have been committed with a knife. When put upon 
his trial and charged upon the bill of indictment, he pleaded not guilty thereto, 
and a jury were impanelled. 

§ 1145. The question of the identity of the body was the first difficulty with 
which the prosecution had to contend. In the mutilated condition of the body 

899 


§ 1147] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


when found, which had been exposed for five or six weeks in the open wood, 
to rough weather and furious rains, with its head severed from it, and every 
bone well nigh denuded of its flesh—the proof of its identity became a most deli- 
cate and difficult question. The testimony of William Merriweather, who had 
exhumed and examined it, as to his belief that it was the body of his brother, 
from the color of the hair and the appearance of the plugged teeth, but who also 
testified that several of the front teeth had been lost since he had seen his brother 
living, and could nowhere be found, was wholly insufficient for this purpose, 
and tended rather to obscure than to elucidate the point in question. Under 
these circumstances it became utterly impossible, under the austere requirements 
of the law, to sustain the indictment without further testimony. Mr. Merri- 
weather could not identify the few torn and tattered garments which the rob- 
ber had left upon the deceased, and which had totally changed appearance by 
exposure to the weather. He thought, however, that he recognized a letter 
or two of the small piece of obliterated manuscript, found in the vest pocket, 
- as his brother’s handwriting. But this was not enough. The vest was of 
figured satin, which he had never seen, the quality and texture of which could 
be discerned by a little spot which was luckily preserved from the general 
decay by being covered by the lapel. The clothing and the contents of the 
vest pocket had been preserved, and were produced upon the trial. 

§ 1146. It became thus necessary to call the widow of the deceased, whose 
knowledge of his clothing was more exact, but whose touching condition, cou- 
pled with the poignancy of her affliction, had led the prosecutor humanely to 
endeavor to spare her a trial so great as that of the public inspection and 
identification of her husband’s remains. The articles were presented to her 
seriatim, and she was severally questioned as to her recollection of them. 
First, a lock of her lost husband’s hair, which she stated upon her belief to be 
his. Next, the articles of wearing apparel, several of which were too much 
altered for her recognition. The vest was produced; she held it up in her 
hand for a moment in doubt, until her attention was called to the spot beneath 
the lapel, where an entire figure was preserved from the general decay, when 
she at once pronounced it, upon her belief, to be his vest. The last article 
produced and identified was the little packet of needles and thread which had 
been found in the vest pocket. 

§ 1147. Assuming the remains to be identified, a second difficulty arose in 
sustaining the allegation in the indictment that the death was produced by a 
knife. When the body was found, as will be remembered, the head was severed 
therefrom, and was lying some paces from it. The flesh was too far decom- 
posed to distinguish the incision of a knife, but the fact that the head was off 
tended to the conclusion that a knife was used to effect it. It will be remem- 
bered, also, that upon the forehead of the deceased there was a deep indentation, 
which must have been made during the desperate struggle, and which, as the 
witness believed, was made by an octagon shaped hammer, or other instrument 
of that shape, and also that the prisoner had been seen with a large octagon 
barrelled pistol. In addition to this, one of the vertebral bones in the neck had 
been evidently disjointed by a violent concussion from a blunt instrument. 
The very intelligent surgeon who examined the body and testified to these facts, 

900 


BOOK VI.] WOUNDS AND BLOWS. [$ 1148 


believed that this was done by a pistol ball, and that when done it produced 
instant death. Jt seemed then that the murder was actually perpetrated with 
a pistol, but a knife had been probably used in the horrible climax the prisoner 
gave to his work in severing the head from the body. This left the question 
somewhat in doubt, until the counsel for the State asked of the surgeon the 
question, whether the disjoining of the vertebral bone referred to might not 
have been effected by compression between the tusks of ahog? He replied, 
that “it might have been done in that way.” It was proven that many hogs 
were about the body when it was found. When the cause was submitted to 
the jury in argument, the counsel for the State argued upon this point, that 
inasmuch as it appeared that the homicide was committed on the morning of — 
the Sabbath, very near to a much frequented highway, and in a populous 
neighborhood, the probabilities were against the hypothesis, that the prisoner 
would have rendered himself so liable to immediate detection in the commission 
of so dreadful a crime, as by the firing of a pistol; and that this fact, connected 
with the severance of the head from the body, and the further pregnant cir- 
cumstance that the prisoner had evidently seen and examined carefully the dirk 
knife of the deceased, as evinced by the incident related by Mr. Merriweather ; 
and had so disposed of it as to be enabled confidently to negative the idea that 
the knife held before him by that gentleman, although its counterpart, was the 
knife of the deceased, clearly established the proposition, as far as circum- 
stances could do it, that the instrument of death was a knife. It was believed 
by the State’s counsel, from all the facts of the case, that the highwayman, 
who during the night before had won the sympathy and confidence of his 
noble and unsuspecting victim, had decoyed him into the wood under some 
pretext, and had perhaps induced him to dismount from his horse, and then 
demanded his money or his life. The well known brave and chivalrous cha- 
racter of the deceased, authorized the further supposition that this demand was 
flatly refused, upon which a struggle ensued, in which the deceased attempted 
to use his dirk knife, and was prostrated by a blow in the forehead with the 
heavy octagon pistol—the knife wrested from his hand and used by the high- 
wayman in assuring his dreadful purpose, by severing the head from the body. 
The jury believed with the counsel for the State. 

§ 1148. A third and more technical difficulty then arose with regard to the 
venue. The indictment was in Shelby County, a county divided into two 
judicial districts. One of these, of which the county seat is Memphis, has 
jurisdiction of all crimes committed in the 5th, 13th, and 14th civil districts. 
The other, of which the county seat is Raleigh, has jurisdiction of all crimes 
committed in the 12th and all other districts of the county. The body was 
found in the 12th civil district, some forty or fifty feet from the Hernando 
road, and the dividing line between the 12th district and the 13th, which lay 
on the opposite side of the road, was the road, or ran along the same for some 
distance in either direction from the spot where the body was found. The 
dividing line was not very well defined in proof, but it was generally under- 
stood that the road was on the same. The fact that the body was found in 
the 12th civil district, without countervailing evidence, would, of itself, have 
sufficed to identify the venue as averred in the indictment. But on cross-exa- 

901 


§ 1150] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


mination of one of the persons who first discovered the dead body, it was 
ascertained that there were appearances upon the leaves and ground of the 
body’s having been dragged from the road toward the tree where it had been 
found. This disclosure changed the whole status of the case, and unless it 
could be explained, required the acquittal of the prisoner. 

§ 1149. To meet this point were introduced perhaps the most extraordinary 
items of evidence which criminal trials record. It had been proven in the 
course of the trial that about 8 o’clock on the Sunday morning that the deceased 
and the prisoner left Mr. Hammel’s, a gentleman coming towards Memphis met 
the horse proven to have been Mr. Merriweather’s, on the Hernando road, 
about two thousand yards from the scene of the murder, and south of the 
same, galloping at full speed in the direction of Hernando, and appearing to 
be exceedingly frightened; with difficulty the gentleman intercepted and 
caught him. There was a saddle and bridle and pair of saddlebags upon 
him. The rein of the bridle was upon his neck. The gentleman finding the 
animal almost uncontrollable from agitation and fright, had some difficulty in 
retaining the rein in his hand, until a young man came forward and claimed 
him. The young man who claimed the horse was recognized by the gentle- 
man upon the trial as the prisoner at the bar. He came forward, said the 
gentleman, claimed the horse, thanked him gracefully for catching him, 
mounted and rode hurriedly off in the direction of Hernando. The prisoner’s 
clothes were observed at the time to be covered with dirt as if he had been 
rolled upon the ground—but supposing the horse had thrown him, the gentle- 
man went on his way thinking nothing of the circumstance. The facts here 
submitted to the jury, in reference to the wonderful instincts of the horse, are 
these : It will be remembered that the noble animal in question was of extra- 
ordinary intelligence, and singularly attached to his master, whom he was in 
the habit of following about whenever he came to the pasture or the farm 
yard where he was. Thomas Merriweather had owned the horse for several 
years, and had taught him many of the various little feats of intelligence, 
which add to the character of that noble animal so great an interest. 

§ 1150. Some several months after the prisoner had been committed to jail 
under indictment, William Merriweather, accompanied by a number of gentle- 
men, witnesses in the case, came up from their homes in Mississippi to attend 
the trial. William Merriweather was riding the horse of his deceased brother, 
which had by this time been recovered into the family. Their journey lay 
along the Hernando road, and by the spot where the body had been found. 
About one or two hundred yards before the party reached the scene of the 
murder, the horse upon which William Merriweather was mounted began to ex- 
hibit symptoms of alarm and excitement, which, considering his ordinarily gentle 
and tractable character, much surprised his rider and the gentlemen who were 
with him. There was no apparent cause of alarm, and the several other 
horses of the party betrayed none. His agitation increased as the party ap- 
proached the fatal spot; and when they had reached a point in the road oppo- 
site to it, the excitement of the horse arose to so furious a pitch that he 
became almost unmanageable. The whole party checked their horses, and for 
a moment regarded the strange conduct of the horse with profound astonish- 

902 


BOOK VI.] WOUNDS AND BLOWS. [§ 11538 


ment. His flesh quivering—his nostrils distended, his eye glancing into the 
wood where his noble master had met his horrible fate—he stood for a mo- 
ment, snorting and neighing—a sublime picture of wildest excitement. One 
of the party suggested to Mr. Merriweather to give him the rein, which mean- 
while had been tightly drawn. This was done, and instantly the noble animal 
rushed into the wood, and down to the identical tree under which the body 
had been found and commenced pawing at its root. After a moment, he 
trotted out further into the wood, and after making a semicircle in his course, 
returned to the same spot, and there stood neighing, trembling and pawing 
until he was forced away. Similar exhibitions were made by the horse several 
times afterwards in passing the spot. 

No blood had ever been seen in the road—and no appearance of a struggle 
there. If the killing had been done in the road, the horse, whose rapid flight 
and wild fright on that morning must have been occasioned instantly by the 
death struggle, would have known nothing of the tree in the wood. 

The verdict of the jury was, that the prisoner was guilty of murder in the 
first degree, as charged in the bill of indictment, and sentence of death was 
pronounced against him, which was afterwards commuted to imprisonment for 
life in the State penitentiary. 

§ 1151. d'. Position and appearance of the body.—a?. Altitude. Where 
the body stiffens in an attitude of resistance or imprecation—where, as in 
Burdell’s case, it is partly mutilated—where, as in Webster’s case, it is cut to 
pieces in order to be burned or otherwise disposed of—where it is crumpled or 
doubled up so as to be packed away in a box—where it is sunk in a pond 
loaded with stones—where an attempt has been made to disguise the features— 
here homicide will be presumed.(v) So, as has already been noticed,(w) a 
presumption of violence is lent by the fact that a weapon is found in a stiffened 
hand, lying on it in such a way as to be supported by the hand as it was 
stretched after death, and not grasped by it as it would be in case of suicide. 
So, on the other hand, the firm grasping of a pistol or weapon indicates sui- 
cide. Where the weapon lies close to the body on the ground, no inference 
either way can be drawn. 

The posture, in case of a sudden and surprised death, is lying on the back, 
and in such case, unless natural causes of sudden death be found, the presump- 
tion is homicide.(7) Then, again, the disposition of the limbs is significant. 
Sentimental suicides compose themselves gracefully for the spectacle. But 
when despair is the controlling cause, the countenance at least may display 
misery even more intense than that of a death struggle with an assassin. (xx) 

§ 1152. b% Marks of blood.—This topic has been already discussed. (y) 

§ 1153. c?. Bruises.—Here, in connection with the points already men- 
tioned,(z) we may call attention to the legal presumptions to be drawn from 
the appearances called ecchymosis and suggillation. These appearances, in 
proportion as they increase in number and extent, evolve the presumption of 
homicide. 


(v) See Burrill’s Circumst. Ev. p. 684. (w) Ante, § 819. 
(x) See ante, § 819. (xx) See ante, § 1139. 
(y) Ante, §§ 820, &c., 828, 830, &e. (z) Ante, §§ 810, 925. 


903 


§ 1153] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


Where death has been produced by violence, certain suspicious spots are 
often found upon the body. These are commonly roundish in shape, from 
one-quarter to three-fourths of an inch in diameter, of a red, or reddish brown, 
or a dirty yellowish brown color, rather hard and tough, and when cut into 
exhibit no real suggillation. These spots may puzzle the examining physician, 
and where the manner of death is unknown and is attended with suspicious 
circumstances, they require the most minute attention, as they may possibly 
indicate a struggle in which the person was engaged at the time that death 
occurred. In the majority of cases, however, these spots are produced by the 
person’s striking against some hard substance at the moment of death, and 
have nothing to do with the manner of death. The same appearances may 
also be produced after death by rough handling of the body, &c. Even some 
days after death pseudo-suggillations may be produced, by excoriating some 
part of the body with a stiff brush, &c., which might easily be mistaken for 
reactions that occurred during life. 

§ 1153(a.) Have the injuries which appear upon a dead body been in- 
Jlicted before or after death?— Generally, as is stated by Dr. Casper,(a) injuries 
inflicted during life may be easily distinguished from those inflicted upon the 
dead body by the fact that in the latter case there will be no appearance of 
reaction, such as inflammation, bleeding, festering, swelling, granulation, or 
drying up of the edges of the wound. But it is important to observe that in 
the case of fat bodies, injuries inflicted after death—as, for instance, a cut with 
a knife-—often assume an appearance, when the body begins to swell, which it 
is very difficult to distinguish from reactions that have taken place during life. 
This may occur where bodies have lain undiscovered in water until the process 
of decomposition has begun. It will also be difficult, often impossible, to dis- 
tinguish the two cases in question where the injured parts have been singed or 
charred by fire. But while it is true that injuries inflicted upon a dead body 
never show any appearance of reaction, it is by no means true that reactions 
always appear where the injury has been inflicted during life. Many cases 
occur, some of which have been already noticed, where no trace of suggillation, 
no inflamed places, no festering, &c., can be seen upon the body, even though 
the injury was inflicted during life. This is especially the case where death is 
very suddenly produced by the opening of some large bloodvessel, as of the 
carotis, jugularis, &e. In such case there is not the slightest trace of reac- 
tion, no suggillation, festering, or swelling; and if a wound is made upon the 
dead body near that which caused death, and similar to it, it will be impossible 
to distinguish the two. 

Very frequently the injuries found upon the body are such as have been pro- 
duced lege artis, as by cupping or bleeding, amputation, &c.(b) These require 
nothing more than a general notice at the hands of the examiner, except in 
cases where the practice of the operating physician is called in question. 

To this head belong also injuries produced upon the body where it has 
served as food for wild animals. 

Where the injuries found upon the body are such as have been the imme- 


(a) Gericht. Med. 1857, p. 128. (b) Casper, Gericht. Med. ed. 1857, p. 135. 
904 


BOOK VI.] INTENT AND DESIGN—PRIOR ATTEMPTS, ETC. [§ 1156 


diate cause of death. In this case, of course, the examination of the injuries 
should be very careful and thorough. The suggillated places, where they are 
prominent, should be accurately described, the size, diameter, &c.(c) 

§ 1154. et. Probability of the infliction of the injury before death.—This 
topic has already been discussed.(d) 

§ 1155. f*. Connection of the wound with the death.(e)—It is necessary 
that the death should be shown to have been produced by the particular blow 
described and charged. ‘Technically, as was shown in Peterson’s case, if the 
wound is charged to have come from a knife, when in fact it is from a pistol, 
the variance is fatal. This difficulty, however, has in many cases been reme- 
died by statutes.(/) The practical result of the common law is well stated 
in Bird’s case, where all the judges concurred in saying that where certain 
assaults were put in evidence, and relied on by the prosecution, as being the 
cause of death, but where the clear surgical testimony was that the death was 
caused by a blow on the head, of which there was no evidence whatsoever, the 
defendants were entitled to an acquittal.(q) 

But while it is necessary to show that the wound caused the death, positive 
proof that life continued to the moment of the blow is not required. (h) 

If it appear that the death was accelerated by the prisoner’s violence, it is 
no defence that the deceased was laboring under a disease otherwise fatal.(z) 
Nor is it a defence that the death was the immediate result of a surgical ope- 
ration, which operation, in the opinion of competent surgeons, was rendered 
necessary to avoid the effects of a wound otherwise mortal.(j) Nor is it a 
defence that had the deceased consented to an amputation, or been more skil- 
fully treated, he might have recovered. (xk) 


C. INTENT AND DESIGN—FROM WHAT TO BE INFERRED. 


§ 1156. I. PRioR ATTEMPTS, PREPARATIONS, THREATS. (@) 

Prior attempts of the defendant to assassinate the deceased can always be 
received to prove intent, and so of former menaces or expressions of vindictive 
feeling.(b) And on the trial of a husband for his wife’s murder, the prosecu- 
tion may put in evidence a long course of ill treatment by the husband of the 
wife.(c) And on a trial for the same crime it has even been held that adul- 
tery with another woman could be shown for the purpose of explaining the 
motive.(d) It has been held admissible, also, to show that on the same day 
the deceased was killed, and shortly before the killing, the defendant shot a 
third person, the transactions appearing to be one.(e) But it is inadmissible 
to prove that the defendant had been guilty of murder or of attempts to mur- 


(c) Casper, Gericht. Med. ed. 1857, p. 136. See these points considered fully, ante, 
§§ 798, 799. 

(d) See ante, §§ 798-802. 

(e) See ante, §§ 833-946, as to the medical question. 

(f) See also Wh. Cr. Law, § 594. (g) R. v. Bird, 2 Eng. R. 448. 

(h) Wh. Cr. Law, § 941. (7) Ibid. (j) Ibid. (k) Ibid. 

(a) See ante, § 972—post, § 1173. 

(b) See Wh. Cr. Law (3d ed.), 292; State v. Rash, 12 Iredell, 382; State v. Wat- 
kins, 12 Conn. 47; Johnson v. State, 17 Ala. 618; R. v. Voke, R. & R. 531. 

(c) State v. Rash, 12 Iredell, 382. 

(d) State v. Watkins, 12 Conn. 47; Johnson v. State. 17 Ala. 618. 

(e) Heath v. Com. 1 Robinson, 735. 

905 


§ 1158] CORPUS DELICTI. | [BOOK VI. 


der third parties,(/) or that he had a tendency to commit the particular 
offence.(g) It is here, indeed, that is to be perceived the line of demarcation . 
between the civil and the common law. By the former it is considered com- 
petent to show that the defendant was likely, from the peculiarities of his 
moral structure, to have committed the particular crime. In the latter, while 
the physical capacity and mechanical concomitants suitable for the commission 
of the offence may, as will be hereafter shown, be proved, it is otherwise with 
regard to the moral or physical constitution. (h) 

§ 1157. Purchasing, collecting, and fashioning instruments of mischief ; 
repairing to the spot destined to be the scene of it; acts done with the view 
of giving birth to productive or facilitating causes for removing obstructions 
in the execution of the design, or for obviating suspicion, &c., may also be put 
in. evidence for the same purpose. 

§ 1158. A remarkable instance is presented in the case of Richard Patch, 
who was convicted and executed in 1806, for the murder of his friend and 
patron, Isaac Blight. The prisoner and the deceased lived in the same house, 
and the latter was one evening shot, while sitting in his parlor, by a pistol 
from an unseen hand. A strong and well connected chain of circumstantial 
evidence fixed Patch as the murderer, in the course of which it appeared that 
a few evenings before that on which the murder was committed, and while the 
deceased was away from home, a loaded gun or pistol had been discharged in 
the same room. This shot the prisoner represented at the time as fired.at him; 
but there were strong grounds, especially from the course of the ball through 
the shutter, for believing that it must have been done by himself, in order to 
avert suspicion, and induce the deceased and his servants to suppose that as- 
sassins were prowling about the building. Of the same character is the case 
related by Dr. Hitzig, of a woman who, in order to prepare her friends for an 
intended crime, sent once a week for arsenic to the apothecaries, for the alleged 
purpose of killing rats. Possession of the instruments or means of offence, 
under circumstances of suspicion, are important facts in the judicial investiga- 
tion of imputed crime. Where a man had in his possession a large quantity 
of counterfeit coin unaccounted for, and there was no evidence that he was the 
maker, the presumption is, that he had procured it with an intent to utter it. 
Facts of this kind become more indicative of guilty purpose, if false reasons 
are assigned to account for them; as, for instance, in the case of procuring 
poisons, that it was procured to destroy vermin, which is the excuse commonly 
resorted to in such cases. A female convicted at the Warwick Summer As- 
sizes, August, 1831, of the murder of her uncle by poison, alleged that she 
had bought arsenic to poison mice, and pointed to a mouse which she said had 
been killed by it, whereas it was proved that the mouse had not died from 
poison.(7) To this class of facts may be referred the case of false representa- 
tions as to the state of another person’s health, with the intentions of pre- 
paring the connections for the event of a sudden death, and to diminish the 


(f) Wharton’s Cr, Law. (3d ed.), 292-297. (g) Ibid. 

(h) Wh. C. Law (3d ed.), 382. 

(i) R. v. Mary Ann Higgins. Lond. Med. Gazette, vol. ix. p. 896, and Annual Re- 
gister for 1831. 


906 


BOOK VI.] INTENT AND DESIGN—PRIOR ATTEMPTS, ETC. [§ 1160 


surprise and alarm which attended its occurrence,(j) as was done by Capt. 
Donnellan respecting Sir Theodosius Boughton. (x) 

§ 1159. It has been remarked that murderers, especially in the lower walks 
of life, are frequently found busy for some time previous to the act in throwing 
out dark hints, spreading rumors, or uttering prophecies relative to the im- 
pending fate of their intended victims.(/) In the case of Susannah Holroyd, 
who was convicted at the Lancaster Assizes of 1816, for the murder of her 
husband, her son, and the child of another person, it appeared that about a 
month before committing the crime, the prisoner told the mother of the child 
that she had her fortune read, and that within six weeks, three funerals would 
go from her door, namely, that of her husband, her son, and the child of the 
person whom she was then addressing. And so, on the trial of Zephon, in 
Philadelphia, in 1845, it was shown that the prisoner, who was a negro, had 
got an old fortune-teller in the neighborhood, of great authority among the 
blacks, to prophesy the death of the deceased. Great caution, however, should 
be used in sifting this kind of proof, particularly when the persons against 
whom the presumption is pointed are ignorant and superstitious, since among 
such, the habit of loose talk of this nature is too prevalent to make an in- 
stance of it, when standing alone, any just ground for suspicion. 

§ 1160. Threats may also be put in evidence for the same purpose, when 
they go to show ill will from the defendant to the deceased. Thus, where the 
prisoner, a negro, said he intended ‘‘to lay for the deceased if he froze the 
next Saturday night,” and where the homicide took place that night; where 
it was said, ‘‘I am determined to kill the man who injured me;’’ where the 
prisoner had declared, the day before the murder, that he would certainly shoot 
the deceased; and where the language of the defendant was, “I will split 
down any fellow that is saucy.’’ Several considerations, however, have already 
been adverted to, which divert the applications of evidence of antecedent pre- 
parations, and which apply with equal force to this head. In addition to 
these, it is important to observe: Ist. The words supposed to be declaratory 
of criminal intention may have been misunderstood or misremembered. 2d. 
It does not necessarily follow, because a man avows an intention, or threatens 
to commit a crime, that such intention really existed in his mind. The words 
may have been uttered through bravado, or with a view of intimidating, an- 
noying, extorting money, or other collateral objects. Thus, a man, such as 
Dr. Parkman, may have frequently been the object of threats or curses of this 
kind from irritated tenants, and yet it was from a man who used neither, that 
his death proceeded. 3d. Another person, really desirous of committing the 
offence, may have profited by the occasion of the threat to avert suspicion from 
himself. A curious instance of this is given in the Causes Célébres. A wo- 
man of extremely bad character and violent temper, one day, in the open street, 
threatened a man who had done something. to displease her, that she would 
“oet his hams cut across for him.”’ He was found dead a short time after- 
wards with his hams cut across. This was, of course, sufficient to excite sus- 


(j) Wells on Circum. Evi. p. 212. 
(k) See Gourney’s Report of the Trial, and ante, 1071. 
(1) 1 Stark. on Evi. 465-66 (3d ed.). 
907 


§ 1162] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. | 


picion against the female, who, according to the practice of continental tribu- 
nals at that time, was put to the torture, confessed the crime, and was executed. 
A person was, however, soon after taken into custody for some other offence, 
who confessed that he was the murderer; that happening to be passing when - 
the threat was uttered, he conceived the idea of committing the crime, as he 
knew the woman’s bad character would be sure to tell against her. 4th. It 
must be recollected that the tendency of a threat or declaration of this nature, 
is to frustrate its own accomplishment. By threatening a man you put him 
on his guard, and force him to have recourse to such means of protection as 
the force of the law, or any extra-judicial powers which he may have at com- 
mand, may be capable of affording to him. Still, however, such threats, as 
observed by Mr. Bentham, ‘‘by the testimony of experience, are but too often 
sooner or later realized. So to the intention of producing the terror and 
nothing but the terror, succeed, under favor of some special opportunity, or 
under the spur of some fresh provocation, the intention of producing the mis- 
chief, and (in pursuance of that intention) the mischievous act.” 


II. MARKS OF VIOLENCE. 


§ 1161. Marks of violence, in connection with the cause of death, have 
already been considered. At present they are only to be noticed in connection 
with the question of intent. It cannot be doubted that when a wound is 
found to have been inflicted in a secret or concealed part, which is inaccessible 
in sudden and passionate conflict, it bears a violent presumption of having 
been the result of design. . Thus, the wounds of which the Scotch historian 
tells as having been inflicted by forcing a heated iron into the fundament, 
could have been explained in no other way than on the hypothesis that to 
death was intended to be added concealment. In the same class may be enu- 
merated the thrusting of a needle in the navel of an infant, running a sharp 
but slight instrument in the cavity behind the ear, dropping corrosive acids 
into the ear itself, and forcing molten lead down the throat through a tube ; 
of each of which resorts the books give instances.(n) The principle on which 
the presumption of intent can be drawn from such cases is, that a person act- 
ing under the impulse of passion is much less likely to inflict a skilful wound, 
than one whose act is the result of premeditation. (0) 

§ 1162. Whether the wound was inflicted in self-defence or otherwise ; 
whether it was self-inflicted, or inflicted by a stranger; whether the perpetrator 
of the crime was an expert or otherwise—may also be deduced from the wound. 
And the direction of the wound may often be shown for the purpose of testing 
the validity of a defence. Thus, where the defence was, that the ground 
being rough and slippery, the prisoner stumbled, and both barrels of the gun 
had gone off by accident, the defence was confirmed by tracing the direction 


(n) Mittermaier von Beweise, 402; Demme’s Annalen des Criminalrechts, vol. iii. 
p. 215; Bauer, Theorie des Anzeigenbeweises ; Henke, Darstellung, sec. 99; Blanci de 
Indiciis, Venet, 1545; Reinhardt de eo quod circa reum ex Presumpt. Convince. et 
Cond. Just., &e. Erford, 1732; Heinroth in Hitzig’s Zeitschrift, n. 42, p. 257. 

(0) Presumption from gunshot wound, see ante, § 811. 


908 


BOOK VI.] MARKS OF VIOLENCE.—INSTRUMENT. [$ 1165 


of the shot, which was found to be pointed upwards.(p) The difference in 
appearance between wounds inflicted before and after death, has been already 
considered. (q) 

§ 1163. It is by medical testimony alone that the agency of the alleged 
violence, as a cause of death, is to be determined; and if the death was not 
accelerated by such violence, the defendant must be acquitted. Thus, in 1847, 
on a trial for manslaughter, the surgeon who had attended the deceased, stated 
that on examining her body he had found the mark of an old wound on her 
head, and a slight bruise on one of her thighs; but he further stated that he 
made a post-mortem examination of the body, and that his opinion was, that 
the cause of the deceased’s death was confirmed consumption, her lungs being 
tuberculous, and that it had not been accelerated by violence, but was wholly 
attributable to natural causes. The defendant, under the direction of Murpry, 
Sergeant, who consulted with Lord Chief Baron PoLuoox, was acquitted.(7) 
But it is no defence that the deceased was laboring under a mortal disease, if 
death was accelerated by the defendant’s violence ;(s) and this, no matter how 
remote the cause, if the intention was to commit an assault, and death re- 
sulted. (2) 


III. INstRUMENT OF DEATH. 


§ 1164. The use of a lethal instrument, knowing it to be such, gives the 
strongest presumption of design, if the weapon appears to have been used 
contrary to the defendant’s usual custom.(w) Whether it was the defendant’s 
custom to carry the particular weapon, becomes, in such case, a material ques- 
tion. Thus, in Selfridge’s case,(v) where the fatal weapon was a pistol, the 
defendant was permitted to prove that he had found it necessary to carry such 
a weapon, in consequence of the danger of being waylaid in his passage 
between his place of business and his residence in the country. And in the 
old cases, such as those of Major Oneby and of Mr. Lutterel, it having been 
the uniform custom of those times for gentlemen to carry swords, no pre- 
sumption was drawn from the fact that in these instances swords were the 
instruments of death. But when the weapon by which the homicide was 
committed was one not usually carried, the presumption is, that it was assumed 
for the special purpose. 

§ 1165. Other inferences are to be adduced from the instrument of death 
which it may not be out of place here to notice. Suicide may be inferred from 
the discovery of the weapon near the body.(w) This, however, is by no means 
a certain test. Thus, in July, 1683, the Harl of Essex was found dead in the 
Tower, with his throat cut, and a razor lying near him. His throat was 
smoothly and evenly cut from one side to the other, and entirely down to the 
vertebral column. Notwithstanding this, the razor was found to be much 
notched on the edge. This fact, those who favored the view of suicide were 


(p) Watson on Homicide, § 246. (q) Ante, §§ 810-816. 

(r) R. v. Conner, 2 C. and K. 518. See also R. v. Crompton, C. and Mars. 597. 
(s) State v. Morea, 2 Ala. 275. (¢) Wh. C. L. (3d edit.) 363. 
(wv) See Wh. on Hom. 41, 385. (v) Wh. on Hom. 417. | 


(w) See ante, §§ 819, 1130. 
909 


§ 1167] CORPUS DELICTI. [BOOK VI. 


..asked to explain. They could do so by no other way than by supposing that 
the deceased had notched the razor by drawing it backwards and forwards on 
the neck bone. This he could hardly be deemed competent to do after all the 
great vessels of the neck had been divided. If the weapon be found in the 
vicinity of the corpse, the question arises whether it could have been placed in 
its position by the act of the deceased. In the case of Courvoisier, who was 
tried for the murder of Lord William Russell, there were two facts relied upon 
to show that this was not a case of suicide. One was, that a napkin was 
placed over the face of the deceased, and the other that the instrument of 
death did not lie near the body. To the same point is the case of Jane Nor- 
kott, who was found dead in her bed with her throat cut, while a bloody knife 
was found sticking in the floor a good distance from the bed, but as it stuck 
the point was turned towards the bed, and the haft from it. This last fact 
told strongly against the hypothesis of suicide. 

§ 1166. On the trial of How, for the murder of Church, in Alleghany 
County, N. Y., in 1824, it was a material fact that a patch of square home- 
made linen, which was found near the deceased, being apparently a part of the 
wadding which was discharged, together with the ball which was the cause of 
death, was of the make and quality with other patches found almost simulta- 
neously in the box of a rifle in the defendant’s possession. 

§ 1167. William Richardson was tried at Dumfries, in 1787, for the murder 
of a young female in the Stewarty of Kircudbright, in the autumn of 1786.(2) 
It appeared from the evidence that the deceased, who lived with her parents 
in rather a remote part of the district, was, the day in question, left alone in 
the cottage, her parents having gone out to their harvest-field. On their 
return home, a little after mid-day, they found their daughter murdered, with 
her throat cut in the most shocking manner. The circumstances in which she 
was found, the character of the deceased, and the appearance of the wound, 
all concurred in excluding any presumption of suicide; while the surgeons 
who examined the wound were satisfied that it had been inflicted by a sharp 
instrument, and by a person who must have held the instrument in his left 
hand. On opening the body, the deceased appeared to have been some months 
gone with child; and on examining the ground about the cottage, there were 
discovered the footsteps, seemingly, of a person who had been running hastily 
from the cottage, and by an indirect road through a quagmire or bog, in which 
there were stepping-stones. It appeared, however, that the person had, in his 
haste and confusion, slipped his foot and stepped into the mire, by which he 
must have been wet nearly to the middle of the leg. The prints of the foot- 
steps were accurately measured, and an exact impression taken of them; and 
it appeared that they were those of a person who must have worn shoes, the 
soles of which had been newly mended, and which, as is usual in that part of 
the country, had iron knobs or nails in them. There were discovered also, 
along the track of the footsteps, and at certain intervals, drops of blood; and 
on a stile or small gateway near the cottage, and in the line of the footsteps, 
some marks resembling those of a hand which had been bloody.(y) A number 


(«) Burnett’s Criminal Law of Scotland, p. 524 et seq. 
(y) As to foot-prints, see post, §§ 1180, 1181. 
910 


BOOK VI.| MARKS OF VIOLENCE.—INSTRUMENT. [$ 1167 


of persons being present at the funeral, the steward depute, with a view of 
obtaining some clue to the murderer, called all the men together, to the num- 
ber of sixty. He then caused the shoes of each of them to be taken off and 
measured; and after going nearly through the whole number, they came to 
the shoes of the prisoner, which corresponded exactly to the impressions, in 
dimensions, shape of the foot, form of the sole, apparently mended, and the 
number and position of the knobs. (Up to this moment no suspicion had 
fallen on any one in particular.) The'prisoner, on being questioned where he 
was on the day the deceased was murdered, answered, seemingly without em- 
barrassment, that he had been all that day employed at his master’s work. 
Some other circumstances of suspicion, however, having transpired, he was, in 
a few days after, taken into custody. On his examination he acknowledged 
that he was left-handed; and some scratches being observed on his cheek, he 
said he had gotten them when pulling nuts in a wood a few days before. He 
still adhered to what he had said of his having been, on the day of the murder, 
constantly at his master’s work, at some distance from the place where the 
deceased resided; but it appeared that he had been absent from his work about 
half an hour (the time being distinctly ascertained) in the course of the forenoon 
of that day; that he had called at a smith’s shop, under pretext of wanting 
something, which it did not appear that he had any occasion for, and that this 
shop was in his way to the cottage of the deceased. A young girl, who was 
some 100 yards from the cottage, said, about the time the murder was com- 
mitted (and which corresponded to the time that the prisoner was absent from 
his fellow-servants), she saw a person, exactly with his dress and appearance, 
running hastily towards the cottage, but did not see him return, though he 
might have gone round by a small eminence which would intercept him from 
her view, and which was the very track where the footsteps had been traced. 
His fellow-servants now recollected that on the forenoon of that day they were 
employed with the prisoner in driving their master’s carts, and when passing 
by a wood, which they named, the prisoner said he must run to the smith’s 
shop, and would be back in a short time. He then left his cart under their 
charge, and they having waited for him about half an hour, which one of the 
servants ascertained by having at the time looked at his watch, they remarked 
on his return that he had been longer absent than he said he would, to which 
he replied that he stopped in the woods to gather some nuts. They observed 
at this time one of his stockings wet and soiled, as if he had stepped into a 
puddle, on which they asked him where he had been. He said he had stepped 
into a marsh, the name of which he mentioned; on which one of his fellow- 
servants remarked that he must have been either drunk or mad if he stepped 
into that marsh, as there was a footpath which went along the side of it. It 
_then appeared, by comparing the time he was absent with the distance of the 
cottage from the place where he had left his fellow-servants, that he might 
have gone there, committed the murder, and returned to them. A search was 
then made for the stockings he had worn that day, and a pair were found 
concealed in the thatch of the apartment where he slept, and which appeared 
to be much soiled, and to have some drops of blood on them. The last he 
accounted for, at first, by saying that his nose had been bleeding some days 
anal 


§$ 1169] LIABILITY OF DECEASED TO ATTACK. [BOOK VI. 


‘before; but it being observed that he had worn other stockings on that day, 
he next said that he had assisted in bleeding a horse when he wore those 
stockings; but it was proved that he had not assisted, but had stood on that 
occasion at such a distance that no blood could have reached him. 

§ 1168. On examining the mud or sand upon the stockings, it appeared to 
correspond precisely with that of the mire or puddle adjoining to the cottage, 
and which was of a peculiar kind, none other like it being found in the neigh- 
borhood. The shoemaker was then discovered who had mended his shoes a 
short time before, and he spoke distinctly to the shoes of the prisoner, which 
were exhibited to him, as having been those he had mended. It then came 
out that the prisoner had been acquainted with the deceased, who was con- 
sidered in the country as of weak intellect, and had on one occasion been seen 
with her in a wood under circumstances that led to a suspicion that he had 
criminal connection with her; and on being gibed with having such connection 
with one in her situation, he seemed much ashamed and greatly hurt. It was 
proven further, by the person who sat next to him while the shoes were being 
measured, that he trembled very much, and seemed a good deal agitated; and, 
in the interval between that time and his being apprehended, he had been 
advised to fly, but his answer was, ‘Where can I fly to?’”’ In the prisoner’s 
defence, evidence was brought to show that, about the time of the murder, a 
boat’s crew from Ireland had landed on that part of the coast, near to the 
dwelling of the deceased; and it was said that some of the crew might have 
committed the murder, though their motives for doing so it was difficult to 
explain, it not being alleged that robbery was their purpose, or that anything 
was missed from the cottages in the neighborhood. On this evidence the 
prisoner was convicted and executed. Before his death, he confessed that he 
was the murderer, and said that it was to hide his shame that he committed 
the deed, knowing that the girl was with child by him. He mentioned also to 
the clergyman who attended him where the knife would be found with which 
he had perpetrated the murder. It was found accordingly in the place he 
described (under a stone in the wall), with marks of blood upon it.(z) 


IV. LIABILITY OF DECEASED TO ATTACK. 


Ist. Possession of Money. 


§ 1169. This opens a wide range of testimony. It is admissible to prove 
that the deceased had received a considerable sum of ready money just before 
the fatal moment, and that he might be supposed to have the whole or a part 
of it on his person. When the defence is passion or self-defence, evidence of 
this kind is always proper to prove premeditation, though it should have no 
effect on the jury, unless it be connected by presumption or otherwise with the 
defendant. If he was not likely from the circumstances to have any suspicion 
of the fact—if the opportunity of robbing the deceased was not used—if the 
defendant’s means were such as to make the acquisition of money in such sums 


(z) Best on Presumption, § 262. 
912 


BOOK VI.] LIABILITY TO ATTACK. [§ 1171 
%, 


and at such risks out of the range of possible temptation—the fact should not 
be allowed to weigh. It will be seen at once that not only the deceased’s con- 
dition and habits—e. g., those which would show the likelihood of his having 
money on his person at this particular time—but those of the defendant become 
thus the legitimate subjects of inquiry. So far as the deceased is concerned, 
a very strong tone is lent to this species of presumption by the fact of his 
being a peddler or itinerant vender of jewelry. The easy exportation of the 
goods of this class of persons, their usual isolation, and the readiness with 
which they can be enticed under business pretexts into places where they can 
be secretly dispatched, contribute to sharpen very much the probability that a 
violent homicide, of which a person of their calling was the subject, was com- 
mitted for the sake of gain. On the other hand, the situation of the defendant 
after the guilty act is to be closely scrutinized. Was there any change in his 
circumstances exhibiting greater means of expenditure than before? For 
this purpose evidence is always admissible, showing the unexpected extinguish- 
ment of pressing debts, or increase of a bank-balancee, or investments or outlay 
of any kind whatever. | 

§ 1170. History rather than the records of criminal courts affords examples 
of cases where homicide has been committed to remove from the assailant’s 
path a party who stood between him and the consummation of his avarice or 
his ambition. In England, however, the poisoning of Sir Theodore Broughton, 
in Paris, that of the family of the Marchioness Brinvilliers, and in Belgium, that 
of Gustavus Fougnies, are conspicuous examples of the judicial punishment of 
homicide committed for the purpose of removing an obstacle in the way of a 
descent. And so frequently in that corrupt state of society which preceded 
the French Revolution was this method of diverting the channel of inheritance 
resorted to, that a specific under the name of the “ Succession Powder’? dis- 
puted with the “‘ Aqua Tophana” the credit of being the most effectual remedy 
for this purpose. ‘The inventress of the last-named agent was said to have 
poisoned six hundred persons, and in Paris at the close of the seventeenth 
century the practice increased to so alarming an extent that it was necessary 
to establish an inquisitorial court, called the ‘‘ Chambre Ardente,”’ for the pur- 
pose of watching and acting upon the use of poisons as a social element. By 
this court two women, named La Vagren and La Voison, were sentenced to 
be burned alive in 1780; and the sentence was executed. The perfumer of 
Catharine de Medicis had the reputation of being able to convey poisons 
through a variety of vehicles, as a jelly or the smell of a rose. Ancient testi- 
mony to this effect was very emphatic, Plutarch, Theophrastus, Livy, Tacitus, 
and Aulus Gellius, uniting in verifying it. That the modern belief was not 
peculiar to France, nor consequent upon the revelations of the Chambre 
Ardente, is proved by the fact that it was received in England at the time of 
Somerset’s trial by both sides of that great politico-judicial struggle. Shak- 
speare thus recognizes the general currency which the opinion had obtained :— 

“ Their great guilt, 
Like poisons given to work a great time after, 
Now ’gins to bite the spirits.”— Tempest, Act III. s. 3. 
§ 1171. But however well-founded may have been the then popular belief, 
58 913 


§ 1173] OLD GRUDGE. [BOOK VI. 


it is clear that if the art ever existed, it is now lost. Dr. Amos, whose 
authority in this branch of medical jurisprudence rests on the most elaborate 
research, tells us that ‘“‘it may now be doubted if a medical man could indicate 
with certainty any poisonous preparation of which the effect should be fatal, 
but should nevertheless be suspended for two months or even a week. And 
perhaps good scientific testimony could be produced, negativing the quality of 
being a slow poison to any of Franklin’s drugs, unless, indeed, they be repeated 
in slow doses for a considerable period.’’(a) 

§ 1172. Neither in England, nor in this country, has there been any recent 
instance of a trial for homicide in which the motive of succession was supposed 
to be involved. And indeed it is not likely that in the present popular temper 
of either country such a species of crime could find place. The abolition of 
hereditary office takes patronage out of the line of descent ; and there is there- 
fore no cortége ready to surround an heir-expectant and to dignify with the 
title of party spirit what with us would be at once denounced as an example 
of unnatural crime which is not to be permitted to exhibit itself in the sight 
of man. ‘The system, also, that obtains among us, of launching young men 
at an early age into the world on an independent basis of support, relieves 
them from those positions of luxurious and yet impotent dependency in which 
the cadets of noble continental families were formerly nurtured. And inde- 
pendently of this, which subtracts in the great mass of cases the motive for 
this species of homicide, it may not be unsuitable for us to notice a still more 
fundamental reason in the essential distinction between the Saxon and the 
Tialian or the Italio-Gallican characters. That subtle and tortuous ambition 
which seeks to reach its object by secret approaches, conducted under the cover 
of patient and polite servility, is as much an exception with us, as is the more 
sudden and public manifestation of passion with them. 


2d. Old Grudge. 


§ 1173. In point of law the proof of an old grudge supplies a violent pre- 
sumption of deliberation. No matter what may be the intermediate provoca- 
tions, if a prior intent to kill exist, that intent will be presumed to continue 
down to the fatal blow.(b) If there has been time for cooling, the prior 
provocation only goes to prove an old grudge, and to make the offence murder. 
Thus, in Major Oneby’s case—which is the leading one under this head, and 
has been already cited—the evidence was that the prisoner being in company 
with the deceased and three other persons at a tavern, in a friendly manner, 
after some time, began playing at hazard; when Rich, one of the company, 
asked if any one would set him three half crowns: whereupon the deceased, 
in a jocular manner, laid down three halfpence, telling Rich he had set him 
three pieces ; and the prisoner at the same time set Rich three half crowns, 
and lost them to him. Immediately after which, in an angry manner, he 
turned about to the deceased, and said, it was an impertinent thing to set 


(a) Great Oyer, 347. 
(0b) Wh. on Hom. 198, ante, §§ 972, 1132. 


914 


BOOK VI.] INDICATORY EVIDENCE. [$ 1178 


halfpence, and that he was an impertinent puppy for so doing, to which the 
deceased answered, whoever called him so was a rascal. Thereupon the pri- 
soner took up a bottle, and with great force threw it at the deceased’s head ; 
but did not hit him, the bottle only brushing some of the powder out of his 
hair. ‘The deceased in return immediately tossed a candlestick or bottle at 
the prisoner, which missed him; upon which they both rose up to fetch their 
swords, which then hung up in the room, and the deceased drew his sword : 
but the prisoner was prevented from drawing his by the company. The 
deceased thereupon threw away his sword; and the company interposing, they 
sat down again for the space of an hour. At the expiration of that time 
the deceased said to the prisoner, ‘ We have had hot words, but you were the 
aggressor; but I think we may pass it over: and at the same time offered 
his hand to the prisoner, who made answer, “No, damn you; I will have 
your blood.”? After which, the reckoning being paid, all the company, except 
the prisoner, went out of the room to go home; and he called to the deceased, 
saying, ‘‘ Young man! come back; I have something to say to you ;”’ where- 
upon the deceased returned into the room, and the door was closed, and the 
rest of the company excluded; but they heard a clashing of swords, and the 
prisoner gave the deceased the mortal wound. It was also found, that at the 
breaking up of the company the prisoner had his great coat thrown over his 
shoulders, and that he received three slight wounds in the fight; and that the 
deceased, being asked upon his death-bed, whether he received his wound in a 
manner among swordmen called fair, answered, “I think I did.” It was 
further found that, from the throwing of the bottle, there was no reconciliation 
between the prisoner and the deceased. Upon these facts all the judges were 
of opinion that the prisoner was guilty of murder; he having acted upon 
malice and deliberation, and not from sudden passion. It should probably be 
taken, upon the facts found in the verdict and the argument of the Chief 
Justice, that, after the door had been shut, the parties were upon an equal 
footing in point of preparation before the fight began in which the mortal 
wound was given. The main point then on which the judgment turned, and 
so declared to be, was the evidence of express malice, after the interposition 
of the company, and the parties had all sat down again for an hour. Under 
these circumstances the court were of opinion that the prisoner had had 
reasonable time for cooling: after which, upon an offer of reconciliation from 
the deceased, he had made use of that bitter and deliberate expression, that 
he would have his blood. And again, the prisoner remaining in the room 
after the rest of the company retired, and calling back the deceased by the 
contemptuous appellation of young man, on pretence of having something to 
say to him, altogether showed such strong proof of deliberation and coolness, 
as precluded the presumption of passion having continued down to the time 
of the mortal stroke. Though even that would not have availed the prisoner 
under these circumstances: for it must have been implied, according to Maw- 
gridge’s case, that he acted upon malice ; having, in the first instance, before 
any provocation received, and without warning or giving time for preparation 
on the part of Mr. Gower, made a deadly assault upon him. 

When there is difficulty in ascertaining the probable perpetrator of a homi- 

915 


§ 1175] POSITION OF DECEASED, [BOOK VI. 


cide it is desirable, therefore, to consider who there is who had an old grief 
or cause of provocation against the deceased. For this purpose evidence of 
threats and hostile declarations is always admissible on trial. 


3d. Jealousy. 


§ 1174. Upon this head, as well as the last, it is not within the province of 
this work to enter. It is sufficient here to remark, that in inquiring for the 
supposed agent in a homicide, motives of this class are always a proper topic 
of investigation. 


V. PosmIvION OF DECEASED. 


§ 1175. That the deceased was found tied is not always a certain ground 
for assuming that he was the victim of a violent homicide, for cases exist where 
a party intending suicide has attempted in this way to relieve his memory 
from the disgrace of self-murder. This, however, is very difficult to effect, 
and the disguise is readily penetrated. It is far different, however, with the 
converse, where the perpetrator of a violent homicide endeavors to so arrange 
the position of the deceased, as to give it the appearance of a /elo de se. 
Cases of this kind are numerous, and sometimes the artifice has been so skill- 
fully contrived as for a while to avert the current of suspicion. Thus, in a 
late case in Mississippi, the deceased was found lying dead with his own 
pistol in his hand, with which the fatal shot had undoubtedly been fired, and 
with his body arranged in such a way as to be entirely consistent with the 
hypothesis of deliberate self-destruction. No question, indeed, as to this being 
the fact existed, until it was subsequently accidentally discovered that the 
pistol had been wadded with a piece of paper which was a fragment of a 
sheet in the defendant’s pocket. So, also, on the trial of a German named 
Papenberg, in Philadelphia, in 1844, it appeared that the deceased was found 
with a hatchet lying by his side, with the sharp edge of which his throat had 
been cut, in a manner which made the hypothesis of suicide not improbable. 
One of the most powerful circumstances in dispelling this hypothesis, and in 
pointing to the real offender, was the discovery in the pocket of the latter of 
a handkerchief, in which was marked in blood the profile of the precise weapon 
with which the wound was effected. In the case of Courvoisier, who was tried 
for the murder of Sir Wm. Russell, suicide, as has already been mentioned, 
was set up as a defence, with much show of evidence; but two facts were suc- 
cessfully relied on by the prosecution to rebut it, viz: that a napkin was 
placed over the deceased’s face, and that the instrument of death did not lie 
near the body. And so Mr. Amos tells us of a trial where the defence of sui- 
cide was defeated by the fact, that, while medical observation shows that prus- 
sic acid produces znstantaneous death, the deceased was found with a corked 
bottle in her hand, from which five drachms of that particular poison had 
been taken, and with the bedclothes composed about her person with elabo- 
rate precision.(¢) 


(c) See ante, §§ 810-16, 1146, for discussion of suicidal or homicidal presumptions. 


916 


BOOK VI.] MATERIALS FOR CRIME. [$ 1177 


§ 1176. Other points are to be noticed in the same connection. Thus, it 
is important to examine whether there are marks of a scuffle about the de- 
ceased, and what footsteps are noticed leading to or from the locus in quo, 
together with their dimensions and other peculiarities. (d) 


VI. MATERIALS APPROPRIATE TO BE CONVERTED INTO INSTRUMENTS OF 
CRIME. 


§ 1177. It is here that what the civilians call indicatory evidence comes 
into greatest play. No deliberate homicide is committed without prepara- 
tion, and the more malignantly contrived is the act, the more—such are the 
sanctions of society—it exposes itself to detection, by the discovery of the 
trains laid by it for the purpose of effecting the guilty purpose. Thus, in 
poisoning, it is necessary that the poison should have been pre-procured, 
either in its rudimental or its complete shape. For this purpose it is admissi- 
ble to show not only, as in Sir Theodore Broughton’s case, the possession of 
the fatal drug, but its purchase, or the purchase of its component elements. 
Inquiries, also, as to the effect of that particular drug—possession of books in 
which the nature of poison is described—become pertinent, for, unless the 
defendant is a scientific man, he must necessarily fortify himself with informa- 
tion before he attempts anything so hazardous as placing in the die both the 
life of another and of himself. When a gunshot wound is the cause of death, 
premeditation as well as identity may be determined in the same way. Of 
course, when fire-arms are habitually used, the possession of powder is of no 
moment in this respect. But the use of a particular fragment of wadding has 
often been the means of insuring conviction; and when a party is not. in the 
habit of carrying fire-arms, but assumes them for a particular occasion, this, 
as has already been noticed, lends a strong presumption of design, if it does 
not form part of a chain of circumstances, indicating the guilty party. The 
species of preparation which most often leads to the discovery of the offender, 
in this class of homicide—particularly among those with whom the carrying 
of fire-arms is habitual—is the selection or arrangement of a lair or shooting 
stand, from which the victim can be shot down without arresting the suspicion 
of himself or the observation of others. In a late case in South Carolina, the 
only trace by which identity could be pursued was that arising from the con- 
struction, by the assassin, of a shed or cover made of boughs of trees, from 
which the deceased was shot at. Similar to this, was the discovery of a level 
in a darkened room in a private house, upon which an air-gun had been poised 
for the purpose of taking a more secure aim. The more artful and skilful is 
the method of death chosen, the more conclusive is the presumption it affords 
when discovered. Thus, in the traditionary homicide of Amy Robsart, the 
fact which defeated the hypothesis of suicide was, that the planks which had 
been taken up from the floor for the purpose of opening a pit-fall, were so 
artfully ent out as to enable them afterwards, had it been necessary, to be 
returned to their former places without the appearance of having been dis- 


(d) See post, §§ 1181-2. 
917 


§ 1177] INDICATORY EVIDENCE, [BOOK Vi. 


turbed. Hitzig, also, mentions a case where suspicion of a projected homi- 
cide, by poisoning, was attempted to be warded off by the prior announcement 
of a tendency to symptoms, on the part of the intended patient, of the same 
general character as that which the poison was likely to produce. And 
nothing added such point and emphasis to the evidence of design in the 
Webster case, as the presumption existing, that the defendant had prepared 
beforehand the means of disposing of the deceased’s body. 

Great care, however, should be exercised in conducting examinations for the 
purpose of testing how under given circumstances the particular result could 
have been produced. When the examinations are carelessly and inartificially 
carried on, their results should be rejected by the court. A strict rein, also, 
should be placed on experiments carried on during the trial for the purpose of 
testing the adequacy of supposed agencies. Unless thus guarded, such experi- 
ments are apt both to cumber the issue and to mislead the jurors. Take, as 


illustrating this, the following statement of certain “experiments”? made be- ° 


fore the jury in a homicide case in Illinois :— 

“The door was placed against the shutters in the rear of the judge’s bench, 
and the experiments commenced. 

‘“‘]. A hole was bored in the head and tyle of the door, and a two-inch 
screw screwed in. A. Wheaton, a juryman, hung to it, and held. 

“9, An inch and a half screw was then used with the same effect. 

“3. The juryman stepped off the chair, and the screw gave. 

“4, The juryman stepped off the chair, the rope slipped, and the screw was 
pulled nearly out. 

‘““5. A hook, size of smaller one found in the room, used, and did not give. 

“6. Another screw, of same size, used with same effect. 

“7, Experiment on last hook; did not give. 

‘8. Experiment on plain one and a half inch screw; did not give. 

“9, Same experiment with same effect. 

“10. Tried by prosecution, on a hook similar to the one used in No. 5 
hook ; the.whole broke. 

“11. By defence, one of the hooks found in Jumpertz’s room; it did not 
oive. 

“12. By prosecution, on same hook in a different place; hook was bent 
down. 

“13. With the same hook; juror stepped from the chair, and hook pulled 
out. 

“14. A two-inch screw used, and when juror stepped from the chair, it was 
nearly pulled out. 

“15. A screw found in the room was then used, and when the juror stepped 
off from the chair, it remained firm.’’(dd) 

The Supreme Court very properly said that they did not “approve” of this 
“exhibition”? and ‘experiments,’ but at the same time intimated that in 
themselves they were not ground for a new trial. 


(dd) Jumpertz v. People, 21 Ill. 375. 
918 


ie 


BOOK VI.] DETACHED CIRCUMJACENT BODIES.—FOOTPRINTS. [$1181 


VII. DETACHED CIRCUMJACENT BODIES. 


§ 1178. Was the deceased’s dress torn, his pockets rifled, or were there any 
traces left by the supposed murderer on the spot? The more artful the design, 
the more emphatic, as has already been noticed, is the presumption to be drawn 
from it. Thus, in a case in New Jersey, suspicion was for some time averted 
by the fact that all the horse-tracks led to the spot, and none from it. This, 
however, tended only to clinch the fact of the defendant’s guilt, when it was 
discovered that the horse which he had ridden that night bore on its hoofs the 
marks of the shoes having been nailed on backwards. So, also, where leaves 
were used for the purpose of concealing foot-tracks to and from the spot, the 
presumption against the accused party was certainly not weakened by the dis- 
eovery that the leaves were none of them taken from a level above that which 
he could conveniently reach, he being, in fact, much below the average height. 

§ 1179. A woman was tried in England, in 1818, before Mr. Baron Garrow, 
for arson. She had been met near the ricks, which were the subject of her 
incendiary attempt, about two hours before midnight. On one of the ricks 
was found a piece of woman’s handkerchief, and in a tinder-box near the spot 
was some unburnt cotton rags. On examining the cotton taken from the 
latter with a lens, it was proved to be of the same fabric and pattern as a 
gown and some pieces of cotton-print taken from the prisoner’s box at her 
lodgings. <A still more conclusive presumption was drawn from the compari- 
son of a half-handkerchief taken from a bundle belonging to the prisoner with 
the piece found in the rick. <A critical examination by experts of the two, 
showed that they belonged to the same square. It appeared, also, that the 
hemming in each was of the same breadth—the stitching in each was of the same 
degree of evenness—and that each was sewed with black sewing-silk, which 
was the more remarkable from the fact that articles of that character were 
usually sewed in cotton. Now although these circumstances would have been 
entirely insufficient to warrant a conviction without proof of guilt alzunde, it 
cannot be denied that they are of much value in relieving the court and jury 
from that anxiety which must always arise when there is a doubt whether if 
the circumstances in question had been explored, they would not have tended 
to have negatived the defendant’s guilt. Andas the burden of proof is on the 
prosecution, if it neglects to examine facts like these, the presumption is that 
if they had been examined, they would have told against it. In this view, as 
well to promote public justice generally, their investigation is a matter of 
duty. 

§ 1180. In a trial in Philadelphia, in 1844—already mentioned under 
another head—a handkerchief found on the defendant’s person was discovered 
to be marked with a profile of a hatchet with which the fatal wound had been 
inflicted. The hatchet itself was peculiarly notched, and a critical analysis 
showed the marks on the handkerchief to be blood. Other circumstances con- 
spired with this to make the presumption irresistible that the defendant was 
the guilty agent. 

§ 1181. The piecing together of the wadding of a pistol with papers or 
other material found in a suspected party’s possession, isa well known method 

919 


§ 1183] INDICATORY EVIDENCE. [BOOK VI. 


of identification.(e) It should be observed, however, that this is a species of 
identification very easily fabricated, as is illustrated by the case of Boynton, in 
Mississippi, where a scrap of paper from which the wadding was cut, was pur- 
posely put in the defendant’s pocket in order to inculpate him. 

§ 1182. In 1836, a Spaniard, named Palayo, was charged with attempting 
the life of an officer in the post-office, by depositing in it packets filled with 
fulminating powder, one of which exploded while in the act of being stamped, 
causing thereby serious personal injury. The letters, which were in Spanish, and 
one of them subscribed with the prisoner’s name, were addressed to persons in 
Havana and Matanzas, who appeared to have been the object of the writer’s 
especial malignity. Evidence that the defendant was on the spot, mailing let- 
ters, at the particular time, was held to be materially corroborated by proof 
that the impression on the wax with which the letters were sealed, corresponded 
with that of a seal worn about the defendant’s person. (ee) 

Footprints, whether of man or beast, lead often in like manner to discovery 
of the guilty agent. In a case already referred to, which occurred in New 
Jersey, in 1820, it appeared that the defendant, who was charged with arson, 
had turned his horse’s shoes round, after arriving at the house to be fired, so 
that there should appear to be two persons proceeding éo and none from it. 
This very artifice, however, was the means of his detection, since the reversal 
of the shoes, as indicated by the recent marks of the nails on the horse’s feet, 
afforded one of the most emphatic of the indications by which the defendant’s 
guilt was determined. (/) 

§ 1183. “It is of the utmost importance,” says Mr. Best, ‘to examine 
minutely for the traces of another person at the scene of death, for it is by no 
means ah uncommon practice with murderers to dispose of the bodies of their 
victims in such a manner as to lead to a supposition of suicide or death from 
natural causes ;( 7/7) while, on the other hand, persons about to commit sui- 
cide, but solicitous to preserve their reputation after death, or their property 
from forfeiture, sometimes make away with themselves in such a manner as to 
avert suspicion of the mode by which they came to their end.(g) In one case, 
where a female was found dead in a room, with her throat cut and a large 
quantity of blood on her person and on the floor, the presence of another per- 
son in that room, was demonstrated by the print of a bloody deft hand on the 
left arm of the deceased.(h) Where a man was found dead, with a discharged 
pistol lying beside him, the hypothesis of suicide from that pistol was rebutted 
by showing that the fatal bullet was too large to fit it.(¢) The following case 
strongly illustrates the difficulties which sometimes attend investigations of 
this nature. A man on detecting his wife in the act of adultery, fell into a 
state of distraction, and having at first dashed his head several times against 
the wall, then struck himself violently and repeatedly on the forehead with a 


(e) 1 Starkie’s Law of Ev. 490; Bentham’s Jud. Ev. Book v. ch. xv. 256; Wills’ 
Circum. Ev. 97. 

(ee) Wills’ Circum. Ev. 99. (f) See ante, § 1167. 

(ff) 1 Stark. Ev. 572. (g) Id. 577. 

(h) Case of Mary Norket and others, 14 Ho. St. Tr. 1324. 

(i) Theory of Presumptive Proof, App. Case, 2d sec. Also, Beck’s Med. Juris. 
591-2. 


920 


BOOK VI.] CARAWAN’S CASE. [$ 1185 


cleaver, until he fell dead from a great number of wounds. All this was done 
in the presence of several witnesses. But suppose it had been otherwise, and 
that the dead body had been found with these marks of violence upon it, mur- 
der would have at least been suspected.(j) And even where there is the 
clearest proof of the infliction of wounds, still death may have been the result 
of previous disease, or violence from some other source. Cases illustrative of 
the former of these are pretty numerous,(%) and the two following show the 
necessity of not overlooking the latter hypothesis. 

§ 1184. ‘‘ At an inn in France, in the year 1808, a quarrel arose among 
some drovers, during which one of them was wounded with a knife, on the 
upper part of the chest, as also on the face and hand. The wounds were 
dressed and he left to return home, but the next morning he was found dead, 
bathed in blood, with-the left lung and pulmonary artery cut. His death was 
at first attributed to the wounds received at the inn, but on a more minute 
examination this appeared unlikely, and it ultimately turned out that, he had 
been robbed and murdered on his road home.(/) In another case, a girl ex- 
pired in convulsions while her father was in the act of chastising her for a 
theft, and who was believed both by himself and the bystanders to have died 
of the beating. Although there were marks of a large number of pretty 
severe stripes on the body, they did not seem to the medical man who saw it 
to be quite sufficient to cause death, who therefore made a post-mortem exa- 
mination, from which, and other circumstances, it appeared that the girl had 
taken poison on finding her crime detected.’’(m) 

§ 1185. One of the most remarkable cases of conviction on this species of 
evidence, is that of George W. Carawan, a deposed Baptist preacher, who was 
tried and convicted in Beaufort County, North Carolina, in the fall of 1853, 
for the murder of Clement H. Lassiter. Carawan was a man of great natural 
force of character, as well as of ingenuity and courage, but was destitute of 
any further education than he had picked up in mature years; and was sen- 
sual, passionate, and unscrupulous. He lived in a section of the country 
which is peculiarly destitute of the means of instruction, either moral or intel- 
lectual. In one district where he had property, and which he occasionally 
made his residence—an island in Beaufort County, he acquired such a control 
over his neighbors as to enable him for some time to defy the attempts of the 
law to secure his arrest. He was over fifty years of age when the murder for 
which he was tried took place, and had recently married a second wife, almost 
immediately upon the death of the first, whose end the subsequent develop- 
ments showed he had at least hastened. Lassiter, the deceased, was a young 
man of mild disposition, who had been for some time engaged in the neigh- 
borhood as a schoolteacher, and who had been employed in the defendant’s 
house in that capacity. When he was residing there the defendant threw out 
intimations of jealousy as to an intimacy between his wife and Lassiter, though, 
as the evidence subsequently showed, without any real ground. It appeared 


(j) Beck’s Med. Juris. 562. 

(k) Several instances of this will be found in Beck’s Med. Juris. chap. xv. (7th 
edit.) entitled “ Wounds on the Living Body.” 

(1) Beck’s Med. Juris. 558. (m) Ibid. 766; Best on Presumptive, § 205, 


921 


§ 1186] INDICATORY EVIDENCE. [BOOK VI. 


that previous to the death of Lassiter the prisoner had made threats as to 
him, and that the deceased entertained fears that he would fall a victim to 
these threats. On Sunday, the 14th of November, the deceased stayed all 
night at the house of a man named Dorset Mason, with whom he had been 
boarding, and spoke of his intention to go on the next day out on the turn- 
pike road to Mattamuskeet Lake to get a school, expressing his fears of the 
prisoner, and speaking of getting some one to go with him. He left Mason’s 
the next morning, with his carpet-bag, and went to the house of Thomas 
Bridgman, a neighbor of Carawan, where he dined. After dinner he took his 
carpet-bag and started on up the road, passing Carawan’s house about two 
o’clock. Carawan was then in the yard, and just before Lassiter appeared 
went into the house, which was a short distance only from the road, and from 
which he had an unobstructed view of any and all who might be passing. 
Lassiter stopped at one or two neighbors, and then passed on along the road 
towards the lake, and was seen no more alive. Carawan was in his house a 
short time only after the deceased passed ; he then left and went direct across 
his field and pasture to the woods on the back of his farm, and was soon fol- 
lowed by his wife to the same point, with a double-barrelled gun concealed 
under her apron. The wife returned shortly to the house without the gun. 
Carawan disappeared in the woods, and is supposed to have hastened through 
the woods to a place beside the road, where the murder was committed. Not 
a great while after Lassiter had gone upon the road a gun was fired in that 
direction, at quite a distance. Carawan returned to his house at sundown, 
without his gun. The place was an appropriate one for the perpetration of 
such a crime, and one likely to be selected. In a few days the non-arrival of 
Lassiter at his appointment on the lake began to awaken attention. It was 
ascertained that he had gone that way on Monday. Suspicion began to be 
excited. His friends became alarmed. It was noised about that he had been 
murdered. Inquiries were set on foot in all directions, and on Friday a gene- 
ral search was commenced on both sides of the turnpike-road. While the 
inquiries were going on, the prisoner manifested great interest in the result of 
them, and made efforts to divert these inquiries into a different channel, sug- 
gesting to one of his friends the probability that Lassiter had run away, and 
before his friend had heard that the deceased was missing. 'The remarkable 
fact then was developed that Lassiter’s dead body had been carried off a long 
distance from the road, into a dense and almost impenetrable thicket, and 
there, beneath the mossy turf of a low bottom, so carefully and adroitly con- 
cealed that it seemed impossible that any human search could ever discover its 
hiding-place. 

§ 1186. Two men, on Saturday afternoon, after a long and tedious search, 
which they were about to abandon as hopeless, were led to this place; but 
how, they could not tell. No mound was there, or footprints, and the moss 
was smooth and level all alike. A few lumps of dirt, less than a handful in 
all, and a decaying limb of laurel that had been overturned, were the sole 
circumjacent indications. There these men found the body, riddled with shot 
and bullets, crammed into a hole upon its face, the elbows sticking up, and 
trampled on, and covered with turf. Though Carawan took no part in the 

922 


BOOK VI.] CARAWAN’S CASE. [$ 1188 


search, yet he betrayed his interest during its progress, inquiring where and 
how far it had been made, and where next they proposed to look. And as 
soon as the result was announced to him, he prepared a budget of clothes and 
escaped; declaring, as he went, to his nephew and his servant, “Boys, I must 
go away, or I shall be hung.” He told his nephew that if he would tell the 
people that he was home all day Monday, he would give him the best negro 
that he had. Some time afterwards he returned to his home by stealth, at 
night, and surrendered himself to the officers of the law only when he dis- 
covered that it was useless longer to hold out. After his arrest, and during 
his imprisonment, the evidence showed that he was uneasy about the witness 
whom he had tried to purchase with a bribe, and making further efforts to hire 
him to leave; in default of this, to get others to get rid of him, ‘‘by hook or 
by crook.” 

§ 1187. The defendant was convicted; but scarcely had the jury returned 
their verdict, when he drew from his breast a single-barrelled pistol, rose from 
his seat in a half sitting posture, leaned forward, and thrusting his arm between 
two attendants, took deliberate aim at Mr. Warren, one of the counsel engaged 
in prosecuting for the State, and fired. The ball struck just above the heart, 
and passing through the lapel of his coat, and cutting the cloth on the breast, 
struck the padding, and fell to the floor. He then dropped this pistol, and 
instantly taking another, applied it to his own forehead. One of the officers, 
observing the movement, scized his arm and pulled it down to the railing of 
the box, but could get it no further. During this struggle, the prisoner, with 
great coolness, leaned his head against the muzzle of the pistol and fired, the 
ball entering the right side of the skull, considerably behind and somewhat 
above the ear, and traversing the brain until it lodged just over the right eye. 
He then dropped on his seat senseless, and died shortly afterwards. 

§ 1188. One other remarkable incident accompanied this case. There fol- 
lowed the circumstantial evidence, a supplement of direct testimony, which, 
though for judicial purposes without value, became interesting fot the purpose 
of showing how completely, in this case, presumption was verified by fact. <A 
negro slave, by the laws of North Carolina, is an incompetent witness; and it 
so happened that there stood behind the trial in this case a negro man named 
Seth, in whom Carawan placed great confidence, and who was privy to the 
whole transaction. His statement, as given after the conviction, was as fol- 
lows: “On Monday night, just before dark (the day on which Lassiter was 
murdered), whilst Seth was feeding the horses in the stable, his master came 
to him and told him he wanted him to take an oath to keep secret what he 
was going to tell him, and made him take the oath. He then told him he had 
killed Lassiter, and that he must go and help him to bury the body; and to 
get a pair of leading lines (such as he used to guide the horses in ploughing), 
and go with him down on the turnpike. The boy got the lines; but asked, as 
he was about to start, if he was going to leave Carawan Sawyer, and a free 
negro boy who was then living with Carawan, at home whilst they were gone. 
Carawan answered that he was not, and then went to the house and sent Saw- 
yer and the free boy to Bell’s, as stated in the trial. They then started, and 
when they got to Yankee field Carawan took a strong rail from a fence which 

923 


§ 1191] INDICATORY EVIDENCE. [BOOK VI. 


inclosed a small garden. When they got to the two pines, Carawan led the 
way a few yards to the bushes, and there lay the body of Lassiter. The negro 
was terribly frightened, and thought he heard somebody coming on the road, 
but it was only his heart beating. The coat had -been taken from the body, 
and doubled under it. Carawan said he had done this to keep the blood from 
running on the ground. He told the negro that he had concealed himself 
close to the two pines, and just as Lassiter had passed he rose up to shoot 
him. In taking aim he stepped on a dead bush, which broke under his foot. 
The noise attracted Lassiter’s attention; he turned partly around, and saw 
him. He cried out, ‘O God! and fell. He rose up straight again, but fell 
instantly. Carawan sprang into the road, seized the body, and threw it into 
the bushes, and then with his hands scraped up the blood in the road, and 
casting it into the ditch, threw some pieces of juniper-wood upon it. He then 
went to the body, and dragged it further off from the road, took off the coat, 
doubled it up, and laid the body upon it, so that the coat was directly under 
the wounds. ‘The first thing Carawan and the negro did was to put the coat 
upon the body. This was done hurriedly, and then they tied him ‘hog fashion,’ 
Carawan pulling the body about, and jerking the line very roughly to tie it; 
and then they fastened him to the rail. They first attempted to take him 
through the woods and bushes, direct from the pines to the spot back of the 
Yankee field, selected by Carawan for the burying place. The negro being 
much shorter than Carawan, and the ground uneven, they stumbled and fell, 
and in the darkness found it impracticable to go through that way. 

§ 1189. “Carawan then told the negro they must take the road—that if 
any one should be coming behind or before they would hear in time to step 
aside in the bushes; but that in fact no one would be travelling at that time 
of night, especially as it was very cold. They accordingly took the body up 
the turnpike to the east end of the Yankee field, and then carried it into the 
woods. They had much difficulty, and fell with the body several times. On 
such occasions Carawan would fly into a passion and kick both the negro and 
the body, sometimes stamping the latter. When they reached the spot which 
Carawan had previously fixed upon, they laid the body down, untied it and 
prepared to bury it. Carawan first cut the turf with a knife, took it off and 
laid it aside, the negro helping as he was wanted. 

§ 1190. “They then commenced digging the grave with sticks, taking the 
dirt out with their hands and putting it into their hats, and then throwing it 
into the woods. They did this in order not to leave any dirt about the grave. 
Finding this process difficult and tedious, Carawan ordered the negro to go to 
the house and get a hoe. He said he was afraid to go. Carawan insisted 
and the negro started, concluding in his own mind to go to the neighbors and 
betray him. But before he had gone fifty yards Carawan called him back. 
They then put the body as well as they could into the hole they had partially 
dug, and covering it over temporarily with the turf aH it and went home, 
taking the rail and line with them. 

§ 1191. “On Wednesday, which was a rainy day, Carawan went out alone 
with a hoe and completed the work of burial.’”? The negro further stated that, 
as soon as the body of Lassiter was found, Carawan came into the woods 

924 


BOOK VI. | CARAWAN’S CASE. [$ 1194 


where he and Sawyer were cutting wood and told them that Lassiter was 
found, and he was going away, as he would be hung if he stayed there—that 
he should send for his family, and wanted Sawyer to come with them. He then 
took the negro with him to the turnpike and told him to go up on the road 
and see if anybody was in sight either way. On his reporting there was none, 
Carawan crossed the canal, and the negro saw no more of him till he came 
back from Tennessee. He was constantly on the look-out for his return. He 
was afraid if Carawan came back and caught him he would kill him. He saw 
some one cross the yard and go into the house, and as soon as he became 
satisfied it was Carawan, he ran with all his might to one of the neighbors and 
told his master had come back. 

1192. Akin to this are the results of recent extraordinary exertion on the 
horse itself, a point which is particularly worthy of consideration, when it was 
necessary that some distance should have been rapidly travelled in order to 
enable the suspected party to pass from the spot where the crime was com- 
mitted to his place of retirement. This is illustrated in the trial of How, who 
was convicted in Alleghany County, N. Y., in 1824, for the murder of Othello 
Church.(n) The’prisoner’s house here was some distance from the deceased’s, 
and there were several circumstances (e. g. old grudge, &.) which indicated 
the defendant as a likely party to have committed the murder. Immediately 
upon the alarm being given, two of the neighbors took sleighs, the snow being 
on the ground, and proceeded at once to the defendant’s house. The defendant 
was at home, and nothing particular about his appearance or dress was dis- 
coverable. On proceeding to the stable, three horses were found, one dry and 
blanketed, the next very wet, having the appearance of natural sweat, and was 
smoking greatly. On this point considerable evidence was taken as to the 
tendency of horses, when subject to particular diseases, to sweat in the night 
season in the manner described. There was other evidence with regard to the 
instrument of death, which left little doubt, and the result was a conviction 
and a subsequent full confession. 


VIII. PossEssIoN oF FRUITS OF OFFENCE. 


§ 1193. When property has been taken from the deceased, the possession of 
it in a third party opens, of course, an important avenue of inquiry. It should 
not be forgotten, however, that light articles, such as form suitable earmarks, 
would be much more likely to be secreted by an assassin on the person or on 
the property of another.(o) A distinction here exists between articles of great 
value and trifles, such as may have been collateral to the homicidal intent. 
The possession of the jirsét gives an overweening presumption of complicity ; 
that of the second, if there has been time for the purpose, is equally likely to 
have been the result of the artifice of another. 

§ 1194. With regard to the general properties of indicatory testimony, it is 
important to keep in mind that whatever may be the differences as to its value 
in other respects, it has some very decided advantages over the direct testimony 


(n) 2 Wheel. C. C. 412. (0) See ante, § 1169. 
925 


§ 1195] FQTICIDE IN ITS LEGAL RELATIONS. [BOOK VI. 


of a limited number of witnesses, and which are thus clearly stated by Mr. 
Bentham, “ First, by including in its composition a portion of circumstantial 
evidence, the aggregate mass on either side is, if mendacious, the more exposed 
to be disproved. Every false allegation being liable to be disproved by any 
such notoriously true fact, as it is incompatible with ; the greater the number 
of such distinct false facts, the more the aggregate mass of them is exposed to be 
disproved ; for it ts the property of the mass of circumstantial evidence, in 
proportion to the extent of it, to bring a more and more extensive assemblage 
of facts under the cognizance of the judge. Secondly, of that additional 
mass of facts, thus apt to be brought upon the carpet by circumstantial evi- 
dence, parts more or less considerable in number will have been brought for- 
ward by so many different deposing witnesses. But, the greater the number 
of deposing witnesses, the more seldom will it happen that any such concert, 
and that a successful one, has been produced, as is necessary to give effect to a 
plan of mendacious testimony, in the execution of which, in the character of 
deposing witnesses, divers individuals are concerned.”() In short, a conclu- 
sion of guilt, deduced from a process of well-collected reasoning, upon evidence 
purely presumptive, may be quite as convincing, and in some cases infinitely 
more so, than one arising from direct testimony. (q) 


D. INFANTICIDE AND FarIcIDE.(¢) 


I. How FAR F@TICIDE IS AFFECTED BY THE DEGREE TO WHICH GESTATION 
HAS PROCEEDED. 


§ 1195. By the common law, as expounded by the earlier text writers, the 
destruction of an infant en ventre sa mere was a high misdemeanor, no matter 
what was the stage of gestation ;(w) and if the death occurred at any time 
subsequent to birth, the offence was murder.(v) The law in respect to feeticide, 
in England and in most of the United States, it is true, has been settled by 
statutes which will presently be noticed; but before proceeding to their con- 
sideration, it is important to observe that on the general question of the 
amenability to indictment of the offender in all cases where the life of the 
foetus has been destroyed, there has been a concurrence of judicial sentiment 
wherever the point has arisen. Where such injury has been attempted by 
violence to the mother, there can be of course no doubt. All assaults are 
indictable, and the guilty party upon conviction punishable with fine and im- 
prisonment ; nor when the offence takes this shape, is it necessary that the 
agerieved party should have been even touched. Thus, it has been held that 
throwing a squib,(w) shaking a whip,(a#) and presenting a gun,(y) form an 
assault; and so far has this doctrine been pushed, that it has been ruled that 
a party, who enticed a young girl into a private place, and there exposed his 


(p) 3 Benth. Jud. Ev. 251. (q) Best on Presumption, § 194. 

(t) See this subject medically examined, note, §§ 335-355. 

(u) 3 Coke’s Inst. 50; Bract. I. c. ec. 31; 1 Hawk. c. 13, s. 16; 1 Rus. on Cr. 671; 
Wh. ©. L. (3d ed.) 537. 

(v) R. v. Senior, 1 Mood. C. C. 346, Wh. C. L. (3d ed.) 426, 537. 

(w) 2 W. Bi. 892. (rv) Wh. C. L. (8d ed.) 545. (jy) 1 Hawk. c 62,5. 1. 


926 


BOOK VI.| FETICIDE IN ITS LEGAL RELATIONS. [$ 1197 


person to her, might be convicted of an assault with an intent to commit a 
rape, though there was no evidence that he actually touched her.(z) Nor is it 
necessary that there should be resistance, if there be not complicity. Thus, 
where a medical practitioner had sexual connection with a female patient of 
the age of fourteen years who had for some time been receiving medical treat- 
ment from him, upon the jury finding that the injured party was ignorant of 
the nature of the defendant’s act, and made no resistance, solely from a bona 
Jide belief that the defendant was (as he represented) treating her medically 
with a view to her cure, the fifteen judges of England held that the defendant 
was guilty of an assault. (a) 

§ 1196. Where, therefore, there is no statute defining the aout and pre- 
scribing a special penalty, there is no doubt that the attempt to commit feeti- 
cide by a third party, is unpunishable by an assault, provided the mother be not 
an accomplice. Where, however, she consents, this form of prescribing must 
~ be abandoned, and the term “‘ assault,’’ if inserted in the indictment, discharged 

as surplusage. In such a state of facts an interesting question arises, which 
was anticipated in England by the early enactment of a statute providing for 
the whole subject matter, but which, in the United States, has been the subject 
of much conflicting adjudication. It being everywhere conceded, that pro- 
ducing the abortion of a quzck infant is indictable at common law, the courts of 
Massachusetts(b) and of New Jersey(c) have held, that unless the infant were 
quick, the offence was not indictable unless made so by statute. The contrary 
opinion has been advanced and carried into effect with equal resoluteness by 
the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.(d)° This conflict of authority has been 
fully considered elsewhere, and it was there maintained, after a full examina- 
tion of authorities, which it is not necessary now to review, that the protec- 
tion of the law was cast round an unborn child from its first stage of ascer- 
tainable existence, no matter whether ‘‘ quickening” had taken place or not. 
Except, however, in those States in which no legislation on this branch of 
criminal law has been had, and they are but few, the point has ceased to be 
~ of practical importance; -but in those jurisdictions where the common law still 
exists untouched, and where there has been as yet no judicial settlement of the 
immediate question, it may still be contended with far the greater show of 
reason, if not of authority, that to make the criminality of the offence depend 
upon the fact of quickening, is as repugnant to sound morals, as it has already 
been shown to be to just medical judgment. That it is inconsistent with the 
analogies of the law is shown by the fact, that an infant born even at the ex- 
treme limit of gestation, after its father’s death, is capable of taking by descent, 
and being appointed executor. 

In most of the States, however, statutory provisions now exist by which 
fceticide is made the subject of specific penalties. (e) 

§ 1197. Mittermaier proposes the following points of inquiry :— 

1. Whether the pregnant female was aware that the means employed were 


(z) Hays v. People, 1 Hill, 351. (a) R. v. Case, 1 Eng. R. 544. 
(6) Com. v. Parker, 9 Met. 263; Com. v. Bangs, 9 Mass. 387. 

(c) State v. Cooper, 2 Zabriskie, 57. 

(d) Com. v. Demain, 6 P. L. J. 29; Mills v. Com. 1 Harris, 631. 

(e) Wh. C. L. § 1214, &e. 


927 


8 
§ 1201] : FQITICIDE IN 118 LEGAL RELATIONS. [BOOK VI. 


such as, under the circumstances, would be likely to produce abortion, or to 
effect the death of the child in the womb. 

The same author remarks that the question whether the means used were 
means for producing abortion is not pertinent, since all such means may also 
serve other purposes. Everything depends upon the circumstances under which 
the means were used. As, for instance, grains of ergot, savin, and all such 
so-called means of abortion, if taken in small doses and continued only for a 
short time, will have no such effect. The same is also true of the mechanical 
means employed. ' 

§ 1198. 2. Has the accused employed certain supposed means? The 
physician will seldom be able to answer this question poxitively. There are 
no means which are attended with such peculiar symptoms as to leave no 
doubt that they were employed. The appearances resulting from the use of 
mechanical means may also be produced in many other ways. Hence, in such 
cases, other evidence must be sought in addition to that offered by the physi- 
cian. 

§ 1199. 3. When the result proper to the employment of certain means 
is observed, and when it is established that the accused actually employed such 
means, may the result be attributed to the use of the means ? 

§ 1200. Upon this point Mittermaier very properly remarks that it cannot 
be concluded simply because abortion has followed the use of certain means 
of abortion, that it actually resulted from the use of such means. In some 
such cases it may be shown that the abortion did not result from the means 
employed, but was produced by some other circumstances. In each case the 
physician should be very careful to examine whether any such circumstances 
exist. 

To these questions proposed by Mittermaier, Dr. Bécker(/) adds the fol- 
lowing. 

§ 1201. 4. Whether means have been employed which could produce 
abortion ? 

Everything here depends upon the manner in which such means were used. 
A pregnant woman may eat, for instance, once or twice a day a grain of 
ergot without detriment, while twenty grains taken daily for a week together 
would certainly cause abortion. 

5. Has there been a miscarriage ? 

6. Did the fcetus in question come from the accused ? 

1. What facts are there which lead to the conclusion that the abortion was 
produced intentionally on the part of the mother, or of some other person, or 
that it occurred through carelessness or from accident ? 

While it is possible to produce abortion by the use of certain remedies, and 
also by mechanical means, yet it will be very difficult to prove in any given 
case that the abortion resulted from the use of such means,.or that the use of 
such means caused the child to be born dead. | 


(f) Gericht. Med. § 115. 
928 


* 
BOOK VI.] INFANTICIDE IN ITS LEGAL RELATIONS. [$ 1204 
* 


II. How FAR THE OFFENCE IS AFFECTED BY THE FACT OF BIRTH. 


§ 1202. While, as has been seen, it is a misdemeanor at common law to kill 
a child in its mother’s womb, the offence becomes murder if the child dies after 
birth in consequence of violence inflicted before delivery. It was decided, in 
fact, at a very early period, that if a child die after birth in consequence of a 
potion or bruises administered before, the offence is murder.(0) And a fortiori, 
when a blow is inflicted on a child’s head during birth, and it is afterwards 
born alive, and then dies, the same result obtains.(p) But the fact of actual 
birth must be shown, and mere breathing is not enough for the purpose. (7) 
It is no defence that the child died in consequence of want of viability, resulting 
from premature delivery, if this delivery was caused by the defendant’s mis- 
conduct in bringing about a miscarriage for the purpose of destroying the 
child. (s) 

§ 1203. The confidence reposed by courts in former days on the hydrostatic 
test was entire; and several executions took place on testimony of viability of 
this character alone. Such, however, is no longer the case. On the trial of 

a woman in 1835, at Winchester Spring Assizes, in England, it was proved 
that the lungs were inflated; but on cross-examination the medical witness 
said that if the child had died during birth the lungs might have been inflated. 
As the question of guilt depended upon the child having been born alive, and 
as the fact of the inflation of the lungs was the only evidence of life that was 
produced, Mr. Baron Gurney stopped the case.(¢) A single sob during birth 
is enough to produce inflation.(w) And where on an indictment for infanticide 
it appeared in evidence that the child’s throat was cut, the wound dividing the 
right jugular vein, and that the lungs floated in water, and proved to have 
been inflated ; but the medical evidence showed that this test only proved that 
the child must have breathed, and not that it had been born alive; and 
that there were instances of children being lacerated in the throat in the act of 
delivery. Mr. Baron Parke told the jury that if they entertained doubts as to 
whether the child was born alive, it was hardly necessary to go into evidence 
on behalf of the prisoner. The jury, without going further, returned a verdict 
of acquittal. (aw) 


III. TEsts oF VIABILITY RECOGNIZED BY THE COURTS. % 


§ 1204. Some fluctuation of sentiment has existed as to how far it is neces- 
sary for the child to be actually produced.(v) While, on the one hand, it is 
not enough for the child to have breathed, unless the whole body was brought 
into the world,(w) and while more than one learned judge has expressly ruled 


(0) Wharton on Hom. 93-8; Wharton’s Crim. Law, §§ 942, 1220. 

(p) R. v. Senior, 1 Mood. C. C. 346. 

(vr) Wharton’s Crim. Law, §§ 942, 1220. 

(s) R. v. West, 2 Car. & Kir. 783; Wharton on Hom. 192-94. 

(t) R. v. Simpson, Cummin on the Proof of Infanticide, p. 40. 

(uw) R. v. Davidson, 1 Hume’s Com. 486. 

(uu) R. v. Grounell, Wills on Circum, Ev. 205. 

(v) As to viability, see ante, §§ 356, 378. 

(w) R. v. Poulton, 5 C. & P. 329; R. v. Enoch, 5 C. & P. 539; R. v. Wright, 9C. & 


P. 754. 
59 929 


§ 1206] FETICIDE AND INFANTICIDE. [BOOK VI. 


_, that there must be an entirely independent circulation,(~) on the other hand, 
the fifteen judges have united in holding, that to constitute such an inde- 
pendent existence, so as to constitute murder, it is not necessary that the child 
should have breathed,(y) nor that the umbilical cord should be severed.(z) 
For this conclusion two reasons are given; one rested on legal, the ether on 
medical foundation. ‘If that’ (the reverse) ‘‘ were the law,’ said Vaughan, 
J., “the child and the after-birth might be completely delivered, and yet, be- 
cause the umbilical cord was not separated, the child might be knocked on the 
head and killed, without the party who did it being guilty of murder.”(a) In 
another case, on the part of the prosecution, there was strong evidence to 
prove that the child had been wholly produced alive from the prisoner’s body, 
and that she had strangled it by fastening a handkerchief, or some such thing, 
around its throat; but it was clearly proved by Mr. Wood, the surgeon who 
examined the body of the child, that it must have been strangled before it had 
been separated from the mother by the severance of the umbilical cord; and 
it was further stated by Mr. Wood that a child has, after breathing fully, an 
independent circulation of its own, even while still attached to the mother by 
the umbilical cord; and that, in his judgment, the child in question had 
breathed fully after it had been wholly produced, and had, therefore, an inde- 
pendent circulation of its own before and at the time it was strangled; and 
was then in a state to carry on a separate existence. ‘If you are satisfied,” 
said Erskine, J., to the jury, ‘‘that this child had been wholly produced from 
the body of the prisoner alive, and that the prisoner wilfully, and of her mal- 
ice aforethought, strangled the child after it had been so produced and while 
it was alive, and while it had, according to the evidence of the surgeon, an 
independent circulation of its own, Iam of opinion that the charge is made 
out, although the child, after it was so strangled, still remained attached to 
the mother by the navel string.” The prisoner was convicted, and upon a 
case reserved, the judges held the conviction right.(0) 

§ 1205. The following legal propositions may be considered as now undis- 
puted :— 

(1.) Where there is a malicious wound inflicted on an infant, with intent to 
produce death, and death ensues after birth, the offence is murder. 

(2.) Where there is a malicious exposure of an infant, with intent to pro- 
duce death, and death ensues after birth, it is murder. 

(3.) Where there is a wanton exposure of an infant, without the intent to 
produce death, but with the expectation of shifting the support of the infant 
upon some third person, and death ensues after birth, it is manslaughter. 

(4.) Where there is an exposure resulting from necessity, ignorance, or in- 
sanity, and death ensues after birth, the offence is excusable homicide, in which, 
in accordance with an American practice, the defendant is entitled to an acquit- 


(x) Parke, J., R. v. Enoch, 5 C. & P. 539; Gurney, B., R. v. Wright, 9 C. & P. 754. 
(y) R. v. Brain, 6 C. & P. 349. 

(z) R. v. Trilloe, 1 Car. & Mars. 650; 8. C. 2 Mood. C. C. 413. 

(a) R. vs Reeves, 9 C. & P. 25. 

(0) R. v. Trillor, 1 Car. & Mars. 650; 8. C. 2 Mood. C. C. 413. 


930 


BOOK VI.| F@TICIDE AND INFANTICIDE. [$ 1206 


tal, The leading cases from which these principles are extracted, are as fol- 
lows :— 

§ 1206. Ann Walters, the prisoner, who was an unmarried woman, had 
taken a place in a stage-wagon, on the 13th of April, 1841, and started in 
the wagon at about ten o’clock on that night, at the Wellington Inn, which 
is situated on the Malvern Hills. The evidence showed that she must have 
left the wagon after that time, as she overtook it at Ledbury. It further 
appeared that she was delivered of a female child at the roadside, between the 
Wellington Inn and Ledbury, and that, after the child was born, she had car- 
ried it a distance of about a mile to the place at which it was found dead, 
which was also at the roadside. It further appeared that this was a much 
frequented road, and that two wagon teams and several persons were on it 
about the time at which the child was left ; and that a wagoner, named Weaver, 
who was passing along the road, heard the child cry, but, instead of going to 
tender any assistance, he went on, and told some other persons, who went to 
the place where the child lay, and there found it dead from ‘cold and exhaus- 
tion. The body of the child was found quite naked. It further appeared that 
the prisoner had arranged with a woman named Thomas to be confined in her 
house. It was urged for the prisoner by Mr. Charles Phillips, the eminent 
criminal barrister, that it was clear that the prisoner had no original intention 
of destroying the child, as she had made arrangements for the taking care of 
it. He insisted, also, that there was equally little doubt that she had got out 
of the wagon when seized with the pains of labor; that she had carried the 
child, after its birth, as long as her strength would allow, and that she had 
then laid it on the roadside, hoping that some passer-by would render it assist- 
ance. Mr. Justice Coltman told the jury—and his charge has since been 
uniformly followed—that if a party do any act with regard to a human being, 
helpless and unable to protect itself, which must necessarily lead to its death, 
the crime amounts to murder; but if the circumstances are not such that the 
party must have been aware that the result would be death, that would reduce 
the offence to the crime of manslaughter—provided the death was occasioned 
by an unlawful act, but not such as to imply a malicious mind. There have 
been cases, he said, where it has been held that persons leaving a child exposed 
and without any assistance, and under circumstances where no assistance was 
likely to be rendered, and thereby causing the death of the child, were guilty 
of murder. ‘It will be for you,” he continued, addressing the jury, ‘‘in the 
present case, to consider whether the prisoner left the child in such a situation 
that, to all reasonable apprehension, she must have been aware the child must 
die, or whether there were circumstances that would make it likely that the 
child would be found by some one else, and its life preserved, because then 
the offence of the prisoner would be manslaughter only. It is impossible to 
say that the offence of the prisoner could be less than manslaughter. It is 
for you to consider whether, under all the circumstances, the child was left in 
such a situation that there was a reasonable expectation that it would be taken 
up by some one else and preserved. Suppose a person leaves a child at the 
door of a gentleman, where it is likely to be taken into the house almost im- 
mediately ; it would be too much to say, that, if death ensued, it would be 

: 931 


§ 1209] CORPUS DELICTI, [BOOK VI. 


murder: the probability there would be so great—almost amounting to a cer- 
tainty—that the child would be found and taken care of. If, on the other 
hand, it were left on an unfrequented place, a barren heath, for instance, what 
inference could be drawn, but that the party left it there in order that it might 
die? This is a sort of intermediate case, because the child is exposed on a 
public road, where persons not only might pass, but were passing at the time; 
and you will, therefore, consider whether the prisoner had reasonable ground 
for believing that the child would be found and preserved.” The jury rendered 
a verdict of guilty of manslaughter.(c) 

§ 1207. In a case tried in Pennsylvania, in 1846, before Chief Justice Gib- 
son, Bridget Harman, a married woman, in very destitute circumstances, who 
had been, it was alleged, deserted some time previous by her husband, was 
indicted for the murder of a female infant child, at the time nine months old. 
The evidence showed that at 6 A. M. on the 11th of August, 1846, she had 
taken the child away from the house where she then lived, and at 9 A. M. she 
returned, saying she had given it away. She was seen shortly after she left, 
with a shovel, going towards a stream in which the remains of the child were 
subsequently found. No question existed but that, under the circumstances, if 
the defendant was guilty at all, she was guilty of murder in the first degree, of 
which crime she was convicted, though never executed. (d) 


LV. CoRPUS DELICTI IN INFANTICIDE. 


§ 1208. Mr. Wills, in his very interesting work on Circumstantial Evidence, 
discusses with much ability the difficulties attending the proof of the corpus 
delicti in cases of infanticide. These difficulties may be enumerated as fol- 
lows :— 

§ 1209. (1.) The uncertainty as to the fact of pregnancy.—The history of 
the English queens, Mary I. and Mary II., with each of whom spurious gra- 
vidity was frequently mistaken for pregnancy, singularly illustrates this. Ina 
case tried in Lancaster, in 1808, before Mr. Justice Chambre, the suspicion of 
pregnancy arose principally from the bulk of the deceased while living, coupled 
with circumstances of conduct which denoted the existence of an improper 
familiarity between the parties, and from the discovery, upon post-mortem 
examination, of what was supposed to be the placental mark. The medical 
testimony was very divided. On the one side it was proved that the deceased 
was subject to obstructions; that the appearance of the uterus might be 
accounted for by hydatids, a species of dropsy, in that part of the body; and 
that what was thought to be the placental mark might be the pediculi by 
which they were attached to the internal part of the surface of the womb. On 
the other hand, four medical witnesses expressed a decided opinion that the 
deceased had been recently delivered of a child nearly come to maturity. The 
learned judge charged the jury that it was a mere matter of conjecture, 7irst, 
whether the deceased had been with child; and secondly, whether she had been 
the subject of the alleged abortion. The defendant was acquitted. (e) 


(c) R. v. Walters, 2 Car. & Marsh, 170. 
(d) Com. v. Harman, 4 Barr. 269. 
(ec) R. v. Angus, Burnett’s C. L. of Scotl. 575. In a case which has been already 


032 


BOOK VI.] F@TICIDE—CORPUS DELICTI. [$ 1212 


§ 1210. (2.) The uncertainty as to the time of death._—We have already 
noticed the difficulties which arise when it is necessary to determine whether 
the child died before or after birth. The law, as has been seen, is, that if the 
death occurs after birth, it is murder; if it occurs before birth, it is but a mis- 
demeanor at common law. It is not necessary at this point to do more than 
to refer to the views already expressed as to the physiological facts bearing on 
this point.(/) | 

§ 1211. (8.) Presumptions which bear with great force in ordinary cases 
of homicide apply much more weakly to cases of infanticide. —“ Concealment 
of pregnancy and delivery,’’ says Mr. Wills, ‘“‘may proceed even from merito- 
rious motives; as where a married woman resorted to such concealment in 
order to screen her husband, who was a deserter, from discovery.’’(g) 

§ 1212. (4.) Gestation and delivery, under the most favorable circum- 
stances, are attended with casualties ; and in cases of clandestine and ille- 
guimate delivery this must be still more strongly the case.(h) 


given, a young girl, under the delusion that she had really been confined, made con- 
fession of the birth and murder by herself of an illegitimate child, and might have 
been convicted, had there not been a medical examination showing that no confinement 
had taken place. Ante, § 989; and see generally ante, §§ 310, 329. 

(f) See ante, Book II. 

(9g) Wills on Circum. Ev. 206; see ante, § 1027. (h) See ante, §§ 378-398. 


933 


BOOK VII. 


LEGAL RELATIONS OF IDENTITY, 


A. OF PERSONS Livine, § 1213. 
Ist. By direct evidence, § 1213. 
a. Appearance, § 1213. 
b. Voice, § 1219. 
c. Marks, 1220. 
d. Daguerreotypes and portraits, § 1221. 
2d. By inferential evidence, 1222. 
a. Presence in the neighborhood, § 1222. 
b. Suspicious circumstances, § 1223. 
B. OF PERSONS DEAD, § 1223. 
Ist. Age, § 1223. 
2d. Teeth, § 1223. 
3d. Sex, § 1223. 
Ath. Skeleton, § 1224. 
5th. Clothing, § 1225. 


A. Or Persons LIvIna. 


§ 1213. Ist. By direct evidence. a. Appearance.—lIdentification of the 
person seen with the person accused is established by the testimony of wit- 
nesses who have known him long enough to have his appearance impressed 
firmly on their memory. Such is the evidence of neighbors, old acquaintances, 
and relatives. Numerous instances, however, have occurred in which such wit- 
nesses have been entirely mistaken. Such was the celebrated case of Martin 
Guerre and Arnaud du Tilh, which was tried before the Parliament of Tou- 
louse, France, in 1560. Martin Guerre had been absent from home some eight 
years, when a person, afterwards proved to be Arnaud du Tilh, appeared and 
represented himself as the long absent man. So great was the resemblance, 
that his word was considered true by all of Guerre’s family, including his wife, 
four sisters, and two brothers-in-law. He lived with Guerre’s wife three years, 
and had two children by her. About this time some circumstances occurred to 
cause suspicions in regard to the true character of the supposed husband, when 
he was arrested and brought before the criminal judge of Rieux to answer to a 
charge of fraud. Upon his examination, he answered satisfactorily the most 
minute inquiries in relation to the former life of Martin Guerre. Some one 
hundred and fifty witnesses were examined during the investigation, of whom 
between thirty and forty testified, from a lifelong acquaintance, that the pri- 
soner was Martin Guerre, while about the same number swore positively that 
he was Arnaud du Tilh, whom they well knew; and over sixty, who knew 

934 


BOOK VII. ] OF PERSONS LIVING. [$ 1214 


them both, declared that they were unable to say which the prisoner was. 
The prisoner, however, was condemned to death, when an appeal was taken to 
the Parliament of Toulouse. Here the difficulty continued; a large number 
of witnesses testifying to the identity of Guerre and the prisoner, and an equal 
number denying it. Among the former were the four sisters of Martin Guerre. 
Finally, however, Martin Guerre himself appeared, and then the relatives were 
requested to say which was the real Martin, when they were both together. 
Immediately the sisters distinguished and recognized their brother. No doubt 
now remaining as to the guilt of the prisoner, he was condemned, and after- 
wards executed. | 

§ 1214. The peculiarities in the appearance of a criminal, as observed about 
the time of the commission of a crime, corresponding to similar circumstances 
in the appearance of the accused, form an important means of identification. 
Among these the following may be mentioned :— 

Size.—Any difference from the ordinary stature or size of the body, as where 
@ person is unusually tall or short, corpulent or slim, at once strikes our atten- 
tion, and is remembered, under impressive circumstances, with more distinctness 
than more minute points. 

Dress.—This is also one of the principal points that strike the attention in 
observing a person under suspicious circumstances. In Barbot’s case(a) the 
peculiar dress of the prisoner was the means of identifying him. 

A woman was tried at Warwick Spring Assizes, 1818, before Mr. Baron 
Garrow, for the crime of arson. The prisoner had been met near the ricks 
which were set on fire, about two hours after midnight. A tinder-box was 
found near the spot, containing some unburnt cotton rags, and a piece of 
woman’s neckerchief was found in one of the ricks where the fire had been 
extinguished. The piece of cotton in the tinder-box was examined with a 
lens, and the witness deposed that it was of the same fabric and pattern as a 
gown and some pieces of cotton print taken from prisoner’s box at her lodg- 
ings. A half neckerchief taken from a bundle belonging to the prisoner, and 
found in her lodgings, corresponded with the color, pattern, and fabric of the 
piece found in the rick, and it was deposed that they both belonged to the 
same square; and from the breadth of the hemming, and the distance of the 
stitches on both pieces, were hemmed with black sewing-silk of the same 
quality (whereas articles of that description are generally sewed with cotton), 
the witness clearly inferred that they were the work of the same person. The 
prisoner was capitally convicted, but there being reason to believe that she was 
of unsound mind, she was reprieved. Evidence of this kind must, however, be 
admitted with caution. On the trial of a young woman for child murder, it 
appeared that the body of a newly-born female child was found in a pond 
about a hundred yards from her master’s house, dressed in a shirt and cap ; 
and a female witness deposed that the stay or tie which was pinned to the cap, 
and made of spotted linen, was made of the same stuff as the cap found in 
the prisoner’s box; but a mercer declared that the two pieces were not only 
unlike in pattern, but different in quality.(b) 


(a) 18 State Trials, 1229. (b) Wills, Cirecumstan. Ev. 96. 
| 935 


§ 1217] LEGAL RELATIONS OF IDENTITY. [BOOK VII. 


§ 1215. Mr. Davip Paut Brown gives us the following narrative :— 

“Tn 1821, an action was instituted by Mary M’Creth against William 
Dickinson, administrator to the estate of Captain Talbot, who, as was alleged 
by him, was an Englishman. Mrs. M’Creth, however, averred that Talbot 
was her brother, and an Irishman, and that, as his only relative, she was en- 
titled to his estate. On the part of the claimant, the evidence by writing and 
parol was exceedingly strong. Mrs. Lee, one of her witnesses, swore to an 
acquaintance with the captain for fourteen years before his death, during all 
which time he lived in the same house with her. He spoke only of one sister ; 
said her name was M’Creth, and she lived in London ; that she was so young 
when he came away, that she would not now know him. He wished to name 
Mrs. Lee’s child Mary, after his sister. He was in the Liverpool trade; had 
frequently been there, but said he could not leave his ship to go and see his 
sister. He never spoke of any other relative. He had a letter in his writing- 
desk, which he said was from his sister, and requested it to be read to him 
while on his death-bed. In addition to this, the letter from Mrs. M’Creth was 
produced, stating where she lived, and how long she had there lived. Anda 
Mr. Leary was produced to prove her actual residence, and identify her person. 
A letter in answer to this was also produced by her from Captain Talbot. In 
Mrs. M’Creth’s letter, she states her poverty; writes by way of Liverpool ; 
requests her brother to direct his letters to No. 2 Lombard Street, London, 
and further states: ‘You may not be acquainted with my marriage, since I 
was, you know, very young when you left Newport, county Tipperary, Ire- 
land.’ This letter was found among his papers; he declared it to be from his 
only sister, and showed his sincerity by keeping it for ten or twelve years. In 
health, sickness, and insanity, he always spoke of his sister, and never of any 
one else. Upon these facts it appeared to be clear that he was an Irishman. 

§ 1216. “On the other side, however, they attempted to show that Captain 
Talbot had always said ‘that he was an Englishman; that he had four or 
five sisters; that Dickinson was the son of one of those sisters.’ A petition 
by the captain for letters of naturalization, in which he states ‘ that he is a 
subject of the King of Great Britain,’ was produced, which, however, was a 
little equivocal in its operation, as Ireland might be considered as embraced by 
the term ‘Great Britain.’ But to strengthen the defence, a number of sea- 
captains testified ‘that Talbot had frequently told them he was born in Eng- 
land.’ A portrait was also produced by Mrs. Lee, at whose house the captain 
died, which was said to bear a strong resemblance to the deceased ; but. even 
this did not remove the difficulty; for while one-half of the witnesses swore 
that it was the very counterpart of the English Captain Talbot, the plaintiff’s 
testimony was just as strong to show that it was an admirable likeness of the 
plaintiff’s brother, whom they professed to know, and that it even bore a 
strong family resemblance to the sister (the plaintiff). 

§ 1217. “Mr. John K. Kane (the present judge of the District Court of the 
United States), was the counsel for the defendant. He enforced the testimony 
for the defence with great ingenuity and ability, and manifested no less 
skill and power in his assaults upon the evidence for the plaintiff. His theory 
was, that loose impressions, derived from thoughtless conversations of Captain 

936 


BOOK VII.] OF PERSONS LIVING. [$ 1217 


Talbot, many years ago, had been misunderstood, or misrepresented by the 
plaintiff’s witnesses ; that it was exceedingly improbable that Captain Talbot 
should sail to Liverpool for years, and never visit his only sister, who was in 
London, but about two days’ journey; that the letter received by him was 
supposed by him to be from the mother of the defendant, whose name was 
also Mary, a favorite sister, whose husband’s name he probably supposed to 
be M’Creth ; that he had written his letter under that impression, and that the 
letter intended for one of. these women fell into the hands of the other, and 
produced all this confusion. He dwelt, also, upon the want of credibility of 
some of the plaintiff’s witnesses, and the bias and interests of others; he ad- 
verted to the fact of many years having elapsed without the plaintiff’s assert- 
ing her claim; and he planted himself firmly upon the petition for naturaliza- 
tion signed by Captain Talbot, and stating himself to be a native of Great 
Britain. He also maintained, that the portrait itself bore strong marks of 
English peculiarity of feature ; and, lastly, that the defendant, being in posses- 
sion of the property, was not to be deprived of it, but by conclusive, or, at 
least, most satisfactory proof on the part of the plaintiff, who could not he 
entitled to recover upon a doubtful title. 

“The answer on the part of the plaintiff, by David Paul Brown, was, that it 
was not more remarkable that Talbot should not visit the plaintiff, than that 
he should not have visited the mother of the defendant, whose residence was 
proved to be nearer to London than Liverpool; that if he had not been born 
in Ireland, he never could have recognized the truth of the letter found in his 
possession, ‘referring to the time when he left his sister Mary, in Newport, 
Tipperary, Ireland ;’ that if the witnesses were doubtful, the letter was un- 
questionable; that Captain Talbot could not have supposed that the letter 
was from the defendant’s mother, consistently with the notion that he was an 
Englishman ; and, if he was not an Englishman, there was no defence. The 
credit of the plaintiff’s witnesses was maintained, and that of the defendant’s 
impugned ; the fact of the mother of the defendant being rich, and the plaintiff 
poor, was referred to as corroborative of the relationship of the latter to the 
deceased, who had said ‘that he had but one sister, and that she was poor, 
though respectable ;’ this poverty was also relied upon to explain her not 
having earlier instituted legal proceedings. As to the petition for naturaliza- 
tion, its apparent inconsistency with the plaintiff’s claim was accounted for by 
its equivocation—by its having been loosely filled up, and carelessly signed— 
and instances confirmatory of this notion were cited; the matter of place of 
birth, as indicated by the portrait, was also minutely discussed, with very 
opposite deductions from those drawn by Mr. Kane; and, in conclusion, the 
plaintiff’s counsel maintained that, although he had not established an un- 
questionable claim, his proofs far outweighed those of the defendant, and, that 
the principle which obtained in criminal cases, that a reasonable doubt should 
discharge the defendant, did not prevail in civil suits. The case, nevertheless, 
resulted in a judgment for the defendant, and the poor plaintiff passed the re- 
mainder of her days in penury and misery, maintaining to her last moment her 
claims to the Talbot estate.” (c) 


(c) 2 Brown’s Forum, pp. 508-513. 
937 


§ 1220] LEGAL RELATIONS OF IDENTITY. [BOOK VII. 


§ 1218. In 1857, the body of a young woman, upon whom an abortion had 
been produced, and who had been murdered by a blow upon the head, was found 
in a ploughed field near Newburg, New York. The body was supposed to have 
been identified as that of Miss Sarah Bloom, and a man named Jenkins, with 
whom Miss Bloom was last seen, was arrested, and already a strong chain of 
circumstantial evidence, fixing, it was thought, the murder upon him, was 
made out. Jenkins insisted that the corpse was not that of Miss Bloom, and 
sure enough, after four days, when the mysterious corpse had been buried, Miss 
Bloom made her appearance alive and well. The resemblance between herself 
and the corpse, however, was so striking as to increase the caution with which 
similar cases should be regarded in future. The body had a scar on the left 
eyebrow precisely where Sarah has one; the body had a cut on the main fin- 
ger of the left hand precisely where Sarah has one of the same character; the 
body has a small black mole about half way between the ankle and the knee, 
on the shin bone, exactly where Sarah has one; but strangest of all, the body 
has two toes of the left foot grown together, precisely like Sarah’s, except 
that Sarah’s are not grown together so,far down on the joint; the toes of 
both feet of the body, like Sarah’s, were pressed together from wearing tight 
shoes, and Sarah wears a coral ring on just the finger from which on the corpse 
aring had been stripped. These facts, connected with Sarah’s absence, the 
remarkable story of Jenkins as to where he had left her, the incident of her 
going in a direction where she did not hear of the discovery of the body, and 
was not herself heard from for four days, combined to make a case of indica- 
tory evidence on which a conviction might well have rested. 

§ 1219. b. Voice.—Peculiarity of voice always makes a strong impression 
on the mind of an observer, and is a valuable assistance in identification. In 
Harrison’s case,(d) a witness testified that on the night when the deceased 
was found strangled in a hackney coach in the street, she saw a coach stop at 
a place named, and heard a person in the coach tell the coachman to go to a 
certain house, and when he did not go fast enough she heard him swear at 
him for going so slow. Afterwards she saw the coachman return with the 
deceased who entered the coach. The witness upon hearing the voice of the 
prisoner declared that it was the same she heard swear at the coachman on 
the night in question, and in this way led to an entire identification. 

§ 1220. c. Marks.—Besides the general appearance, dress, manner, and 
voice of a person, peculiar marks upon the body are a very important, perhaps 
much the most reliable, means of identification. Scars, burns, cicatrices, frac- 
tures, &c., upon some portion of the body of the prisoner, distinctly remem- 
bered by those who have seen them, will generally be received as evidence of 
identity. Very often where the scars resemble each other they may have been 
caused by different agencies. In such cases the evidence of physicians can be 
brought to testify as to the cause of the wound. Still such evidence is not 
always reliable, for a mark of such a nature may exist from exactly the same 
cause in two different persons. It goes, however, a great way in establishing 
identity, and is generally conclusive, unless rebutted by stronger contradictory 
evidence. 


(d) 12 State Trials, 850, 860, 861. 
938 


BOOK VII] OF PERSONS LIVING. [$ 1221 


According to Bécker,(e) the gender, age, size, stature, walk, bearing, color 
of hair and eyes, shape of eyes and nose, appearance of teeth, the condition 
of the hands, feet, bones, and joints, must be observed, together with changes 
produced by pregnancy, birth, miscarriage, disease, &e. Moles leave important 
evidence, which continue throughout life, unless cut away, and then a scar 
remains. Marks of branding and of tattooing are often also permanent, 
though it should be observed they may be fabricated. Scars from injuries or 
disease can often be observed for a long time. In reference to the hair, it is 
to be observed that there are various means of changing its color. Different 
employments often impart some peculiarity to the hands or other organs. 

The above rules apply also to the examination of a dead body, in case the 
appearance has not yet been affected by decomposition. 

§ 1221. d. Daguerreotypes and portraits.—This method is now coming in 
vogue in the police departments of our great cities. Its practical value in 
the determination of questions of identity has not yet been the subject of legal 
consideration. (/) 

Pictures, however, have not been without their use for detective purposes. 
A capital conviction is reported by Mr. Wills to have been secured by the 
prisoner having given his portrait to a youth, which enabled the police, after 
watching a month in London, to recognize the culprit.(g) 


(e) Gericht. Med. § 138. 

(/) For the following note I am indebted to the officers having charge of this spe- 
cial department (1860) in the Mayor’s office in Philadelphia. 

“ During the mayoralty of the Hon. John M. Scott, in 1842-43, rough pen and pencil 
sketches were made of the countenances of the prisoners—the remembrance of whom 
it was thought desirable to perpetuate. Of these there now remain on file, &c., sketches 
of twelve individuals; this may be considered as the first approach towards the for- 
mation of a Rogues’ Gallery; these have been found useful in a number of instances. 
During the administration of Mayor Gilpin from 75 to 80 daguerreotypes and ambro- 
types of noted men in police annals were made the nucleus of a gallery, though kept 
in a trunk under lock and key most of the time. They were seldom exhibited to 
others than officers of the detective department of police. With the present adminis- 
tration the gallery of photographs commenced, and has been carried forward to its 
present condition, numbering now (April 24, 1860) 266 portraits. It has been thought 
desirable, in furtherance of police ends, to add, as far as possible, the portraits of men, 
notorious in other cities, but who occasionally visited us professionally. Exchanges have 
been made to some little extent with New York, Albany, Pittsburg, &c., and pictures 
received have been hung up in our gallery. As it regards the pictures of men known 
to the police as rogues of a high grade, very few of these, as yet, are known to exist, 
in any portion of the land. . Generally, these men will not, under any consideration, 
sit for their portraits. When in custody, and are therefore secure, the question is 
often asked, How do you get the consent of these men and women to sit and have their 
likenesses taken to be hung up for general exhibition? The answer is, Sometimes by 
threats of thirty days’ imprisonment, as the alternative of refusal; at others, and in 
most cases, the parties have been arrested for the commission of some crime, and 
having years of imprisonment before them, are reckless and regardless of consequences 
so far as their pictures are concerned, and yield readily to the demand therefor. The 
greater portion of the pictures in our gallery are the pictures taken under these cir- 
cumstances ; and, therefore, for any practical purposes, are by the writer deemed 
almost useless—especially so with regard to the younger portion of them. They alter 
so materially in person, &c., as often to be hardly recognized after years of imprison- 
ment. 

“The one great idea in the establishment of a Rogues’ Gallery should be to enlarge 
the acquaintance of detective officers with individuals, with whom they have to do, 
and thus to give the officers greater facilities in the performance of official duty.” 

’ (g) Wills, Circum. Ev. 95. / 


939 


§ 1223] LEGAL RELATIONS OF IDENTITY. [BOOK VII. 


§ 1229. 2d. By inferential evidence. a. Presence in the neighborhood.— 
When a person very strongly resembling the accused was seen in the neighbor- 
hood of the alleged crime, it is very strong evidence of identity. Hvidence of 
proximity, and that of presence as inferred from it, may sometimes be made 
out by physical facts, such as the impression of boots of a peculiar kind, after- 
wards discovered to be the same as those of the prisoner. This latter evidence 
is very common, and the one most naturally sought for directly after the com- 
mission of the crime. Footsteps, as evidence of the number as well as the 
particular kind of persons engaged, are important indications. In the case of 
Mrs. Arden, who, with a number of others, was accused of murdering her 
husband, at Feversham, in England, in 1551, the crime was committed in the 
house of the deceased, and the dead body carried out and laid on the ground. 
From the impressions made upon the recently fallen snow, the prisoners were 
tracked through all their progress back to the house, where, by means of yet 
stronger evidences of guilt, conviction was brought about. 

Impressions from other parts of the body answer likewise a useful purpose 
in detecting and identifying an offender. In the case of Rex v. Brindley,(h) 
impressions were found on the soil, near the scene of crime, of the knee of a 
man who had worn breeches made of striped corduroy, with a patch of pecu- 
liar shape; which was found to correspond exactly with the dress of the 
prisoner. (2) | 

§ 1223. b. Suspicious circwmstances.—Under this head we may mention 
anything remarkable in the appearance of the prisoner, either before or after 
the crime, which may lead an observer to suspect something wrong. Singu- 
larities of conduct of a criminal, from the inability to conceal the secret which 
is weighing on his mind, will be hereafter mentioned. Whenever any physical 
connection exists between something belonging to the prisoner and traces 
of the criminal at the scene of crime, identification may he established by 
actual comparison. In the case of footprints, this is done by fitting the feet 
or shoes of the party to the impress which they left. Footprints, or impres- 
sions made by instruments used by the person committing a crime, may aid in 
identification in two ways: jirsé, by showing the quarter from which the 
criminal came immediately before the crime, or to which he went directly after 
it; second, as specially pointing out the guilty person. Marks of violence, 
such as impressions of instruments used in forcing the way into a house, show 
that the perpetrator came from without. The absence of any such traces may. 
lead also to the inference that the criminal was an inmate of the house. Evi- 
dence of the peculiar manner in which an instrument of crime was used, may 
contribute material aid in fixing guilt upon a particular person. Where the 
evidence shows that a fatal wound has been inflicted by the left hand, for 
example, and the accused is found to be left-handed, this cireumstance, although, 
of course, not conclusive, lends great force to other indications. Objects left 
at the scene of crime, which are found to belong to the prisoner, are evident 
means of identification. A connection, also, between something found at the 
place of the crime, and something in the prisoner’s possession, may here be 


(h) Wills, Circ. Evid. 100. (i) See Wh. Cr. Law, § 862. 
940 


BOOK VIL] OF PERSONS DEAD. [$ 1225 


mentioned. Where the bullet, for instance, with which a murdered man was 
killed, fits exactly a fire-arm in the prisoner’s possession, or where the wad- 
ding of a gun corresponds to wadding found with the prisoner, strong evi- 
dence is afforded of identification.(7) Chief Justice Shaw, in his charge in 
the Webster case,(“) mentions the case where a portion of a broken knife 
blade was found in the murdered man’s body, and afterwards the handle, with 
a small portion of the blade remaining, was discovered, and the two parts 
were found to fit so exactly that no doubt could exist of their having once 
been joined together in the same blade. Positive evidence was adduced to 
show that a knife with exactly the identical handle had been in the prisoner’ S 
possession but a day or two before the crime. (/) 


B. Or Persons DEAD. 


§ 1223(a). Ist. Age.(m) 

2d. Teeth.(n) 

3d. Sex.(0) | 

§ 1224. 4th. Skeleton.—This subject, in its general relations, has been already 
noticed.(p) Where nothing but the skeleton has been found, it may be identi- 
fied by peculiar marks or objects found near it. In the case of Rex v. Clewes,(q) 
twenty-one years after the death of a certain person his body was identified by 
his widow from some peculiarity about the mouth, and by a carpenter’s rule 
and a pair of shoes found near the remains, and identified as having belonged 
to the deceased. (7) 

§ 1225. 5th. Clothing.—In Peterson’s case, which has been already given, 
the difficulties attending this kind of evidence are illustrated. There the 
clothes were so much decayed as to make their recognition almost impossible. 
The wife of the deceased, however, was able to identify a small fragment of his 
vest, and a little package of needles she placed in his pocket before he left her. 


(j) Ante, § 1179. (k) Bemis’ Report, 465, 466. 
(1) See ante, § 1180, &c. (m) See ante, § 474. 

(n) See ante, § 477. (0) See ante, § 478. 

(p) See ante, § 477. (q) 4 Carr. & P, 221. 


(rv) Burrill on Cire. Ev. 681. 
941 


i OFK xo Veldeha 
SUR Y TY ORS Tot Py 


I. AS TO THE PARTIES, § 1225. 
Ist. Sex, § 1225. 
2d. Age, § 1227. 
3d. Size and temperament, § 1228. 
4th. Health, § 1229. 

II, AS TO MODE OF DEATH, § 1230. 
Ist. Drowning, § 1230. 
2d. Asphyxia, § 1237. 
3d. Heat, § 1238. 
4th. Cold, § 1239. 
5th. Starving, § 1240. 
6th. Poison, § 1243. 
7th. Crushing or burying alive, § 1244. 
8th. Childbirth, § 1245. 
9th. Wounds, § 1246. 

III. Tests WHERE BODIES ARE FOUND DEAD, § 1247. 


§ 1225(a). I. As to the parties. Ast. Sex.—Generally the male is supposed 
to survive the female, though in cases of suffocation Zacchias assumes the sur- 
vivorship to be with the woman, on account of a less liability to asthma. This 
is verified by one or two cases. A girl and a young man were exposed in the 
same apartment to coal-gas. He was dead, but she, though she had heen 
exposed ten hours, recovered.(a) 

A very interesting narrative to the same effect is quoted by Dr. Kriigelstein. 
In the Catacombs near Maestricht there is a labyrinth from which, when the 
way is lost in the dark, it is almost impossible to escape. Among the mum- 
mies which are found in the passage is one of a Leipsig student, whose name 
is not recorded. This much, however, is told of him. He was a man of much 
beauty and accomplishments, and was preparing for a professorship. An 
attachment sprang up between himself and the daughter of a rich merchant 
from Leipsig. The father refused his consent, and the young couple eloped 
and hid themselves in Maestricht. They were followed there, and finally took 
refuge in the Catacombs, thinking that they could readily conceal themselves 
there for a few days. Their track, however, was followed, and at the end of the 
third day they were discovered in a remote hole. The husband was dead, and 
his body is the mummy just mentioned. The wife was resuscitated, and lived 
to an extreme old age. 

§ 1226. According to Dr. Guy, in cases where one of each sex perishes by the 


(a) Henke’s Zeitschrift, 1 heft. B. 75, s. 99. 
942 


BOOK VIII] SURVIVORSHIP. [$ 1228 


same accident, the probability is that the male, being stronger, is the survivor. 
This rule applies only where strength and courage are the best means of safety. 
In those cases, however, where the danger of death is increased by struggles and 
resistance, the probability of survivorship is with the female, from the inca- 
pacity of action which would result from her greater liability to weakness and 
fainting. (b) 

§ 1226(a). In 1766 General Stanwix and his daughter set sail from Ireland 
for England, and during the voyage both perished from shipwreck. Opposing 
claims were set up for the personal estate by the nephew of Gen. Stanwix and 
the maternal uncle of the daughter. It was argued in favor of the general’s 
survivorship that he being a soldier and man of courage would be apt during 
the tempestuous weather to be upon deck, while the daughter would probably 
be below, and hence it was supposed that the father would struggle much 
longer for his life than the daughter. It was contended, on the other hand, 
that the general was old and feeble, while the daughter was young and healthy, 
and hence able to resist such an attack longer than the father. 

A second wife of the general perished at the same time, and her representa- 
tives put in a claim to the property. The difficulties were such that the judges 
were unable to decide, and advised a COMP LQTONAGY which was accordingly 
effected.(c) 

§ 1227. 2d. Age.—The body is in the possession of its maximum strength 
and vigor between the ages of 27 and 50. In cases, therefore, when adults 
between these ages perish by the same means and where strength and power 
of endurance only are concerned, no presumption of survivorship can be enter- 
tained between them. Before and after these ages the power of endurance is 
probably less, but still between the ages of 15 and 60 not enough difference 
can exist to establish any general rule. Where a middle aged person perishes 
with one under puberty or above 60, the probability of survivorship is in favor 
of the adult. Where one under 15 and above 60 perish together, according 
to the French law, the former is the survivor. The civil law of England 
assumes that in case the parent and child die by a common death, the child 
survives the parent if he is above puberty, and dies first if he is below that 
age. (d) 

§ 1228. 8d. Size and temperament.—Hippocrates is quoted as saying qua 
natura sunt valde crassi, subtto moriuntur quam gractles. The fat, in other 
words, die quicker than the slender. The older commentators on this passage 
make a still further distinction between those who are naturally stout, and 


(b) Guy’s Medical Jurisprudence, 400. 

(c) See this question thoroughly considered in Polk v. Ball, post, § 1232. 

(d) The duration of human life is very different in different cases, but seldom ex- 
ceeds 100 years. The average duration in Russia is 21.3, in Prussia 29.6, in Switzer- 
land 34.6, in France 35.5, in Belgium 36.5, in England 38.5 years. The probable 
duration of life has latterly increased. The average length of life is greater with mar- 
ried persons than with those who remain single ; this difference is more remarkable in 
the case of females than in that of males, but the former are more subject to fatal attacks 
during the period of child-bearing. Extreme old age is oftener reached by men than 
by women. The average duration of life is different in different professions. Among 
theologians it is 65.1, among merchants 62.4, among government officials 61.7, among 
farmers and foresters 61.5, among soldiers 59.6, lawyers 58.9, among teachers 59.9, 
among physicians 56.8 years. . (See Bécker’s Gericht. Med. ed. 1857, § 129.) 


943 


§ 1281] SURVIVORSHIP. [BOOK VIII. 


those whose fat is the result of high living, the latter of whom they declare to 
be the more shortlived. (e) 

Temperament.—Persons who are sanguine and choleric, outlive those who 
are melancholy and phlegmatic. Celuz qui est doué d’un temperament pitut- 
teux meurt le premier, vient ensurt le melancholique, puis le sanguin et le 
bilieux.(f) 

The timid die much more quickly than the courageous. 

Dr. Gray says: “It is necessary, however, to understand that mere muscular 
strength and power of endurance are two very different things, and do not 
often meet in the same person. Muscular strength is often greatest in the so- 
called lymphatic temperament ; power of endurance in the bilious.(g) 

§ 1229. Health.—Disease, all other things being equal, supposes an earlier 
death. 

— § 1230. II. As to mode of death. 1st. Drowning.—Many cases of great 
difficulty have arisen from doubt as to the priority of death, where persons 
have perished from drowning. Where shipwreck occurs, men ate more apt to 
be saved than women. ‘They are stronger, can endure more, and are more apt 
to know how to swim than women, and generally they are more apt to be upon 
the deck, and in favorable places to secure their safety, than are women. 

When the comparison is between those of the same age and sex, it is to be 
considered which of them was the more exposed to cold from having his body 
only partly immersed. Investigation should also be made as to whether any 
injuries may have occurred to prevent a swimmer from using his strength. 

§ 1231. Where there is an explosion, those persons, according to Orfila, 
who are the lightest and weakest, will be presumed to have been the last who 
were precipitated into the water. When the water is reached, however, and 
in all cases of ordinary shipwreck, the presumption of survivorship is with 
those who have the greatest presence of mind and strength, and with those 
best acquainted with swimming. Besides this, the following considerations 
are to be noticed :— 

Dress very much affects the power of keeping above water. Boots soon 
fill with water and interfere with swimming. A woman’s clothes, as lighter, 
and often exposing a greater resistance to the water than those of a man, 
may act as floats to keep the body a few moments longer on the surface. 

A power to hold in respiration, or a condition of the body that permits 
this, presumes a longer struggle. 

It should be inquired, also, whether the death was by apoplexy or suffoca. 
tion. Persons of apoplectic tendencies are very apt to be struck with the dis- 
ease when suddenly precipitated into the water, and when this is the case, 
death is presumed to have been earlier than in the ordinary cases of suffoca- 
tion.(h) 


(e) See Pauli Zachie Question Med. Leg. lib. v. tit. iii. Quest. 12. 

(f) Orfila, Lecons de Médecine Légale, Paris, 1825, tom. ii. p. 271. 

(g) Guy’s Med. Jur. 400. 

(4) According to Bicker, the stronger person will live longer—the mature man lon- 
ger than the child or old man. In cases of poison, the person who is found to have 
taken the largest dose probably died soonest. In cases of suffocation, the person who 
has strong lungs has probably survived one with weaker, as a young child. In cases 


944 


BOOK VIII.] SURVIVORSHIP. [§$ 1282 


§ 1232. The leading American case is that of Pell v. Ball.() In that 
case it appeared that Hugh Swinton Ball, with his wife and adopted daughter, 
were lost on board the steamer Pulaski, in June 14, 1838. By will he left 
certain portions of his estate to his wife in case she survived him. The facts 
are thus stated by Chancellor Johnson: ‘‘The Pulaski left Savannah on the 
15th of June, 1838, and arrived at Charleston that evening. The next morn- 
ing Mr. and Mrs. Ball, their adopted daughter and a servant, went on board, 
and she departed north on her course, until about 11 o’clock of that night, 
when, most of the passengers having retired to their berths, the starboard 
boiler exploded. By the explosion an extensive breach was made on the star- 
board side of the vessel. Her main deck was blown off, thus destroying the 
communication between the forward and after part of the steamer. The for- 
ward part of the upper deck (called the hurricane deck in contradistinction to 
the after part, which is called the promenade deck) was blown off, carrying 
with it the wheel-house, in which the commander of the boat, Capt. Dubois, 
was sleeping at the time; the gentlemen’s forward cabin was much torn, its 
floor ripped up, and its bulkhead driven in, and Major Twiggs, whose berth 
was there, gives us reason to suppose that many perished in that part of the 
vessel by the explosion. The gentlemen’s after cabin (which was under the 
main deck and immediately beneath the ladies’ cabin, which was on that deck) 
was also injured. Some part of the floor was ripped up, the bulkhead partly 
driven in, and the stairs communicating with the deck more or less shattered. 
The vessel was careened to the larboard, and as she dipped, began to fill with 
water. In a very short time the hold was filled, and the water gained to the 
level of the floor of the gentlemen’s cabin. It rose higher with great rapidity, 
the vessel settled to the centre, where the breach was, and all hope that she 
could hold together was abandoned. She parted amidships, and the forward 
and after parts pitched into the water toward the centre, at an angle of nearly 
thirty degrees. The gentlemen’s after cabin was now entirely filled, and the 
forward cabin was certainly in as bad a condition. There were some persons 
on the forward part of the vessel, nearly all of whom speedily perished, but 
the greater number were in the after part, including one or two who had 
passed by swimming from the forward to the after part. Of those on the 
after part, as many as could climbed to the promenade deck; but there were 


of drowning, a good swimmer has probably retained life longest. Persons upon whom 
traces of reaction are found, have survived those upon whose bodies such marks are 
wanting. In cases of injuries the more important the organ affected, the sooner death 
follows. A sick person will die sooner than one in good health. Women bear loss 
of blood longer than men. If the fatal instrument must have reached the different 
persons at intervals, the one first reached has probably died first. Where one of the 
persons has died by the hands of another, and the other by his own hands, the latter 
has probably survived the former. In cases of starvation or of freezing, young, weak, 
lean persons perish sooner than others. Hunger and thirst combined produce death 
sooner than hunger or thirst alone. If a mother and a newly-born infant are found 
dead, it is probable that the infant, where it was evidently born alive, lived the longer. 
Some physicians hold the opinion that the birth of a child may be consummated 
after the death of the mother. The person whose body is most advanced in decom- 
position has died first. 

In some cases the circumstances will enable one to decide with a high degree of 
probability as to priority of death. 

(7) 1 Cheves’ Ch. Cases. 

60 945 


§ 1283] SURVIVORSHIP. [BOOK VIII. 


many, mostly ladies, among whom was Mrs. Ball, who remained on the main 
deck. These, as that deck sank deeper and deeper, retreated along the gang- 
ways, by the ladies’ cabin, toward the stern. The promenade deck, by the 
action of the waves, was burst from the top of the boat and was submerged 
with all that were on it. Whether the stern of the boat was submerged at or 
after this time, is uncertain. Some of the witnesses think it was, even before 
the promenade deck, others, that it was not submerged at all. All these 
events had taken place, according to most of the witnesses, in about from forty 
to fifty minutes; according to others, in less time. 

‘‘ Some few escaped in the boats, others on parts of the wreck, and others 
on rafts constructed by them as they could. Of Mrs. Ball, nothing is known, 
after the submerging of the promenade deck, nor for some time before. Be- 
fore that event, her cries were heard by one witness, who had gained the pro- 
menade deck, as they proceeded from the place she still occupied on the deck 
below. No witness speaks of her afterwards. 

“Within a few minutes after the explosion, aceording to one witness 
who knew her, she came out of the ladies’ cabin and began to call upon her 
husband. The scene was one of terror, as may be supposed; and although 
a crowd was instantly gathered at that part of the vessel, there was not much 
noise. The surrounding horrors seem to have subdued the sufferers, and in 
mute astonishment they contemplated the fate that awaited them. Even the 
wheels had stopped. Nothing but the sound of the waters, which were some- 
what disturbed, and the hasty exclamations of friends, as they sought each 
other out, and the noise occasioned by such preparations as the more active 
and prudent felt themselves called upon to make for themselves and others 
under their charge, were heard. But the voice of Mrs. Ball was heard above 
all others, calling upon her husband. She ran forward to the chasm caused 
by the explosion, retraced her steps, and continued to traverse the starboard 
gangway in search of him, uttering his name in tones'so elevated by her agony, 
that they reached most parts of the vessel, and seem to have made an indelible 
impression upon all who heard them. Her cry, according to one witness, was 
a cry of bitter despair and anxious inquiry, and, according to all, it was lifted 
in shrill tones, carrying an irresistible appeal to all hearts. 

§ 1233. ‘ Mr. Ball was neither seen nor heard. Mrs. Ball was heard and 
seen by many, but no response was heard to her cries, nor was any one seen 
to approach her for her protection or consolation. Two witnesses, who knew 
Mr. Ball, saw her, but did not see him. One of them passed and repassed 
her, in a hurried manner to be sure, but did not discover him. He was neither 
seen nor heard after the explosion, unless he was the person referred to by two 
witnesses, who stated the following circumstances: Very shortly after the ex- 
plosion, a boat was let down on the starboard side of the steamer, into which 
some persons descended. As the boat was lying below, a gentleman came to 
that side of the deck, and throwing a coat into the boat, called to those in it 
to hold fast a moment, and instantly disappeared. He never reappeared, but 
the next day the coat was found to be a black dress-coat of large size (such 
was the size of Mr. Ball), and in one of the pockets was discovered a shirt 

946 


BOOK VIII.] SURVIVORSHIP. [§ 1234 


collar, on which was written the name of Ball with some initials, which the 
witnesses have forgotten. 

‘“‘ Now these are the circumstances of the case. It is not the case of an 
unknown calamity, nor of one withdrawn from observation, nor is it a case 
where the calamity was of instantaneous operation. It is a case for testimony, 
and to be decided on testimony.’’ 

§ 1234. Chancellor Johnston proceeds to say, that as the right on the part 
of Mrs. Ball was derivative, the burden is on the plaintiffs to prove that she 
was the survivor. But although bound to prove this, it does not follow that 
they are to prove it to demonstration. We must take the best evidence that 
the case affords. 

Although unwilling to rest on the fact that Mrs. Ball was the last person 
seen, yet he inclines to the opinion, that in cases of persons lost by a common 
accident, this should be the ground of decision. He prefers, in the present 
instance, “‘to put the case upon the ground of probability arising from the 
evidence, upon a belief engendered by a combination of circumstances, and 
upon the superiority of positive proof over conjecture, or even probability. 

“The explosion produced its most fatal effects in the gentlemen’s forward 
cabin, and that was the first part of the vessel which sank. The after cabin 
was also much injured. From the forward cabin many persons never escaped. 
From the after cabin, so far as we know from the evidence, all did escape ex- 
cept Judge Cameron, an infirm old man. But from the description given of 
its condition, it is possible that some others may have been detained, either 
from being hurt or otherwise, until the cabin filled. 

“Tt is certain that Mrs. Ball escaped the explosion. Is it certain Mr. 
Ball did? Mr. Ball engaged a berth in the after cabin. The probability is 
that he got it, but this is far from certain. The boat came with many per- 
sons from Savannah, which may have occasioned Mr. Ball to be displaced and 
transferred forward. I think, however, it is not probable he was so trans- 
ferred, because, by an arrangement between the agents in Savannah and at 
Charleston, they were entitled to let berths, in alternate order, throughout the 
boat, and we know that some of the passengers who came from Savannah had 
not the advantage of pre-occupying the after cabin, and that some of the 
Charleston passengers were let into the cabin; Mr. Ball, therefore, was pro- 
bably in that cabin. But there is a probability that he was in the forward 
cabin, and if so, in the greatest danger from the explosion. Mrs. Ball was 
cleared from that danger certainly, Mr. Ball only probably. Supposing that 
he was in the after cabin, still there are chances of his destruction there, from 
which, we know, Mrs. Ball was totally free on the deck. We know Mrs. Ball 
was there. That iscertain. Is it certain that Mr. Ball had hitherto escaped, 
and was the person who threw the coat into the boat? It may be that he 
was the man. I think it hardly probable. I should have thought that he 
was the man if he had been seen at any time near his wife, or had answered 
to her heart-rending calls. But it is more probable that some one else in the 
hurry of the moment may have mistaken Mr. Ball’s coat for his own, and 
thrown it into the boat, than that an affectionate husband and brave man, as 

947 


§ 1235] SURVIVORSHIP. [BOOK VIII. 


Mr. Ball is proved to have been, should have heard such appeals as were made 
to him by his wife, and should at such a time have failed in his duty to her. 

‘We have indubitable evidence that she had so far escaped; the same evi- 
dence, with a moral force which cannot be resisted, convinces us that he must 
have already perished, or he would have been at her side. J have from all 
these considerations, formed the opinion that Mrs. Ball survived her husband.”’ 
On appeal (February, 1840), the above decision was confirmed. 

§ 1235. More lately this subject was discussed in England on the followin 
facts.(i7) A testator, by his will, gave all his real and personal estate to W., 
in trust for his wife absolutely, ‘and in case my said wife shall die in my life- 
time, then in trust for such of them, my three children, C., F., and A., as 
shall attain the age of 21, &c., and in case all of them shall die under the age 
of 21, &c.,” then he gave and bequeathed all his property to W. The tes- 
tator and his wife, and two of the children, F. and A., were drowned at sea, 
in a shipwreck, having been washed off from the side of the vessel by the same 
wave. The other child, C., was also drowned, but had been seen alive, after 
the others were drowned. W., as executor, proved the will. <A bill was filed 
by the administrator of C., as next of kin of the wife, under an asserted in- 
testacy, against W. There was no direct evidence on the question of survi- 
vorship as between the husband and wife, but there was considerable medical 
evidence of a conflicting nature, with reference to the presumptions of. the 
case. The case came up in 1854-5, on an appeal from the Master of the 
Rolls, and was heard before Cranwortu, Lord Chancellor, assisted by 
WicutMman, J., and Martin, B. Wicutman, J., in the course of his judg- 
ment, said: ‘‘The question of survivorship is the subject of evidence to be 
produced before the tribunal which is to decide upon it, and which is to deter- 
mine it, as it determines any other fact. If there he satisfactory evidence to 
show that the one survived the other, the tribunal ought so to decide; and if 
there be no evidence, the case is the same asa great variety of other cases, 
more frequent formerly than at present, where no evidence exists, and conse- 
quently no judgment can be formed. On this point, we concur with the Mas- 
ter of the Rolls; we think there is no evidence to show whether the husband 
or the wife was the survivor. There may be surmise, and speculation, and 
guess, but we think there is no evidence. We have no doubt that the scien- 
tific gentlemen who were examined were perfectly sincere in their opinions, 
but it is obvious that their opinions were given, having reference to the case 
of two persons quietly submerged in water, and remaining there until 
drowned ; or in the case of two persons, one being a swimmer, and the other 
not, and both thrown suddenly into the water, unincumbered, and acting on 
certain instinct. The present case is that of two persons clasped together, 
two boys clinging to one of them, and standing pretty high out of the water 
on the ship’s side, swept off together by an overwhelming wave into a raging 
sea, and one or other, or both of them, may have been stunned by the vio- 
lence of the blow from a wave, or they may have struck against a timber of 
the ship, and may, in fact, have been dead before he or she reached the water 


(iz) Underwood v. Wing, 1 Jur. N. 8. 169; 31 Eng. Law and Eq. 293. 
948 


BOOK VIII] SURVIVORSHIP. [$ 1286 


at all. How is it possible, under such circumstances, for any tribunal, sitting 
judicially, to say which of these two individuals died first? We may guess, 
or imagine, or fancy; but the law of England requires evidence, and we are 
of opinion that there is no evidence upon which we can give a judicial opinion 
that either survived the other. The Master of the Rolls is reported, in the 
report of his judgment, to have said: ‘There is, therefore, no evidence to 
show who was the survivor, and the conclusion of law is that both died at the 
same moment.’ According to our view, this is not correct; we think there 
is no conclusion of law on the subject. In fact, we think it unlikely that 
both did die at the same moment of time, but there is no evidence to show 
who was the survivor. Our opinion, therefore, on the questions, with respect 
to which it was requested, is in favor of the plaintiff.” 

§ 1236. Lord Chancellor CRANWorRTH, after adopting the views of Wicut- 
MAN, J., added :— 

“Then we come to the question of fact. I entirely concur in what was said 
by the learned judges on that subject, that there is no evidence whatever which 
will justify anybody in coming to any such conclusion; because I take it in 
this case, as in all others where it is said that a person must show such and 
such a state of things to have arisen, that it is not sufficient to show a variety 
of circumstances on which it is very difficult to form your mind; that, if you 
had to lay a wager, you would rather lay a wager one way than the other. 
That is not what is necessary. The heir at law is not to be dispossessed unless 
the devisee or person claiming can show such circumstances as displace him— 
not show that there is a confusion and an ignorance as to what happened, and 
that if may have so happened, that the greater probability may be that it has 
so happened, as to entitle him; but there must be evidence as to who was the 
survivor. I think it impossible to carry this evidence to anything like proof 
as to which was the survivor. I give the medical gentlemen most entire credit 
for speaking scientifically and, as they believe, quite accurately. I do not 
think that they themselves even are very confident. Indeed, it is idle, when 
you are calculating and reasoning @ priory in this way, as to which of two 
people may have breathed a few seconds the longest at the bottom of the sea ; 
for that is all it comes to. To think that one can take that as establishing 
the fact seems to me to be quite misunderstanding the nature of human testi- 
mony. The medical men may be quite right in the observations they have 
made of persons dying from asphyxia; that such and such results follow; that 
there is a small interval, of perhaps half a minute, after sensation has ceased, 
in which life still continues; and I think they say that that is, as far as their 
observation goes, uniform in all states of health and in all states of strength. 
I dare say that may be very learned and probably accurate, as far as science 
enables us to form such an opinion; but, happily, the instances of such events 
cannot have been sufficiently numerous to have enabled anybody to have formed 
at all an accurate and certain conclusion on such a difficult subject ; and I 
confess that I rose from the perusal of their evidence utterly unconvinced that 
those gentlemen can tell us which of these two persons died first ; that is to 
say, which of them died first if they had both been taken and quietly sub- 

949 


§ 1288] SURVIVORSHIP. [BOOK VIII. 


merged to the bottom of the sea. But when you add to that, that they are 
all violently thrown by one blast from the side of the ship, and may have - 
fallen against some spars (for from what we know that may have been so), 
and then in the whirlpool and confusion of the moment to pretend that you 
can come to any conclusion on which you can act, that these medical gentle- 
men are right in supposing the wife did die a few seconds before the husband, 
seems to me to be confusing and confounding the province of human testi- 
mony. I must say that I come to a conclusion upon the assumption that we 
cannot tell which of these two persons died first. That is the conclusion at 
which the Master of the Rolls arrived. In the report certain words are attri- 
buted to the Master of the Rolls. Ido not mean to say that reporters are 
not accurate in taking down judge’s words. It may be that judges use inac- 
curate words, or that the words are not distinctly understood as used; but I 
have, from personal communication, ascertained what he meant to say. He 
is represented in one passage to have said, he must assume they both died 
together. All he meant was—and I know he was not aware he ever used 
such an expression, but, if he did, all he meant was—that the property must 
be distributed just as it would have to be distributed if they had both died at 
the same time, punctum temporis; that there was not a practical difference 
between them, not that any person may assume it to be proved or probable or 
possible. That two human beings should cease to breathe at the same moment 
of time is hardly within the range of imagination. I suppose that time, like 
space, is infinitely divisible; and if we are to speculate on such a subject, one 
can hardly suppose that the one did not breathe a millionth part of a second 
longer than the other. Therefore, to adjudicate on a principle that they did 
actually cease to breathe at the same moment would, I think, be proceeding 
on false data. The real ground to proceed on is, that it cannot be proved 
which died first; they both probably died within a few seconds of each other, 
but which died first it is impossible to say. That being so, what is the result? 
Why, here is a will made in which in one state of circumstances, namely, that 
if the wife died in the husband’s lifetime, the property is given away. It is 
not proved that that state of circumstances existed, and in no other state of 
circumstances is it given away. Then it is not given away at all. Therefore, 
it is to be taken as upon an intestacy, and must be distributed amongst the 
next of kin.” 

§ 1237. 2d. Asphyxia.—Where the parties are in the same circumstances, 
the female is presumed to have survived the male, from the fact that women 
consume less oxygen than men, and hence can exist longer on the same amount 
of air. In poisoning by carbonic acid gas, the chances of survivorship are with 
the female. In 19 out of 360 cases of asphyxia by carbonic acid, which took 
place in Paris during 1834 and 1835, a man and woman were asphyxiated 
together ; of these, three only were saved ; and these three were females. 

§ 1238. 3d. Heat.—The young and old bear heat better than those in the 
prime of life. The difference between the sexes in the capacity to endure heat 
is not well ascertained. Fodere relates a case where an Englishman and his 
daughter of seven years of age, crossed the desert of Syria to the Persian 

950 


BOOK VIII. ] SURVIVORSHIP. | [§ 1241 


Gulf, each being in precisely the same circumstances; the father perished, but 
the child reached her journey’s end in safety.(/) 

§ 1239.. 4th. Cold.—Middle aged men endure cold much better than young 
children or old persons. Men bear cold better than women. The amount of 
clothing and state of health of the parties is to be taken into consideration. 
Where spirituous liquors are taken in excess, they make the cold more intolera- 
ble; but if taken in moderation, they help to resist its effects. 

§ 1240. 5th. Starving.—The aged require less nourishment than adults, and 
adults less than children, so that the probability of survivorship is in favor of 
the more aged of different persons, where death is from starving. Corpulent 
persons also are apt to live longer than those of emaciated frames. Where 
one person has had access to water, this is presumed to have prolonged his 
life. Active exertion to escape from the perils of their situation hastens the 
hour of death, so that those who possess the most passive endurance are sup- 
posed to live the longest. 

§ 1241. On Friday the 13th of April, 1856, the mines known as the Blue 
Rock Coal Mines, situated on the west bank of the Muskingum River, in Har- 
rison township, Muskingum.Co., Ohio, fell in. At the time of the catastrophe 
some twenty persons were at work, of whom all but four succeeded in making 
their escape. The names of the four who were imprisoned in the mine were 
William Edgell, James Pearson, James Gatwood, and Edward Savage. 
Edgell was twenty years old, Pearson thirty-three, Gatwood twenty-two, and 
Savage sixteen. They were working at the time in a well-defended portion 
of the mine, and consequently escaped any immediate injury. After satisfying 
themselves that there was no prospect of an early escape from their confine- 
ment, they established themselves in one of the compartments scarcely large 
enough to contain them all, and made preparations to die together, after their 
means for sustaining life should be exhausted. The only food they had with 
them were the dinners for two persons that had been left by some of the other 
hands. ‘This was shared between them, and made two scanty meals. They 
were all thinly clothed, none of them having more than a shirt and pair of 
trowsers, and the sleeves of their shirts had been torn off, as is customary with 
miners, to prevent them from interfering with their work. Two of the men, 
however, succeeded in finding jackets that afforded some warmth to the upper 
part of their bodies. ‘They were well supplied with oil, but after their lamps 
had been replenished some nine or ten times, they ceased to burn, and the 
miners were left intotal darkness. In this condition of things the men, huddled 
together upon a bed of dirt, forced to take turns in occupying the middle posi- 
tion as the only place of comfort, suffering intense anguish from hunger and 
cold, looked forward to death as their only escape. The water which they 
had with them soon gave out, when very fortunately they found not far off a 
reservoir of water strongly impregnated with copperas. The supplies of this, 
which they kept constantly by them, seemed to afford considerable nourishment, 
and were undoubtedly the means of preserving their lives. The intense pains 
of hunger which affected them the first two or three days afterwards in a great 


(j) Guy’s Med. Jur. 401, 
mE Ly | 


§ 1245] SURVIVORSHIP. [BOOK VIII. 


measure disappeared, attributable, as the men thought, to their liberal use of 
the copperas-water. They were all of them delirious at different times, expe- 
riencing the dreams and visions of tempting food that so often accompany 
starvation. ‘The oil which they had with them was used on two occasions for 
nourishment, but proved so nauseating that it was not again tried. They re- 
mained in this condition, gradually growing weaker, but still all of them able 
to stir about, until after two weeks had elapsed, when they were rescued by 
their fellow workmen and neighbors, having been entombed in their prison 
fourteen days and thirteen hours. 

§ 1242. As indicating one of the effects of the copperas-water, and as one 
of the elements in this remarkable prolongation of life, it may be observed 
that the sufferers were “‘ constipated during the entire time of their imprison- 
ment. After their rescue a healthful action was restored by means of clysters, 
and with no great difficulty.” 

“Considering all things,” is a statement made in a pamphlet report of the 
condition of the parties when brought out, “ Edgell looks remarkably well ; 
being a fleshy young man; he is not much emaciated. Pearson, and the boy 
Savage, are somewhat reduced; Gatwood very much so and very weak.” 

§ 1243. 6th. Poison.—Dissection alone gives here very little aid. The 
marks on the body are often the most unequivocal in cases where the suffering 
was the longest protracted. Cases are well known in which one person gave 
another poison, and afterwards took it himself, and in which the giver sur- 
vived. 

§ 1244. 7th. Crushing or burying alive.—Here again we fall back on the 
general consideration of the age, the corporeal energy, the sex, and the posi- 
tion of the corpse. Younger persons, in this kind of death, survive the older. 
After the Calabrian earthquake, the children who were buried alive were found 
to have survived their parents. Where the question is of continued respira- 
tion, the presumption of survivorship is with children, with whom loss of 
breath can be longest borne. So also when the lungs are sound, in which 
case a longer living will be presumed than where the lungs are weak, so as to 
have difficulty in obtaining the necessary air. Men are supposed, from this 
reason, in such cases. to survive women, though this has been much contro- 
verted. (%) 

Signs of struggling at extrication indicate a longer continuance in life than 
where the deceased appears to have at once succumbed. 

§ 1245. 8th. Childbirth._—Where the mother and child have both perished 
in childbed, the presumption is that the mother survived, for there is prima 
facie evidence of stillbirth, and a still stronger probability that the mother 
was unable to render the child any assistance towards its preservation, and 
hence the chlid woul ddie first. A case is mentioned(/) where the succession 
to a large landed estate was thus involved. The mother and child both died 
during delivery. If the latter survived, the father was entitled to the property, 
but if the former, her relatives were entitled to it. It was proved, on trial, 


(k) See Henke’s Zeitschrift, B. 75, s. 117. 
(1) Beck’s Med. Jur. 11th ed. p. 638. 


BOOK VIII. ] SURVIVORSHIP. [$ 1247 


that the child was born alive, when the question was decided, that the child 
was the survivor. . 

When a mother died of a nervous attack, during, but before the birth, and 
when the child was in a good position, and there was no mechanical hindrance 
to the birth, the survivorship was ascribed to the child.(m) 

That an unborn child can survive its mother, and even live when cut from 
her body after her death, is proved by many cases.(n) Cases even remain on 
record in which, after the execution, by hanging or otherwise, of pregnant 
women, children, at the distance of one day, were taken alive from their 
bodies. 

§ 1246. 9th. Wounds.—Questions under this head very rarely arise. As 
an illustration, we may give the following :-— 

Dr. Casper, in the 1857 edition of his Handbook of Judicial Medicine, 
supposes the following case. A. is killed by the thrust of a sabre on the head, 
B. by that of a bayonet in the heart, and ©. by a shot which has torn 
open the jugular vein. Here the presumption would be that B. died first ; 
that C. bore the loss of blood a little longer; and that A. resisted the deadly 
influence of the blow the longest of the three. 

§ 1247. ILI. Tests where bodies are found dead.—Where the wounds, in 
case of violence, are the severest, there the earlier death is. presumed. 

Stiffness, coldness, discoloration, degree of putrefaction, are all to be taken 
into account. 

As to stiffness, there are many minor distinctions to be observed. The pro- 
cess of stiffening is greatly affected by the age of the deceased, and by the 
prior state of his body. Was he strong and muscular, or meagre and feeble ? 
With persons of powerful muscles, this stiffness is far more rigid than with 
those of weaker frame. The stiffness gives way after very varied intervals 
to that suppleness and softness which is the preliminary of putrefaction. 
Generally, it is not observable after corruption is begun, which is mostly 
earlier in cases of poisoning, and death by drowning and lightning. 

The process is hastened by lethal causes which act on the brain, and delayed 
by those which are accompanied by the loss of blood. 

Where corruption has proceeded furthest, there the death can be presumed 
to have been earliest. 


(m) Henke’s Zeitschrift, B. 75, s. 109. (n) Ibid. 
955 


BOOK IX. 
MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. 


Fas BO: Wa fae Bi Oe Ss 
CIVIL LAW PRACTICE. 21248. 


CHAPTER II, 


COMMON LAW PRACTICH. 


I. In CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS, § 1252. 
II. Iy actions For Torts, § 1273. 


Ba Me ys abl Blas ps be 
CIViILeLAW PRACTICE: 


§ 1248. According to the civilians, where the practice of the attending 
physician is called in question, the prosecution must show, Ist, that the injury 
to the health or body resulted from bad treatment of the case by the physician 
or surgeon in attendanee; and 2d, that this evil result might have been cer- 
tainly foreseen and avoided by a competent practitioner. The answer to this 
latter question will be affected by the position of medical science at the time, 
and often by the peculiar circumstances of the case.(a) 

§ 1249. Malpractice can only be affirmed where the physician has set aside 
established principles, and neglected to employ means which are universally held 
to be necessary in the given case. But before the physician can be reckoned 
guilty of malpractice on account of such deviation, it must be established— 

1. That the following of the rules prescribed by medical science for the cure 
of the disease never proves detrimental. 

2. That there is, at least, the greatest probability that the following of the 
rules would accomplish the desired end. 

3. That the great majority of medical authorities approve the rules. 

§ 1250. In the treatment of internal diseases, the physician, according to 
both Casper and Bocker, can never be held guilty of criminal carelessness for 
failing to use any particular remedy, since there is never any remedy upon 


(a) Bocker, Gericht. Med. § 58, &c. 
954 


BOOK IX.] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [§ 1252 


which all authorities are agreed, and since it is always possible that the patient 
may recover without the use of such remedy. This uncertainty of remedies 
extends even to the antidotes recommended for various poisons. Even where 
the antidote produces a favorable effect, it can never be certainly determined 
how much of this effect is due simply to the action of the antidote. Besides, 
many antidotes have been recommended merely upon theoretical grounds, some 
of which are known to be actually injurious. But when it can be proven that 
there is great probability that the injurious effects of a poison might have 
been prevented by the use of a certain antidote, the physician is guilty of 
criminal carelessness when not employing it. 

€ 1251. It is asserted by Casper that a physician ‘‘should be liable to pun- 
ishment if in a given case he departs entirely from the treatment which the 
great majority of physicians of his time adopt in such cases, and which the 
- great majority of medical authorities recommend for such cases.”’ Great diffi- 
culty might arise from this test. It would be impossible, for instance, for a 
physician to stop to inquire, in any given case, what is the practice of the ma- 
jority of his contemporaries ; and if he should, he has often no means of answer- 
ing the question. 

This principle would also render all homceopathists liable to punishment. 
Besides, it would be impossible to collect the views of the great majority of 
authors upon the given case. Many will not have noticed the particular case 
in point, and much difference of opinion will be found among those who have. 

In America, in consequence of these doubts, the opinion has been laid down 
that if a physician gives himself out as acting on a particular basis, and is 
employed by persons knowing that this is the case, he is at least not civilly 
responsible to them because his views do not accord with those of what are 
called regular practitioners.(d) 


Os Dory lite 


COMMON LAW PRACTICE. 


I. In Criminal Prosecutions. 


§ 1252. The accountability of medical men has been a fruitful source of 
lego-medical discussion, and in early times was the subject of much variety of 
judicial, as it is still of popular, sentiment. At one time, so great was the 
rigor with which the courts were disposed to treat irregular practitioners, that 
it was held that while if a potion or plaster administered bona fide by a 
licensed physician or surgeon unexpectedly killed the patient, this was but mis- 
adventure, yet if the defendant was not a regular physician or surgeon he was 
guilty of manslaughter.(c) Thus, where an old woman, who sometimes dealt 
in medicines, gave to a party asking for an emetic, a solution of white vitriol, 
which caused his death, Bayley, J., said: ‘I take it quite clear that if a person, 


(b) Bowman v. Woods, 1 Iowa, 441. 
(c) Brit. C. 5; 4 Inst. 251; Wilcock’s L. Med. Prof. Append. 227. 
955 


§ 1253] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [BOOK IX, 


not of medical education, in a case where professional aid might be obtained, 
undertakes to administer medicine which may have a dangerous effect, and 
thereby occasions death, such person is guilty of manslaughter. He may have 
no evil intention, and may have a good one; but he has no right to hazard 
the consequence in a case where medical assistance may be obtained; if he 
does so, it is at his peril.”” The prisoner was convicted.(d) But even as far 
back as Lord Hale, the distinction between regular and irregular practitioners 
began to be doubted, and that learned but quaint judge did not hesitate to 
ascribe to the doubt greater antiquity than the doctrine, since, as he said, it 
was clear that physic and salves were in use before physicians and surgeons. (e) 
And now, in England and in this country, the great weight of authority is 
that no such distinction exists. ‘ 

From the leading cases, which will be presently given in full, the following 
propositions may be extracted :— 

1. If the defendant acted honestly, and used his best skill to cure, and it does 
not appear that he thrust himself in the place of a competent person, it makes 
no difference whether he was at the time a regular physician or surgeon or not. 

2. To constitute guilt, gross ignorance or negligence must be proved. 

3. A defendant who, with competent knowledge, makes a mistake in a 
remedy, is not answerable; but it is otherwise when a violent remedy, shown © 
to have occasioned death, is administered by a person grossly ignorant, but 
with average capacity, in which case malice is presumed in the same way that 
it is presumed when a man compos mentis lets loose a mad bull into a tho- 
roughfare, or casts down a log of wood on a crowd. 

4, Where competent medical aid can be had, the application of violent 
remedies, by an ignorant person, though with the best motives, involves him 
in criminal responsibility. 

5. Express malice, or an intent to commit a personal or social wrong, 
makes the practitioner criminally responsible in all cases of mischief. 

§ 1253. In 1807, before Lord Ellenborough, Chief Justice of the King’s 
Bench, John Williamson, a man midwife, seventy-five years of age, who was 
shown to have been in the habit of acting as such among the lower classes of 
people, though not a regularly educated accoucheur, was tried for the murder 
of Ann Delacroix, of Westminster. From the evidence of the female nurse, 
it appeared that the deceased had been delivered by the prisoner on Friday, 
September 17th, of a male child, and on the following Sunday was attacked 
with a prolapsus utert. This was mistaken by the prisoner for a remaining 
part of the placenta, which had not been brought away at the time of delivery ; 
and upon attempting to tear away the prolapsed uterus by force, he lacerated 
the uterus and caused the death of the patient. It was proved on the one 
hand, by a number of medical witnesses, that there must have been great want 
of skill in the prisoner, and on the other, by several women whom he had 
delivered, that he always acted with kindness and attention, and, as far as they 
could judge, with skill. The prisoner, in his defence, said that he had acted 
according to the best of his judgment. Lord Ellenborough took from the 


(d) R.,v. Simpson, 4 C. & P. 407. % (e) 1 Hale, 429. 
956 


BOOK IX.] COMMON LAW PRACTICE. [§ 1254 


jury the question of murder, and in submitting to them that of manslaughter, 
said: ‘To substantiate that charge, the prisoner must have been guilty of 
criminal misconduct, arising either from the grossest ignorance or the most 
criminal inattention. One or other of these is necessary to make him guilty 
of that criminal negligence and misconduct which are essential to make out a 
case of manslaughter. It does not appear that in this case there was any want 
of attention on his part; and from the evidence of the witnesses on his behalf, 
it appears that he had delivered many women at different places, and from this 
he must have had some degree of skill.(/) It would seem that having placed 
himself in a dangerous situation, he became shocked and confounded. I think 
that he could not possibly have committed such mistakes in the exercise of his 
unclouded faculties; and I own that it appears to me, that if you find the 
prisoner guilty of manslaughter, it will tend to encompass a most important 
and anxious profession with such dangers as would deter reflecting men from 
entering into it.” The result was an acquittal.(g) 

§ 1254. In 1829, an unlicensed practitioner, named Van Butchell, was 
indicted for manslaughter, by thrusting “a round piece of ivory into and up 
the fundament and against the rectum of the deceased, William Archer, 
thereby making one perforation, laceration and wound, of the length, &c., in 
and through the rectum of the said William Archer.”’ It was proved by Mr. 
Lloyd, an eminent surgeon, that he opened the body of the deceased, and found 
a portion of the zlewm adherent to the rectum, and that on separating this 
adhesion, he discovered a small hole perforated through the rectum. Upon 
cross-examination he said that operations must sometimes fail, notwithstand- 
ing they might be skilfully performed ; and he added that he himself had ope- 
rated in extracting an encysted tumor from the breast of a woman at a time 
when she was pregnant, and who soon afterwards died; and he and many 
other surgeons thought that correct practice, though he admitted that the 
propriety of the operation was doubted by others. The counsel for the defence 
offered to prove that the defendant had a regular medical education, when Hul- 
lock, B., said that this was not material, and in summing up said: ‘‘ This is 
an indictment for manslaughter, and I am really afraid to let the case go on, 
lest an idea should be entertained that a man’s practice is to be questioned 
whenever an operation fails. In this case there is no evidence of the mode in 
which this operation was performed ; and even assuming for the moment that 
it caused the death of the deceased, I am not aware of any law which says 
that this party can be found guilty of manslaughter. It is my opinion that 
it makes no difference whether the party be a regular or an irregular surgeon. 
Indeed, in remote parts of the country many persons would be left to die, if 
irregular surgeons were not permitted to practise. There is no doubt that 
there may be cases where both regular and irregular surgeons might be liable 
to an indictment, as there might be cases when, from the manner of the opera- 
tion, malice might be inferred. All that the law books have said has been 


(f) In a subsequent reference to this same case it is stated that he had attended 
the deceased in seven previous confinements with success, and that he attended in this 
instance at her request. 4 Car. & P. 398. 

(g) R. v. Williamson, 3 C. & P. 635, note. 


957 


§ 1255] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [BOOK IX. 


‘read to you, but they do not state any decisions, and their silence in this 
respect goes to show what the uniform opinion of the lawyers has been upon 
this subject. As to what is said by my Lord Coke, he merely details an 
authority, a very old one, without expressing either approbation or disappro- 
bation ; however, we find that Lord Hale has laid down what is the law upon 
this subject. This is copied by Mr. Justice Blackstone, and no book in the 
law goes any further. It may be that a person not legally qualified to prac- 
tise as a surgeon may be liable to penalties, but surely he cannot be liable to 
an indictment for felony. It is quite clear you may recover damages against 
a medical man for want of skill; but, as my Lord Hale says, ‘God forbid that 
any mischance of this kind should make a person guilty of murder or man- 
slaughter.’ Such is the opinion of one of the greatest judges that ever 
adorned the bench of this country, and his proposition amounts to this, that 
if'a person, bona fide and honestly exercising his best skill to cure a patient, 
performs an operation which causes the patient’s death, he is not guilty of 
manslaughter. In the present case no evidence has been given respecting the 
operation itself. It might have been performed with the most proper instru- 
ment, and in the most proper manner, and yet might have failed. Mr. Lloyd 
has himself told us that he performed an operation the propriety of which 
seemed to have been a sort of vexata questio among the medical profession ; 
but still it would be most dangerous for it to get abroad, that if an operation 
performed by either a licensed or unlicensed surgeon should fail, that surgeon 
would be liable to be prosecuted for manslaughter. I think that in point of 
law this prosecution cannot be sustained; and I feel bound to say, that no 
imputation whatever ought to be cast upon the gentleman who is now at the 
bar in consequence of anything that has occurred.” The prisoner was 
acquitted. (h) 

§ 1255. In 1830 and 1831, John St. John Long, who had acquired great 
popular celebrity as a practitioner in cases of consumption, even among the 
more aristocratic and educated portions of London society, was tried on two 
successive indictments for manslaughter. In the first case the indictment 
charged him with sponging the back of Catharine Cashin with an inflammatory 
and dangerous liquid, which produced inflammation and consequently death. 

It appeared from the evidence of Mr. Sweetman, a surgeon, that two of the 
family of Mrs. Cashin had died of consumption ; but that Miss Cashin, who 
was twenty-four years of age, had enjoyed good health ; and that Mr. Long told 
him that he (Mr. L.) had informed a young lady that unless Miss Cashin put 
herself under his care she would die of consumption in two or three months ; 
and that, on this being communicated to Mrs. Cashin, she placed her daughter 
under Mr. Long’s course of treatment, hoping to prevent her having a con- 
sumption. Mr. Sweetman also stated, that Mr. Long told him that he rubbed 
a mixture on different parts of the bodies of his patients, and that this had 
been applied to Miss Cashin. It was proved by Mrs. Roddis, who was also 
a witness for the prosecution, that she, on Friday, the 13th of August, went 
with Miss Cashin to Mr. Long’s, respecting a wound on her back, and that 


(h) R. v. Van Butchell, 3 C. & P. 629. 
958 


BOOK IX. | COMMON LAW PRACTICE, [$ 1256 


Miss Cashin then inhaled ; and that on the next day Mr. Long examined Miss 
Cashin’s back, and said it was in a beautiful state, and that he would give one 
hundred guineas if he could produce a similar wound on the persons of some 
of his patients. Mrs. Roddis stated that she directed Mr. Long’s attention to 
a part of the wound which was of a darker appearance, and that he stated 
that this proceeded from the inhaling; and that, unless those consequences 
were produced, he could expect no beneficial result. The wound, at this time, 
was about five or six inches square. Mrs. Roddis further stated, that Miss 
Cashin was suffering much from sickness, and that she mentioned this to Mr. 
Long, who said that it was of no consequence, but, on the contrary, a benefit ; 
and that those symptoms, combined with the wound, were a proof that his 
system was taking due effect; and that on Sunday, the 15th, Miss Cashin, 
having got worse, Mr. Long said that in two or three days she would be in 
better health than she had ever been in her life, and spoke very confidently — 
that the result of his system would be to prolong her life; and that no person 
could be doing better than Miss Cashin was. At this interview Mrs. Roddis 
showed Mr. Long the wound on Miss Cashin’s back, which had extended. 
Mrs. Roddis also stated that Mr. Long, on Sunday, the 15th, was desired to 
do something to stop the sickness of Miss Cashin, but that he said he had a 
remedy in his pocket which he would not apply, as he knew that the sickness 
had been beneficial ; and he also stated on that day, and on Monday, the 16th, 
that Miss Cashin was doing uncommonly well. On Tuesday, the 17th, she 
died. 

§ 1256. It was proved by Mr. Brodie, the surgeon, that he saw Miss Cashin 
on Monday, the 16th, and that her back was extensively inflamed, as large as 
a plate; and that, in the centre, was a spot as large as the palm of his hand, 
black and dead, which was in a sloughing or mortified state. Mr. Brodie 
stated that he did not consider Miss Cashin to be in any immediate danger, 
and that he thought that some very powerfully stimulating liniment had been 
applied to her back. In his cross-examination, he said that it was very com- 
mon to produce a counter-irritation, and that the things used to make that 
produce different effects on different constitutions; but, in re-examination, he 
stated that applying a lotion of a strength capable of causing the appearances 
he saw, to a person of the age and constitution of the deceased, if in perfect 
health, was likely to damage the constitution and produce disease and danger. 
Mr. Brodie also stated, that the appearances on Miss Cashin’s back were quite 
sufficient to account for her death. Several medical men who had examined 
the body of the deceased stated that, on the most careful examination, they 
could not discover any latent disease, or seeds of disease. A servant of Mr. 
Long, named Ann Dyke, proved that, on the 3d of August, she, by the direc- 
tion of Mr. Long, rubbed Miss Cashin’s back with a liquid, but that she did 
not know what the liquid was. In her cross-examination, she stated that Mr. 
Long had a great many patients, many of them persons of rank, and that she 
rubbed Miss Cashin with the same liquid that was used for the other patients. 
The witness stated that the Marchioness of Ormond and Lady Harriet Butler 
were at Mr. Long’s at the same time as Miss Cashin, and that the same lotion 
was applied to them, and also to Mrs. Ottley, and many others. 

959 


§ 1258] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [ BOOK IX. 


§ 1257. For the defence, twenty-nine witnesses were called, including the 
Marchioness of Ormond and Mrs. Ottley, who stated that they had been 
patients of Mr. Long, and that they were satisfied with his skill and diligence. 
One of the witnesses said, that he should never cease to pray for Mr. Long as 
long as he lived. Another (a lady) said, that she could never be sufficiently 
thankful to him for what he had done for her family. And another was a 
surgeon, who had lived in Jamaica for thirty-six years, and he expressed him- 
self perfectly satisfied with Mr. Long’s treatment and conduct. 

§ 1258. Mr. Justice Park, in summing up, said: “The learned counsel for 
the prosecution truly stated, in the outset, that, whether the party be licensed or 
unlicensed is of no consequence, except in this respect, that he may be subject 
to pecuniary penalties for acting contrary to charters or acts of Parliament. 
But it cannot affect him here. For this I have the authority of that great 
and eminent person, Lord Chief Justice Hale, who has expressly said, that, 
though physicians and surgeons, if they are not licensed, may be subject to 
penalties, yet they are not answerable criminally on that account. His phrase 
is, ‘God forbid that any mischance of this kind should make a person guilty 
of murder or manslaughter.’ And, therefore, licensed or unlicensed, certainly 
does not signify. I agree with my learned brother, that what is called mala- 
praxis in a medical person, is a misdemeanor; but that depends upon whether 
the practice he has used is so bad that everybody will see that it is mala- 
praxis. The case at Lancaster differs from this case. I have communicated 
with Lord Chief Justice Tindal, who tried that case, and he informed me that 
the man was a blacksmith, and was drunk, and was so completely ignorant of 
the proper steps, that he totally neglected what was absolutely necessary after 
the birth of the child. That certainly was one of the most outrageous cases 
that ever came into a court of justice. I would rather use the words of my 
Lord Ellenborough, in the case of Rex v. Williamson. He says, ‘that a 
medical man is not to be charged with manslaughter\unless he has been guilty 
of criminal misconduct, arising either from the grossest ignorance, or the most 
criminal inattention.’ And this is important here; for, though he be not 
licensed, yet experience may teach a man sufficient; and the question for you 
will, by and by, be, whether the experience this individual acquired does not 
negative the supposition of any gross ignorance or criminal inattention. The 
case quoted from the institutes of Lord Coke, who lived upwards of two hun- 
dred years ago, occurred at a time when there were very few cases of the kind, 
and was deemed to be a case of manslaughter. But Ido not derogate from 
his high and illustrious character, when, as far as criminal law is concerned, 
I set against it the authority of my Lord Chief Justice Hale, on whom, when 
authority is quoted, reliance is always placed. He says: ‘If a physician gives 
a person a potion without any intent of doing him any bodily hurt, but with 
the intent to cure or prevent a disease, and, contrary to the expectation of the 
physician, it kills him, this is no homicide; and the like of a chirurgeon;’ and 
he quotes the Year Book, 3 Edw. III. And he goes on to say, ‘And I hold 
their opinion to be erroneous’ (evidently alluding to my Lord Coke), ‘ who 
thinks if he be no licensed chirurgeon or physician that occasioneth this mis- 
chance, that then it is felony; for physic and salves were before licensed phy- 

960 


BOOK IX.] CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS. [§ 1258 


sicians and chirurgeons.’ And he proceeds further, and says: ‘ These opinions 
may serve to caution ignorant people not to be too busy in this kind with 
tampering with physic, but are no safe rules for a judge or jury to go by.’ I 
say the same, that the public weal is deeply interested in preventing ignorant 
persons from tampering with these subjects. It is true his next reason, about 
the want of surgeons in the country, does not apply here, because, in London, 
all persons can obtain the assistance of the best men, however poor they are. 
The question is, whether there was gross ignorance in this gentleman, or 
scandalous inattention in his treatment of this lady. The opinion of Lord 
Chief Justice Hale is recorded and adopted in Sir Edward East’s Pleas of the 
Crown, and in Mr. Justice Blackstone’s Commentaries. I come now to the 
case of Van Butchell, decided here only twelve months ago by Mr. Baron Hul- 
lock, of whom it may be said that a sounder lawyer or a stronger headed man 
never was known in the profession. I quote this case rather to show you 
what that learned person’s strong opinion was upon the general question, on 
the danger, not of punishing the man found guilty of gross negligence, but 
whether his practice can be questioned whenever an operation happens to fail. 
He says: ‘It is my opinion, that it makes no difference whether the party be a 
regular or an irregular surgeon.’ And also, ‘There is no doubt that there may 
be cases where both regular and irregular surgeons might be liable to an in- 
dictment, as there might be cases where, from the manner of the operation, 
even malice might be inferred.’ I agree with him that there may be such cases 
as those he has first mentioned; and you will have to decide, by and by, 
whether this case is one of them or not. I wish also to state to you what 
Lord Ellenborough said in the case of the King v. Williamson, which was the 
case of a man who acted as a man midwife. (His lordship here read the case 
as reported in 3 OC. & P. 635 (a), and observed): Lord Ellenborough there says, 
that, from the evidence, it appeared that the prisoner had delivered many 
women at different times, and, from this, he must have had some degree of 
skill. He goes along with me in thinking that skill may be acquired by prac- 
tice. That is my opinion here, and there are twenty-nine witnesses all speak- 
ing to the prisoner’s skill in their cases. (His lordship read the evidence, 
and then observed): There is clear proof that the prisoner did the act which 
shortened Miss Cashin’s life. But that does not prove the case, unless you 
think that there was gross ignorance, or inattention to human life to be in- 
ferred from it. It is evident he had some information; whether he drew 
improper conclusions from it, is not for you or me to say. It seems, from 
Mr. Sweetman’s evidence, that the disorder had been in the family; that a son 
was dead, and a daughter was likely to die. The prisoner always said that 
his remedy would cure consumption ; and, if the disease had not been in the 
family, they would not have sent to him at all. The prisoner’s counsel could 
not by law ask the defendant’s witnesses any questions as to their respective 
disorders, and the mode of cure, as my brother and I were of opinion that it 
was not evidence. All that was evidence was, that he has displayed so much 
skill in other cases as to show that he was not that grossly ignorant or inat- 
tentive person who could be guilty of manslaughter according to my Lord 
Ellenborough’s opinion in the case before mentioned. The refusal by the pri- 
61 961 


§ 1258] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE, [BOOK Ix. 


soner to apply the medicine in order to stop the sickness, although he had it 
with him, would, in my opinion, if wickedly done, amount to murder; but he 
mentioned a case in which sickness had been beneficial. Undoubtedly, the. 
result proves a very erroneous opinion on his part; and it seems singular that 
the restlessness and other circumstances did not awaken apprehension and call 
for further measures. But the question again recurs, whether this was an’ 
erroneous judgment of a person who was of general competency, though he 
unfortunately failed in the particular instance. It appears that he said, on 
examining the wound on Miss Cashin’s back, that he would give 100 guineas 
if he could produce a similar wound in some of his patients. This seems to 
show his confidence in his proceedings. And there is this observation to be 
made of him throughout, that he seems to have been living in a fashionable 
part of the metropolis, and attended by right honorable persons ; and it would 
be against his interest to act ignorantly and carelessly. It appears, with 
respect to Miss Cashin, that he did not go to seek her out, and this will be 
for you to take into your consideration. With respect to the application of 
the mixture, if he commanded the woman to use it, it is the same as if he used 
it himself. Perhaps, from the evidence, you will think that the act caused the 
death; but still the question recurs, as to whether it was done either from 
gross ignorance or criminal inattention. No one doubts Mr. Brodie’s skill, 
but that is not quite the question; it is not whether the act done is a thing 
that a person of Mr. Brodie’s great skill would do, but whether it shows such 
total and gross ignorance in the person who did it, as must necessarily produce 
such a result. On the one hand, we must be careful and most anxious to pre- 
vent people from tampering in physic, so as to trifle with the life of man ; and, 
on the other hand, we must take care not to charge criminally a person who 
is of general skill, because he has been unfortunate in a particular case. It is 
God that gives, man only administers medicine, and the medicine that the most 
skilful may administer may not be productive of the expected effect; but it 
would be a dreadful thing if a man were to be called in question criminally 
whenever he happened to miscarry in his practice. These are things for your 
consideration when you are considering whether a man is acting wickedly ; 
for I call it acting wickedly when a man is grossly ignorant, and yet affects to 
cure people, or when he is grossly inattentive to their safety. With respect 
to the evidence on the part of the prisoner, all the witnesses that he has called 
have spoken of him as being perfectly satisfied with his skill, attention, and 
behavior in every respect. It is observable of several of them, that, after 
their families had been attended, they put themselves under his care, so satisfied 
were they with his conduct. One of them says, that he shall pray for him as 
Jong as he lives, and another, a lady, says, she can never sufficiently thank him 
for what he has done for her family. It is also to be remarked, that one of 
these witnesses is himself a surgeon, who lived for thirty-six years in a hot 
climate, and he expresses himself perfectly satisfied. You will take the whole 
case into your consideration, and if you think there was gross ignorance or 
scandalous inattention in the conduct of the prisoner, then you will find him 
guilty; and if you do not think so, then your verdict will be otherwise.” 
962 


BOOK IX. | CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS, [$ 1260 


The jury, after some deliberation, found the prisoner guilty, and he was sub- 
sequently sentenced to pay a fine of £250 to the king.(¢) 

§ 1259. Very shortly afterwards, Long was tried before Bayley, B., Bolland, 
B., and Bosanquet, J., for manslaughter in causing the death of Colin Camp- 
bell Lloyd, wife of Edward Lloyd, by causing her to inhale certain noxious 
and injurious vapors, and sponging her breast and chest with a corrosive and 
inflammatory liquid, which produced a gangrenous sore. The witnesses called 
on the part of the prosecution, were Captain Lloyd, the husband of the de- 
ceased; Mrs. Campbell, a relation, at whose house she was staying; Mr. 
Campbell, Mr. Vance, Mr. Brodie, and Mr. Franklin, surgeons. 

§ 1260. The examination of Captain Lloyd, as stated in the report, was as 
follows: The deceased had been for several years troubled occasionally, when 
she caught cold or anything excited her, with a choking sensation in the 
throat, for which she had about three years before her death consulted a medi- 
cal man, and for which she was in the habit of applying a blister to the throat, 
and afterwards of healing the wound with a simple dressing of spermaceti 
ointment. A son of the deceased was under the care of Mr. Long; and on 
various occasions when the deceased attended with her son, she mentioned, in 
conversation with Mr. Long, the complaint she had in her throat; and the 
conversations eventually led to her putting herself under his care on the 6th 
of October, 1830, at which time she was in very good general health. On the 
3d of October she had applied a small blister to her throat, but the wound 
occasioned by it was nearly well on the 6th; on the 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th, 
she went to Mr. Long’s, and on the evening of the 10th, complained to her 
husband of a violent’ burning across her chest, in consequence of which he 
looked at it, and found a great redness across her bosom, darker in the centre 
than at other parts; she also complained of great chillness, and shivered with 
cold, and passed a very restless and uncomfortable night. On the 11th, she 
was very unwell all day, and complained of great thirst, the redness was more 
vivid, and the spot in the centre darker, round the edges white and puffed 
up, and there was a dirty white discharge from the centre. Cabbage leaves had 
been applied, and when they were removed, they appeared slimy from the dis- 
charge; the night of the 11th was passed very uncomfortably. On the morn- 
ing of the 12th, the redness on the breast and chest was, if anything, greater, 
and the spot in the centre more puffed up and darker; the redness was more 
spread round the edges, and, where it stopped, there were blisters in the skin, 
apparently from the discharge; the inner part of the arms also was very red 
where the discharge had run down on each side. On the 12th, she was very 
feverish and restless, and had no appetite, and in consequence of these symp- 
toms, Capt. Lloyd went to Mr. Long about the middle of the day ; Mr. Long 
asked why Mrs. Lloyd had not come to inhale, and go on with rubbing ; Capt. 
Lloyd replied, it was impossible, she was so very ill; that she had been con- 
stantly unwell since the night of the 10th, and was suffering a great deal of 
pain and sickness; Mr. Long said he dare say it would soon go off, it was 
generally the case. He was told of the shivering and chillness, and that some 


(i) R. v. Long, 4C. & P. 398. | 
963 


§ 1261] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [BOOK IX. 


hot wine and water had been given to relieve her; he said hot brandy and 
water would have been a better thing, and to put her head under the bed- 
clothes. He was told that the breast and chest looked very bad and very red; 
he said that was generally the case in the first instance, but it would go off as 
she got better, and that Capt. L. need not be uneasy about it, as there was no 
fear or danger; Capt. Lloyd requested him to call in the evening, and then 
told him where Mrs. Lloyd was, which it appeared he did not know before ; 
in the evening he came and saw her; in the course of the day the cabbage 
leaves had been removed, and a dressing of spermaceti ointment put on the 
chest instead. He said he was very sorry to see her so unwell, that she ought 
to have endeavored to get up and come to him, and he would have relieved 
her; she said it was impossible, she was in such pain and suffering, and with 
her breast open in that way, it might be dangerous. 

He desired to look at it, and observing the dressing, said, those greasy 
plasters had no business there, and she ought to have continued the cabbage 
leaves. She said she could not bear the pain of keeping them on. He then 
took off his great coat, and said he would rub it out; and he turned up the 
cuff of his coat as if for the purpose of doing so. She exclaimed very much 
with fright, and expressed her wonder that he should think of rubbing in the 
state her breast was in. She asked if there was no way of keeping the leaf 
on without touching the breast; and he asked her what she wished. She 
replied, ‘‘To be healed.” He said it would never heal with those greasy 
plasters, that was not the way in which he healed sores. He then asked for 
a towel, and began dabbing it on the breast, particularly in the centre, where 
the discharge came from. He said that old linen was the best thing to heal 
a wound of that kind. She said her skin and flesh were very healthy, and 
always healed immediately with the simple dressing she had used. He said 
old linen was better, but she might use the dressing if she liked, he saw no 
objection, and when it skimmed over, he would rub it again. She said no, she 
thought she could never submit to rubbing again, from what she was then 
suffering. He then went away. On the evening of the following day (the 
13th), he called again, but Mrs. Lloyd would not see him, and begged her hus- 
band not to allow him to come up; and he never saw her afterwards. She 
died on the 8th of November, just'a month and a day after she put herself 
under Mr. Long’s care. 

§ 1261. On the cross-examination of Capt. Lloyd he said, that his son con- 
tinued to attend Mr. Long for several days after the commencement of the 
deceased’s illness, and on one occasion was desired to tell Mr. Long that he 
need not come to see her, as she was better. He also added that a person 
describing himself as a medical man, and saying that he was sent by Mr. Long, 
applied to see Mrs. Lloyd, and was not allowed. He also admitted that he 
had told Mr. Long that he could not pay fees for his son until after Christmas, 
and that Mr. Long said that would not make any difference, he might send 
him and he would attend to him. Mrs. Campbell stated that Mrs. Lloyd was 
in a very good state of health, except that her throat was sometimes trouble- 
some, that she complained of a stoppage in swallowing; that on the 10th of 
October, when the shivering came on, the bed was warmed and Mrs. Lloyd put 

964 


BOOK IX.] CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS. [§ 1262 


in, and bottles of hot water were applied to her feet; and that when Mr. Long 
went away, after having seen her, he did not give any directions as to diet, or 
order her any internal medicine. It also appeared from her evidence that, 
previous to Mrs. Lloyd’s putting herself under the care of Mr. Long, she had 
attended three days at the inquest held on the body of Miss Cashin. 

§ 1262. From the examination-in-chief of Mr. Campbell, the surgeon, it 
appeared that he was the son of Mrs. Campbell, at whose house the deceased 
was on a Visit, and that he first saw the deceased about four o’clock in the 
afternoon of the 12th of October, at his mother’s desire; at which time he 
found a very extensive wound covering the whole anterior part of the chest, 
which in his opinion might be produced by any strong acid; that the skin 
was destroyed, and lay in folds on the chest, entirely separated; that the cel- 
lular tissue was partly destroyed, and there was a considerable discharge gene- 
rally ; that the wound extended nearly from one armpit to the other, and from 
the throat down to the pit of the stomach ; that the skin was off both breasts, . 
and the centre of the wound was darker and in a higher state of inflammation 
than other parts; that he removed the cabbage-leaves and applied the dressing 
of spermaceti ointment; that he saw the deceased on the 13th and afterwards 
daily, several times a day, till her death; that he considered the wound very 
dangerous to life when he first saw it, but only continued to apply the sperma- 
ceti dressing until the 21st of October, when he called in the assistance of Mr. 
Vance, who continued at first to apply the same dressing, only adding to it a 
little calamine powder ; that on the second or third day of his attendance Mr. 
Vance applied a bread and water poultice; that he (Mr. Campbell) at first 
gave Mrs. Lloyd some saline aperient medicine, and when the centre spot and 
upper part of the chest became gangrenous, which they did in about a week, 
in order to support nature she had bark, mineral acid and quinine. The wit- 
ness added that in his opinion Mrs. Lloyd died of the wound which he first 
saw; that according to his judgment it was not necessary or proper to produce 
such a wound to prevent any difficulty in swallowing; and that he did not 
know of any disease in which the production of such a wound would be neces- 
sary or proper. He further stated, that he informed Mr. Vance of the course 
he had pursued, and that nothing which he and Mr. Vance applied could 
possibly increase the danger of the patient. On his cross-examination he 
said that he had been in practice six or seven years; that in the course of his 
practice he had known a common blister often produce very injurious effects 
which the person who prescribed it never contemplated, and that a medical 
man must regulate his treatment as well by the statements of the patient as 
by external appearances; that he did not wish for any additional assistance 
till gangrene commenced, though he feared it would take place from the first ; 
and that he stated the danger he apprehended, very soon after he was called 
in, to his mother and Capt. Lloyd and a sister of the deceased, but that twice 
they had some hopes of her eventual recovery. On his re-examination he 
said that he did not consider it a case of difficulty in the treatment; that he 
was present at the post-mortem examination; and that the wound did not 
present the appearances which he had ever seen produced by a common 
blister. In answer to questions from the judge he said, that he thought 

965 


§ 1264] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [BOOK IX. 


rubbing, on the 12th of October, when he first saw the wound, would have 
increased the inflammation, and could not have been in any respect beneficial. 

§ 1263. Mr. Vance’s evidence agreed in substance with the account of the 
appearances of the wound, as given by other witnesses. He stated also that 
he approved of the treatment pursued by Mr. Campbell. He added that he 
had attended Mrs. Lloyd about three years before her death for an affection of 
the throat, which he at first thought a case of narrow cesophagus, but after- 
wards ascertained to be globus hystericus, which he described as an inverted 
motion of the muscular fibres of the canal, very common among women in 
early life, and of which he had seen many thousand cases, but never knew it 
produce death. He described the appearance of the body after death, and said 
it was internally and externally in perfect health, with the exception of a partial 
disease of the thyroid gland, and an inflammatory affection of the lining of the 
windpipe (occasioned by their contiguity to the ulcer), and a little narrowness 
at the entrance of the cesophagus, which he believed to be congenital, as there 
was no thickening of the part. He attributed the death of Mrs. Lloyd to the 
extent of the mortification caused by high inflammation, produced by some 
powerful application. On his cross-examination he said, that at one time he 
had hope, because he found the healthy and unhealthy parts were separating. 
In answer to questions from the judge he said, that the state of the wound, as 
described, on the 12th of October, might produce the result stated; that he 
thought a man of common prudence or skill would not have applied a liquid 
which in two days would produce such extensive inflammation; though all 
irritating external applications sometimes exceeded the expectations of the 
medical attendant; but he should say that such conduct was a great proof of 
rashness and ignorance. In answer to a question from a juror he stated that 
it was very difficult to say whether, if he had been called in on the 12th, he 
could have prevented the death; but, if he were to make a positive reply, he 
should say that it was not likely that he could, as it seemed to be a case of 
great peril from the beginning. 

§ 1264. Mr. Brodie stated that he saw the deceased at the request of Mr. 
Vance on the 29th of October, and saw a large sloughing ulcer, which he 
believed might have been produced by rubbing a corrosive liniment into the 
parts on the 10th of October; that he did not know of any disease which 
should lead a person to apply a liniment with the intention of producing such 
an effect. On his cross-examination, he said: ‘It is and always has been 
the practice to produce counter-irritation, and the same application may be 
beneficial to one person and injurious to another, according to the habit and 
constitution. The effect of a liniment or blister, or any other external irritant, 
as we call them, sometimes goes beyond the effect we intend, and the most 
scientific practitioner may often be deceived in his expectations; he cannot 
always calculate to a nicety. I do not recollect at this moment any instance 
in which death has ensued from a blister properly applied, but I suppose it 
may happen. I suppose over-exercise would produce over-irritation where a 
blister had been applied. In treating a wound, I should judge from the 
appearances and state of the patient; I think it would be desirable, under 
such circumstances, to know the nature of the application, but I do not think 

966 


BOOK IX.] CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS, [$ 1265 


it would lead to any great difference in the treatment. In cases of poison, we 
do not apply the same remedy, especially when it has been taken into the 
stomach. As to external applications, I do not think a surgeon would judge 
so much from what had been applied, as from the appearances. Circumstances 
may occur in which, when a particular course is intended, a stranger’s coming 
in and pursuing another and different course would produce mischief.” 

On his re-examination, he said: ‘‘In the case of such a wound as has been 
described and I saw, I should not have thought it necessary to resort to the 
person who had produced it; and I doubt whether, in this case, it would have 
led to any useful knowledge.”’ | 

§ 1265. In answer to questions from the judge, he said: “ Though I do not 
think it absolutely necessary, I should have got at the matter if Icould. Ishould 
think that the spermaceti ointment would not certainly increase the danger of 
such a wound as that described on the 12th of October. J never saw such an 
effect produced by an ordinary medical application. There are some constitu- 
tions in which very slight remedies will produce dangerous consequences. I 
have seen one person die of the bite of a leech, and another by the sting of a 
bee. JI had no means of knowing anything of this lady’s constitution. I 
should believe from the evidence I have heard of the way in which the inflam- 
mation made progress, that it proceeded rather from the nature of the appli- 
cation than from the constitution of the party ; but it may have depended on 
both. It is usual to try to ascertain the nature of the constitution. We 
cannot always do it, but in using potent remedies we use great precaution. I 
cannot form a positive opinion whether the liniment was rashly used or not, 
but the impression on my mind is, that it was used without sufficient caution, 
and, therefore, either rashly or ignorantly. I have seen many instances of 
inflammation from external application, but I never saw so extensive effect 
produced as in this instance.” 

Mr. Frankum then proved that he saw Mrs. Lloyd about before her death, 
and was present at the post-mortem examination. His opinion was that she 
was very healthy, and there was not, as far as he could judge, any peculiarity 
of constitution which would account for the violent effects produced. 

§ 1266. It was very ably argued by the counsel for the defendant, that as 
the motive was to do good, and as there was no personal advantage to be 
gained, there was no responsibility, and the older cases were cited to show that 
the court should at this stage take the case from the jury, and direct an 
acquittal. But Bayley, B., said: ‘There are, in my mind, contradictory 
authorities, and I propose, with the assent of my learned brothers, to reserve 
the point for you, if the prisoner is convicted. JI agree with my Lord Hale, 
and do not think there is any difference between a licensed and an unlicensed 
surgeon. It does not follow that in the case of either, an act done may not 
amount to manslaughter. There may be cases on which a regular medical 
man may be guilty; and that is all Lord Hale lays down. And that may be 
laid out of the question at this time. But the manner in which the act is 
done, and the use of due caution, seem to me to be material. Mr. Justice 
Foster, in his Criminal Law, p. 263, speaking of a person who happens to kill 
another by driving a cart or other carriage, says: ‘If he might have seen 

967 


§ 1268] | MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [BOOK Ix. 


the danger, and did not look before him, it will be manslaughter for want of 
due circumspection.’ But all that I mean to say now is, that there being 
conflicting authorities, and the impression of our minds not being in your 
favor, I purpose to reserve the point. As to the indictment not being sup- 
ported by the evidence, one of the allegations is that the prisoner feloniously 
applied a noxious and injurious matter. And there is no doubt, if the jury 
should be of opinion against the prisoner, that the facts proved will be suffi- 
cient to warrant their finding that the prisoner feloniously did the act. For 
if a man, either with gross ignorance or gross rashness, administer medicine, 
and death ensue, it will be felony.”” Upon the defendant’s counsel urging 
that to make out the felony a trespass must have been affirmatively proved, 
and that here there was no evidence of trespass at all, Bayley, B., said: “I 
think that if the jury shall find a given fact in the way in which I shall sub- 
mit it to them, it will constitute the crime of feloniously administering, so as 
to make it manslaughter. As, for instance, if I have the toothache, and a 
person undertakes to cure it by administering laudanum, and says: ‘I have 
no notion how much ought to be taken,’ and gives mea cupful, which imme- 
diately kills me; or, if a person presenting James’ powder, says, ‘ I have no 
notion how much ought to be taken,’ and yet gives me a tablespoonful, which 
had the same effect ; such person acting with rashness, will, in my opinion, be 
guilty of manslaughter. With respect to what has been said about a willing 
mind in the patient, it must be remembered that a prosecution is for the public 
benefit, and the willingness of the patient cannot take away the offence against 
the public.” 

§ 1267. The defendant being put upon his defence, said that the prosecution 
was in reality that of the medical gentlemen, who did not prosecute other 
medical men, but attacked him because his patients were the incurables of the 
faculty, and because he cured consumptions, which they were never able to do. 
He contended that it was not just to hold him responsible where the death 
occurred while Mrs. Lloyd was under the care of others, and neither he nor his 
medical friend were able to do anything for her. He also charged Mr. Camp- 
bell with unskilfulness in his treatment of the case, and argued that if the 
mixture had been of the injurious kind suggested, it must have produced 
mortification at a much earlier period than that in which, according to the 
evidence, it did. He also offered to prove that he had studied anatomy, and 
was acquainted with the constitution of the human frame. Of his skill and 
aceeptableness as a practitioner very strong testimony was given, to the same 
effect as on the former trial. 

§ 1268. Bayley, B., in summing up to the jury, said: ‘It matters not 
whether a man has received a medical education or not; the thing to look at 
is, whether, in reference to the remedy he has used, and the conduct he has 
displayed, he has acted with a due degree of caution, or, on the contrary, has 
acted with gross and improper rashness, and want of caution. I have no 
hesitation in saying, for your guidance, that if a man be guilty of gross negli- 
gence in attending to his patient after he has applied a remedy, or of gross 
rashness in the application of it, and death ensues in consequence, he will be 
liable to a conviction for manslaughter. There is no pretence in the present 

968 


BOOK IXx.] CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS. [§ 1269 


case for saying that there was any degree of negligence after the application of 
the liquid, because it seems that the prisoner did not know where Mrs. Lloyd 
lived ; and when he was sent for, on the 12th, he went, but was almost imme- 
diately dismissed, and was not allowed to see her afterwards. If you shall be 
of opinion that the prisoner made the application with a gross and culpable 
degree of rashness, and that it was the cause of Mrs. Lloyd’s death, then, 
heavy as the charge against him is, he will be answerable on this indictment 
for the offence of manslaughter. There was a considerable interval between 
the application of the liquid and the death of the patient; yet if you think 
that the infliction of the wound on the 10th of October was the cause of the 
death, then it is no answer to say that a different course of treatment by Mr. 
Campbell might have prevented it. You will consider these two points: first, 
of what did Mrs. Lloyd die? You must be satisfied that she died of the wound 
which was the result of the application made on the 10th of October; and 
then, secondly, if you are satisfied of this, whether the application was a felo- 
nious application. This will depend upon whether you think it was gross and 
culpable rashness in the prisoner to apply a remedy which might produce such 
effects, in such a manner that it did actually produce them. If you think so, 
then he will be answerable to the full extent.”” The defendant was acquitted.(/) 

§ 1269. Several subsequent cases occur in the English books, in which, down 
to a recent day, the doctrine was repeated that death resulting from grossly 
incautious or grossly unskilful conduct on the part of a medical practitioner, 
whether licensed or unlicensed, was manslaughter. In one case the prisoner, 
who for nearly thirty years had carried on the business of an apothecary and 
man-midwife, with a very considerable practice—having, amongst others, 
attended the deceased on the birth of all her children—was tried for man- 
slaughter, in having made use of a metal instrument, known as a veciis or 
lever, in such a way as to cause death; and it was proved by medical men, 
first, that the weapon was a dangerous one, and improper to be used at that 
stage; and secondly, that it must have been used in a very improper way, and 
in an entirely wrong direction. Coleridge, J., told the jury that it was for 
them to say whether the instrument was the cause of death, and whether it 
had been used by the prisoner with due and proper skill and caution, or with 
gross skill or gross want of attention. ‘‘No man,” he said, ‘ was justified in 
making use of an instrument, in itself a dangerous one, unless he did so with 
a proper degree of skill and caution.’’(£) In another case, where a child died 
in consequence of a corrosive plaster placed improperly on its head, Bolland, 
B., advanced a step further, saying: ‘If any person, whether he be a regular 
or licensed medical man or not, professes to deal with the life or health of his 
majesty’s subjects, he is bound to have competent skill to perform the task 
that he holds himself out to perform, and he is bound to treat his patient with 
care, attention, and assiduity.’’(7) And again, where the defendant, who was 
the agent of Morrison’s pills, administered a large quantity of them to the 
deceased, Lord Lyndhurst, C. B., after reiterating the position that in such 


.v. Long, 4 C. & P. 423. 
. v. Spilling, 2 M. & Rob. 107; S. P. Ferguson’s Cases, 1 Lew. 181. 
. v. Spiller, 5 C. & P. 333. 

969 


NON 
mS, 
VY 
oes E--) 


§ 1270] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [BOOK IX. 


eases there was no difference between the licensed and the unlicensed practi- 
tioner, said: ‘‘In either case, if a party having a competent degree of skill or 
knowledge makes an accidental mistake in his treatment of a patient, through 
which mistake death ensues, he is not thereby guilty of manslaughter ; but if, 
when proper medical assistance can be had, a person totally ignorant of the 
science of medicine takes on himself to administer a violent and dangerous 
remedy to one laboring under disease, and death ensues in consequence of that 
dangerous remedy having been administered, then he is guilty of manslaugh- 
ter.’’(m) 

§ 1270. Varying in no essential degree from the English doctrine on the 
main point, though much more liberal in its application, is that determined by 
the Supreme Court of Massachusetts in the trial for murder of Samuel Thomp- 
son, the founder of the Thompsonian system. The report states that on the 
trial it had been proven that the prisoner, some time in the preceding Decem- 
_ ber, came into Beverly, where the deceased then lived ; announced himself as a 
physician, and professed an ability to cure all fevers, whether black, gray, 
green, or yellow; declaring that the country was much imposed upon by 
physicians, who were all wrong, if he was right. He possessed several drugs 
which he used as medicines, and to which he gave singular names. One he 
called coffee ; another well-my-gristle ; and a third ram-cats. He had several 
patients in Beverly and in Salem, previous to Monday, the 2d of January, 
when the deceased, having been for several days confined to his house by a cold, 
requested that the prisoner might be sent for as a physician. He accordingly 
came, and ordered a large fire to be kindled to heat the room. He then 
placed the feet of the deceased, with his shoes off, on a stove of hot coals, and 
wrapped him in a thick blanket, covering his head. In this situation he gave 
him a powder in water, which immediately puked him. Three minutes after, 
he repeated the dose, which in about two minutes operated violently. He 
again repeated the dose, which in a short time operated with more violence. 
These doses were all given within the space of half an hour, the patient in the 
mean time drinking copiously of a warm decoction, called by the prisoner his 
coffee. The deceased, after puking, in which he brought up phlegm, but no 
food, was ordered to a warm bed, where he lay in a profuse sweat all night. On 
Tuesday morning the deceased left his bed, and appeared to be comfortable, 
complaining only of debility; and in the afternoon he was visited by the pri- 
soner, who administered two more of his emetic powders in succession, which 
puked the deceased, who, during the operation, drank of the prisoner’s coffee, 
and complained of much distress. On Wednesday morning the prisoner came, 
and, after causing the face and hands of the deceased to be washed with rum, 
ordered him to walk in the air, which he did for about fifteen minutes. In 
the afternoon the prisoner gave him two more of his emetic powders, with 
draughts of his coffee. On Thursday the deceased appeared to be comfort- 
able, but complained of great debility. In the afternoon the prisoner caused 
him to be again sweated, by placing him, with another patient, over an iron 
pan with vinegar heated by hot stones put into the vinegar, covering them at 
the same time with blankets. On Friday and Saturday the prisoner did not 


(m) R. v. Webb, 1 M. & Rob. 405. 
970 


BOOK IX.] CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS. [§ 1270 


visit the deceased, who appeared to be comfortable, although complaining of 
increased debility. On Sunday morning, the debility increasing, the prisoner 
was sent for, and came in the afternoon, when he administered another of his 
emetic powders, and in about twenty minutes repeated the dose. This last 
dose did not operate. The prisoner then administered pearl-ash mixed with 
water, and afterwards repeated his emetic potions. The deceased appeared 
to be in great distress, and said he was dying. The prisoner then asked him 
how far the medicine had got down. ‘The deceased, laying his hand on his 
breast, answered here: on which the prisoner observed that the medicine would 
soon get down and unscrew his navel; meaning, as was supposed by the hear- 
ers, that it would operate as a cathartic. Between nine and ten o’clock in the 
evening, the deceased lost his reason, and was seized with convulsive fits, two 
men being required to hold him in bed. After he was thus seized with con- 
vulsions, the prisoner got down his throat one or two doses more of his emetic 
powders, and remarked to the father of the deceased, that his son had got the 
hyps like the devil, but that his medicines would fetch him down; meaning, as 
the witness understood, would compose him. The next morning the regular 
physicians of the town were sent for, but the patient was so completely ex- 
hausted that no relief could be given. The convulsions and the loss of reason 
continued, with some intervals, until Tuesday evening, when the deceased 
expired. From the evidence it appeared that the coffee administered was a 
decoction of marsh-rosemary, mixed with the bark of bayberry bush, which 
was not supposed to have injured the deceased. But the powder, which the pri- 
soner said he chiefly relied upon in his practice, and which was the emetic so often 
administered by him to the deceased, was the pulverized plant commonly called 
Indian tobacco. <A Dr. French, of Salisbury, testified that this plant, with this 
name, was well known in his part of the country, where it was indigenous, for 
its emetic qualities ; and that it was gathered and preserved by some families, 
to be used as an emetic, for which the roots, as well as the stalks and leaves, 
were administered; and that four grains of the powder was a powerful puke. 
But a more minute description of this plant was given by the Rev. Dr. Cutler. 
He testified that it was the lobelia inflata of Linneeus ;(n) that many years 
ago, on a botanical ramble, he discovered it growing in a field not far from 
his house in Hamilton; that, not having Linneus then in his possession, he 
supposed it to be a nondescript species of the lobelia; that, by chewing a leaf 
of it, he was puked two or three times; that he afterwards repeated the 
experiment with the same effect; that he inquired of his neighbor, on whose — 
ground the plant was found, for its trivial name. He did not know of any, 
but was apprised of its emetic quality, and informed the doctor that the chew- 
ing of one of the capsules operated as an emetic, and that the chewing more 
would prove cathartic. In a paper soon after communicated by the doctor to 
the American Academy, he mentioned the plant, with the name of the lobelia 
medica.(o) He did not know of its being applied to any medical use until 


(n) Lobelia. Class Pentandria. Order Monogynia. Capsule 2 or 3 celled, corol. 
irregular, cloven; anthere united; stigma simple; species inflata; stem erect; 
leaves ovate, slightly serrate, longer than the peduncle; capsules inflated.—Turt. 
Lin. vol. iv. pp. 259, 330. 

(0) Ibid. 

971 


$1271] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. [BOOK 1X. 


the last September, when, being severely afflicted with the asthma, Dr. Drury, 
of Marblehead, informed him that a tincture of it had been found beneficial in 
asthmatic complaints. Dr. Cutler then made for himself a tincture, by filling 
a common porter bottle with the plant, pouring upon it as much spirit as the 
bottle would hold, and keeping the bottle in a sand heat for three or four days. 
Of this tincture he took a tablespoonful, which produced no nausea, and had a 
slight pungent taste. In ten minutes after he repeated the potion, which pro- 
duced some nausea, and appeared to stimulate the whole internal surface of 
the stomach. In ten minutes he again repeated the potion, which puked him 
two or three times, and excited in his extremities a strong sensation like irri- 
tation; but he was relieved from a paroxysm of the asthma, which had not 
since returned. He had since mentioned this tincture to some physicians, and 
has understood from them that some patients have been violently puked by a 
teaspoonful of it; but whether this difference of effect arose from the state of 
the patients, or from the manner of preparing the tincture, he did not know. © 
The Solicitor-General also stated that, before the deceased had applied to the 
prisoner, the latter had administered the like medicines with those given to 
the deceased to several of his patients, who had died under his hands; and to 
prove this statement he called several witnesses, of whom but oneappeared. He, 
on the contrary, testified that he had been the prisoner’s patient for an oppres- 
sion at his stomach; that he took his emetic powders several times in three or 
four days, and was relieved from his complaint, which had not since returned. 
And there was no evidence in the cause that the prisoner, in the course of his 
very novel practice, had experienced any fatal accident among his patients. 
The defence stated by the prisoner’s counsel was, that he had for several 
years, and in different places, pursued his practice with much success, and that 
the death of the deceased was unexpected, and could not be imputed to him as 
acrime. But as the court were satisfied that the evidence produced on the 
part of the commonwealth did not support the indictment, the prisoner was 
not put on his defence. 

§ 1271. The chief justice charged the jury: and the substance of his direc- 
tion, and of several observations, which fell from the court during the trial, is 
condensed by the reporter as follows :— 

‘As the testimony of the witnesses was not contradicted, nor their credit 
impeached, that testimony might be considered as containing the necessary 
facts, on which the issue must befound. ‘That the deceased lost his life by the 
unskilful treatment of the prisoner, did not seem to admit of any reasonable 
doubt: but of this point the jury were to judge. Before the Monday evening 
preceding the death of Lovett, he had by profuse sweats, and by often repeated 
doses of the emetic powder, been reduced very low. In this state, on that 
evening, other doses of this Indian tobacco were administered. When the 
second potion did not operate, probably because the tone of his stomach was 
destroyed, the repetition of them, that they might operate as a cathartic, was 
followed by convulsion fits, loss of reason, and death. But whether this treat- 
ment, by which the deceased lost his life, is or is not felonious homicide, was 
the great question before the jury. To constitute the crime of murder, with 
which the prisoner is charged, the killing must have been with malice, either 

972 


BOOK IX.] CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS. [$ 1271 


express or implied. ‘There was no evidence to induce a belief that the pri- 
soner, by this treatment, intended to kill, or to injure the deceased; and the 
ground of express malice must fail. It has been said that implied malice may 
be inferred from the rash and presumptuous conduct of the prisoner, in ad- 
ministering such violent medicines. Before implied malice can be inferred, 
the jury must be satisfied that the prisoner, by his treatment of his patient, 
was wilfully regardless of his social duty, being determined on mischief. But 
there is no part of the evidence, which proves that the prisoner intended by 
his practice any harm to the deceased. On the contrary, it appears that his 
intention was to cure him. The jury would consider whether the charge of 
murder was, on these principles, satisfactorily supported. But though inno- 
cent of the crime of murder, the prisoner may, on this indictment, be convicted 
of manslaughter, if the evidence be sufficient. And the solicitor general strongly 
urged that the prisoner was guilty of manslaughter, because he rashly and 
presumptuously administered to the deceased a deleterious medicine, which, 
in his hands, by reason of his gross ignorance, became a deadly poison. The 
prisoner’s ignorance is in this case very apparent. On any other ground con- 
sistent with his innocence, it is not easy to conceive that on the Monday evening 
before the death, when the second dose of his very powerful emetic had failed 
to operate, through the extreme weakness of the deceased, he could expect 
a repetition of these fatal poisons would prove a cathartic, and relieve the pa- 
tient ; or that he could mistake convulsion fits, symptomatic of approaching 
death, for an hypochondriac affection. But on considering this point, the 
court were all of opinion, notwithstanding this ignorance, that if the prisoner 
acted with an honest intention and expectation of curing the deceased by this 
treatment, although death, unexpected by him, was the consequence, he was 
not guilty of manslaughter. To constitute manslaughter, the killing must 
have been the consequence of some unlawful act. Now there is no law which 
prohibits any man from prescribing for a sick person with his consent, if he 
honestly imtends to cure him by his prescription. And it is not felony, if 
through his ignorance of the quality of the medicine prescribed, or of the 
nature of the disease, or of both, the patient contrary to his expectation should 
die. The death of a man, killed by voluntarily following a medical prescrip- 
tion, cannot be adjudged felony in the party prescribing, unless he, however 
ignorant of medical science in general, had so much knowledge, or probable 
information of the fatal tendency of the prescription, that it may be reasonably 
presumed by the jury to be the effect of obstinate wilful rashness at the least, 
and not of an honest intention and expectation to cure. In the present case 
there is no evidence that the prisoner, either from his own experience or from 
the information of others, had any knowledge of the fatal effects of the Indian 
tobacco, when injudiciously administered : but the only testimony produced on 
this point proved that the patient found a cure from the medicine. Tho law, 
thus stated, was conformable, not only to the general principles which governed 
in charges of felonious homicide, but also to the opinion of the learned and 
excellent Lord Chief Justice Hale. He expressly states that if a physician, 
whether licensed or not, gives a person a potion, without any intent of doing 
him any bodily hurt, but with intent to cure or prevent a disease, and, con- 
‘ 973 


§ 1273] MEDICAL MALPRACTICE, [BOOK IX. 


trary to the expectation of the physician, it kills him, he is not guilty of mur- 
der or manslaughter. If in this case it had appeared in evidence, as was stated 
by the solicitor general, that the prisoner had previously, by administering 
this Indian tobacco, experienced its injurious effects, in the death or bodily 
hurt of his patients, and that he afterwards administered it in the same form 
to the deceased, and he was killed by it, the court would have left it to the 
serious consideration of the jury, whether they would presume that the pri- 
soner administered it from an honest intention to cure, or from obstinate rash- 
ness and fool-hardy presumption, although he might not have intended any 
bodily harm to his patient. If the jury should have been of this latter opinion, 
it would have been reasonable to convict the prisoner of manslaughter at least. 
For it would not have been lawful for him again to administer a medicine of 
which he had such fatal experience. It is to be exceedingly lamented, that 
people are so easily persuaded to put confidence in these itinerant quacks, and 
to trust their lives to strangers without knowledge or experience. If this 
astonishing infatuation should continue, and men are found to yield to the 
imprudent pretensions of ignorant empiricism, there seems to be no adequate 
remedy by a criminal prosecution, without the interference of the legislature, 
if the quack, however weak and presumptuous, should prescribe, with honest 
intentions and expectations of relieving his patients.’”? The prisoner was ac- 
quitted. (p) . 

§ 1272. The more reeent American cases follow the views of Chief Justice 
Parsons, in Thompson’s case. (g) 


Il. In Actions for Torts. 


§ 1273. Where a medical man is sued in a civil court for damages for mal- 
practice, the law as held by the English and American courts may be stated as 
follows :— 

a. A physician or surgeon is only responsible for ordinary care and skill, 
and for the exercise of his best judgment in matters of doubt. He is not ac- 
countable for a want of the highest degree of skill.(7) And in determining 
whether the practitioner possesses ordinary skill, regard must be had to the 
advanced state of the profession at the time.(s) 

b. A volunteer is held to much more strict responsibility. Thus, when 
medicine was administered to a slave without the owner’s consent, the practi- 
tioner was held responsible for all the evil consequences which resulted. (¢) 
And this rule is still more strictly applied when the volunteer excludes a com- 
petent practitioner, otherwise attainable. (w) 

c. Where the law prescribes no absolute system, a physician is expected to 
practise according to the system he professes and avows. It was accordingly 


(p) Com. v. Thompson, 6 Mass. 134; and see also Fairlee v. People, 11 Il. 1. 

(q) See Rice v. State, 8 Miss. 561; Fairlee v. People, 11 Ill. 1; Holmes »v. State, 23 
Alab. 17; Wh. C. L. § 1015. 

(r) Leighton v. Sargent, 7 Fost. 460; Simonds v. Henry, 39 Maine, 155. 

(s) Slater v. Baker, 2 Wils. 359 ; McCandless v. McWha, 22 Penn. St. R. 261. 

(t) Hood v. Grimes, 13 B. Monr. 188. 

(u) Ante, § 1252, and cases cited. 


974 


BOOK IX. | COMMON LAW RULES, * [$1278 


held admissible for a defendant, in an action for malpractice, to prove that 
his treatment of the case was according to the botanic system of practice, 
which he professed, and was known to follow.(v) 

d. Such an action does not lie when it appears the plaintiff refused to co- 
operate with the practitioner, and to conform to his prescriptions. (w) 


(v) Bowman v. Woods, 1 Iowa, 441. 
(w) Leighton v. Sargent, 7 Fost. 460. 


975 


BOOK X. 


PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. 


Mr. RAWLINSON, as his motto to the Bampton Lectures of 1859, takes the 
following from Aristotle :— 


TQ mév yae Gander navra ovradss Ta Dnaexorra, Te Se Yevder tayxd Scavaver Tarndés. 


(FOR WITH THE TRUE ALL THINGS THAT EXIST ARE IN HARMONY; BUT WITH THE FALSE 
THE TRUE AT ONCE DISAGREES.) 


This conflict between the true and false arises in all cases where guilt is 
attempted to be screened by human contrivance. The mind involuntarily 
becomes its own prosecutor. It drops at each point evidence to prove its 
guilt. Hach statement that it makes—each subterfuge to which it resorts— 
each pretext it suggests—is a witness that it prepares and qualifies for admis- 
sion on trial. In this, and in the universality of the psychological truth that 
guilt cannot keep its counsel, we may find an attribute of divine justice by 
which crime is made involuntarily its own avenger. Man cannot conceal the 
topic of a great crime, either anticipated or committed. It sometimes leaps 
out of him convulsively in dreams; sometimes a false cunning leads him to 
talk about it to know what suspicions may be afloat; sometimes that sort of 
madness which impels people to dash themselves from a high tower, forces 
him to the disclosure. Even his silence tells against him; and when it does 
not, the tremor of the body supplies the place of the tremor of the mind. 
Nor can he keep peace with his associates. There is a disruptive power in a 
consciousness of common guilt, which produces a hatred so demonstrative, 
that if it does not supply the proof, it attracts the suspicion of a great wrong 
having been done. 

§ 1275. Itis proposed to discuss these psychical proofs of guilt as follows :— 


I. Prior To CRIME. 
Ist. Preparations, § 1276. 
2d. Intimations, § 1278. 
3d. Overacting, § 1284. 


II. Ar CRIME. 
Ist. Incoherence, § 1285. 
2d. Self-overreaching, § 1288. 


976 


BOOK X.] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [$ 1277 


II. ArrEer CRIME. 
1st. Convulsive confession, § 1291. 
2d. Nervous tremor, § 1307. 
3d. Morbid propensity to recur to scene and topic of guilt, § 
1314. 
4th. Permanent mental wretchedness, § 1318. 
5th. Animosity between confederates, § 1322. 


§ 1276. I. Prior to crime. Ast. Preparation.—The most astute here fail. 
Poison has to be obtained somewhere. . For domestic purposes it might be 
boldly purchased ; but the poisoner, in a vast majority of cases, is impelled to 
a more circuitous course. He buys it to kill vermin, and then gives a false 
excuse—as in a case where the prisoner pointed to a mouse which he said 
was killed by the poison, when in fact, it turned out that the mouse was not 
so killed. He places a loaded pistol on his person on a pretext which he 
takes care to announce, but which turns out in like manner to be false. There 
is, in almost every kind of crime, a swelling of the upper soil which shows the 
subterranean road which the criminal travelled. It would seem as if it were 
a germinal element of guilt that it cannot work without such memorials. The 
most adroit hand may get witnesses away from the intended spot—the greatest : 
caution may be shown in the purchasing, the collecting or the fashioning of 
instruments—but still the traces remain, ready to increase the presumption, 
if not the positive material for conviction. 

§ 1277. At the Shrewsbury races, in November, 1856, appeared two young 
men, each of whom had large stakes involved—in each case those of life and 
death. Polestar, one of the horses entered, belonged to John Parsons Cook; 
a sporting character and spendthrift, and not much besides. He had inherited 
a considerable estate, but a large portion of this had gone in dissipation, and 
now, the result of the race was to decide whether the remnant was to be 
doubled or destroyed. Watching him pretty closely, though with an off-hand 
familiarity which required an experienced eye to penetrate, was William Pal- 
mer, a man several years his senior, whose fortune, which had also been con- 
siderable, was now entirely gone.’ The ‘ Chicken”? was Palmer’s horse, and 
on this he had ventured enormous bets. But he hada double game. Ruin, 
it is true, was imminent, but there was a method of escape. He was a medical 
man, and he had discovered the fatal properties of strychnine—how that it 
produced a disease scarcely to be ‘distinguished from lock-jaw—how it could 
be administered without exciting the victim’s attention—what was the mini- 
mum dose necessary to take life, and how, when this dose alone was adminis- 
tered, the poison was dispersed, leaving no traces behind. He had a book in 
which these points were stated, and to make himself certain, he not only 
turned down the book at the place, but made a memorandum giving the sub- 
stance in his note-book. He was a man of the world, and he made himself, 
without appearing to do so, thoroughly master not only of Cook’s confidence, 
but of his secrets. He knew that Cook had a disease which produced sores 
on the tongue which might be considered, if talked about in the right light, 
as the cause of lock-jaw, so he proceeded to tell about them in this light. He 
knew how to imitate hand-writing.. So he wrote a paper by which Cook 

62 977 


§ 1278 PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


acknowledged himself his debtor in a sum sufficient to absorb all Cook’s 
effects. “ Polestar’? won and “Chicken”? was beaten. Palmer, in his care- 
less, sporting way, borrowed Cook’s winnings to pay his losses. Then every- 
thing was ready to poison Cook, and the work was done with complete cool- 
ness and success. A little preliminary sickness was induced, during which 
nothing could be more kind and yet less officious than Palmer’s attentions. 
It is true the strychnine had to be bought, but this was done in a circuitous 
way, and under a false color. Then it had to be administered, but two medical 
men, of undoubted probity, were called in, and as they recommended pills, it 
was very easy to substitute pills of strychnine for pills of rhubarb. So Cook 
was killed, and this so subtly, that the attending physician gave a certificate 
of apoplexy. As to the post-mortem, Palmer knew it would not amount to 
much, nor did it. No strychnine was discovered, but here the nerves of Palmer 
eave way. He showed an undue fidgetiness while the examinations were 
going on. He tried to tamper with the vessels in which the parts to be ex- 
amined were placed. Then, also, the note he produced to show Cook’s in- 
debtedness to him was suspected; and then Cook’s betting book could not be 
found. This led to Palmer’s arrest. The first medical authorities in England 
proved that Cook’s death came from strychnine and nothing else. The apo- 
thecaries from whom the strychnine was bought, attracted by the discoveries, 
identified Palmer. In a dark passage he had been seen to drop something into 
a glass for the sick man, but the passage was not so dark but that he was ob- 
served. Then his note-book turned up, showing how acquainted he was with 
the poison. And upon these facts, skilful as he was, and completely as he had 
covered up his guilt from the superficial eye, he was convicted and executed. 

§ 1278. 2d. Intemations.—Intimations are to be tested by the character of 
the party from whom they emanate. In the present connection, they may be 
divided into three classes. 7 

Direct intimations are the least frequent. The coarse old feudal baron, 
over whom there was no law which would interfere to make a threat defeat 
itself—whose importance depended upon the emphasis with which he pursued 
his enemies—to whose temper deceit was intolerable—threatened dashingly, and 
performed implacably. So the Scotch clansman followed his hereditary ven- 
geance until the last of the tribe he hated was extinguished. 

Now in these cases there was neither parsimony nor insincerity in the threat, 
and no reserve in the execution. What was said was meant. It is only, 
however, in the rudest and most lawless states of society that we now find this 
phase. In a community where there is a justice of the peace, to threaten life 
is followed by a binding over to keep the peace; and such a threat, therefore, 
is rarely heard except asa bluster. Civilization, it is true, has not extracted 
the venom from homicide, but it has silenced its rattle. 

There are cases, however, where the rattle is still heard. A purpose of 
vengeance may be whispered in a friend’s ear. Among men over whom there 
is no law, in the mountain slopes or prairie sweeps to which no jurisdiction 
except that of the vigilance committee has reached—among the hunters of 
the wilderness who have preceded law, or the wreckers of the coast who have 
defied it, or the outcasts of the city who have been rejected by it—in those 

7k 


BOOK X.] THREATS. [$ 1280 


cases of domestic outrage where social usage seems to permit vengeance being 
taken into private hands—here threats may be the precursors of deeds. Des- 
peration, also, gives out the same warning; and in such cases the warning 
uttered is of real consequence. 

§ 1279. Then again a threat which may be meant merely as bravado, may 
afterwards become a real and desperate purpose. Provocation—opportunity— 
the desire to save the character from the imputation of mere bullying—may 
stiffen the attempt to frighten into an attempt to destroy. Or again, a settled 
animosity may be produced which may lead, though circuitously, to secret 
mischief. 

Taking out these exceptions, however, and assuming the case to be one of 
a man of ordinary prudence, where there is no proved settled purpose of re- 
venge, and in a community where the usual restraints of the law are applied, 
it becomes very unsafe to connect threats previously uttered by such a party 
with a recent homicide. ‘‘The tendency of such a prediction,’”’ says Mr. Ben- 
tham, “is to obstruct its own accomplishment. By threatening a man, you 
put him upon his guard, and force him to have recourse to such means of 
protection as the force of the law, or any extra-judicial powers which he may 
have at command, may be capable of affording him.’ In the case last put, it 
is not likely that the one who really accomplished a deed which would lead to 
condign punishment, was the one who publicly threatened it. 

§ 1280. Then, however, comes the ambuscade intimation. The more refined 
society becomes, the more likely is this kind of preparation to precede crime. It 
may be adopted to lull the victim. When the massacres of St. Bartholomew 
were planned, the Huguenot chiefs were invited to Paris on the pretence of the 
wedding between Henry of Navarre and Margaret of Valois. ‘This polite- 
ness of the Italian Queen is very suspicious,’’ said the more wary of them; 
“she kisses whom she would betray.’”? But they went, were caressed, and 
were massacred. 

The Admiral Coligny had been wounded by an assassin under the pay of 
the Duke of Guise. He lay helpless on his sick-bed, when Charles IX., then 
a boy of only nineteen, but thoroughly schooled by his malign mother, was 
announced. ‘The Huguenots were thoroughly aroused by the attack on the 
admiral. The preparations for crushing them, however, were not then com- 
plete. It was necessary that they should be quieted and kept together. So 
Charles entered into the admiral’s chamber, and throwing his arms around the 
aged warrior, said, ‘‘ Father, yow received the wounds, but J the sorrow.” 
Two or three nights afterwards, Coligny, hacked and helpless as he was, was 
torn from his bed and cut to pieces. Then his body was dragged through the 
streets, and at last his trunk was kicked about like a foot-ball in the presence 
and for the diversion of the young king, who had shortly before embraced it. 
‘Had it been the mother,’’ said the survivors, ‘‘we would have had suspi- 
cion; but it was only the boy.’’ Here was the Medicean mask—the very 
luxury of artifice in which Catharine of Medicis enveloped herself when 
about to commit a crime; and yet, from its very excess, it was a premonition. 
So it is that subtle guilt, in the very degree to which’ its subtlety is refined, 
gives its own warning, and at all events invokes its own retribution. For the 


“am, 979 


§ 1282] : PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


‘recoil of St. Bartholomew’s night destroyed the House of Valois far more 
effectually than did the massacre the Huguenots. Charles IX. died only a few 
years after, of a disease in which nervous horror, if not remorse, was the prime 
agent, and so did men turn from him, even in Catholic Paris, that his body 
was deserted when on its way to the grave, and was followed to St. Denis by 
only three private gentlemen. His brother, Henry III., who succeeded him, 
was the last of his race. 

§ 1281. Cowardice may work in the same way, from the fear of being 
struck back, if a face-to-face blow be attempted. So it was with James I. :— 


“‘ Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike.” 


When he was rolling the execution of the Earl of Somerset as a sweet morsel 
in his mouth, he hung about the neck and slabbered over the face of that 
unfortunate favorite. It is not that he wanted to entrap—Somerset was 
caught already. Nor did he want to prevent detection, for he afterwards 
never shrank from the moral consequence of the deed. It was merely because 
he was physically afraid to face a collision. 

Then come precautionary intimations. Of these the following may be taken 
as illustrations. - Captain Donellan was tried in Warwick, in 1781, for poison- 
ing Sir Theodosius Boughton, on whose estates his wife had a reversionary 
interest. The defendant had no doubt long formed a plan by which the deceased 
was to be removed. To exclude suspicion, the idea was thrown out long in 
advance that the latter’s health was desperate—that speedy death was certain 
—that his imprudence was constantly heaping up causes upon causes to pro- 
duce it. 

When Sir Thomas Overbury was in the Tower, and when the arrangements 
for his poisoning, under the direction of the Countess of Somerset, were made, 
the doctors, whom the countess had in pay, were careful, long before the poison 
took effect, to announce that the patient was very sick, and, indeed, “‘ past all 
recovery.”’? It was a trick to prevent surprise. 

§ 1282. Then come prophetic intimations. Those who approach a crime 
under the stress, either felt or assumed, of a supernatural decree, often move 
with the pomp worthy of so grand a mission. The muttered forebodings of 
the fanatic precede the fanatic’s blow. The assassinations of John of Leyden 
and the assassinations of Joe Smith were always ushered in by intimations, 
more or less obscure, that the intended victim had fallen under the divine ban. 
Nor can we dismiss this as mere hypocrisy. The consciousness, though only 
partially sincere, of a supernatural impulse, cannot be completely repressed. 
The Greek tragedians felt this when they made those who meditated, under 
such an impulse, a deed of blood, bear witness to their awful mission by their 
dark forebodings of misery to him they would destroy. So it was that Cly- 
temnestra stalked over the stage, relating to the sympathetic chorus the 
terrors before her-eyes and the fate by which she was driven, and so it was that 
they ejaculated back their admiring horrors. So it was with the first Napo- 
leon, with whom this sense of.the supernatural was sometimes master, some- 
times creature. He knew how to use it to overreach others; but he knew not 
how to use it without its sometimes overreaching himself. In the very face of 


980 


BOOK X. | OVERACTING: INCOHERENCE. * [§ 1285 


policy he could not always conceal within himself the decrees of destiny with 
which he supposed himself charged. Thus the death of the Duke d’Enghien 
was muttered forth by him long before the fatal arrest; and so before sovereign 
houses ceased to reign came the intimations of this vice-regent of destiny that 
the decree was about to issue. It was not mere threats—it was not ambuscade 
—it was the involuntary witness born against itself by crime acting under the 
guise of fate. | 

§ 1283. Among the vulgar these intimations are not unfrequent. Mur- 
derers, especially in the lower walks of life, are frequently found busy for some 
time previous to the act in throwing out dark hints, spreading rumors, or 
uttering prophecies relative to the impending fate of their intended victims. 
Susannah Holroyd was convicted at the Lancaster assizes of 1816, for the 
murder of, her husband, her son, and the child of another person. About a 
month before committing the crime, the prisoner told the mother of the child 
that she had had her fortune read, and that, within six weeks, three funerals 
would go from her door, namely, that of her husband, her son, and of the 
child of the person whom she was then addressing. And so, on the trial of 
Zephon, in Philadelphia, in 1845, it was shown that the prisoner, who was a 
negro, had got an old fortune-teller in the neighborhood, of great authority 
among the blacks, to prophesy the death of the deceased. (a) 

Where there is a family or local superstition, it may be invoked for the same 
purpose. Thus Miss Blandy, when her preparations for poisoning her father 
were in progress, threw out references to the supernatural music with which 
the house was pretended to be pervaded; music which, according to tradition, 
betokened a death in twelve months. 

It is in these several classes of intimations, most of them involuntary, that 
we find another instance of the self-detective power of guilt. 

§ 1284. 3d. Overacting.—Extraordinary affection is often simulated before 
a near relative is removed by poisoning. Thus, a husband is reconciled to and 
lives with his wife whom he intends to dispatch ; and a wife, as in Mrs. Chap- 
man’s case, becomes singularly demonstrative in her public attentions to her 
husband. Mary Blandy, at the time her father was writhing under poisons 
she had herself administered, garlanded him over with caresses so inappro- 
priate to his condition as to become the subject of suspicion then, and the 
items of proof afterwards. So industrious declarations of friendliness and 
fairness not unfrequently are thrown out prior to an assassination. 

§ 1285. II. At crime. Ist. Incoherence.—“ Providence,” said Mr. Web- 
ster, in his speech in Knapp’s case, “hath so ordained, and doth so govern 
things, that those who break the great law of Heaven by shedding man’s blood, 
seldom succeed in avoiding discovery. Discovery must come, sooner or later. 
A thousand eyes turn at once to explore every man, everything, every circum- 
stance, connected with the time and place; a thousand ears catch every whis- 
per; a thousand excited minds intensely dwell on the scene, shedding all their 
light, and ready to kindle the slightest circumstance into a blaze of discovery.” 

While there is on the one hand this concentration of observation, there is 


(a) Wh. Crim. Law, § 726. 
981 


-§ 1287] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


an almost unlimited multiplication of points to be observed. The criminal 
stands in the position of a country which has a coast line of indefinite extent, 
compelled to meet an adversary whose powerful and vigilant fleet commands 
the seas. There is this distinction, however, between the cases. The coast 
line may be broken without ruin, but not so the line of a criminal’s defence. 
A single false position in his plans—such, for instance, as the omission to wash 
off a blood-stain—the leaving a letter or a paper disclosing identity, in the 
room—the forgetting that snow was on the ground, by which footprints 
could be tracked—over-industry in setting up a sham defence—sudden forget- 
fulness in answering to a real and not a feigned name—is destruction. And 
yet this is the necessity of all who seek to cover up guilt. They are acting a 
part which, to be perfectly acted, requires perfect skill, perfect composure, per- 
fect foresight, perfect powers of self-transposition. Now we all know how 
impossible it is for even the most consummate actor to be true to an assumed 
character for an hour, and this under the tension of the stage. Yet this 
is required of a criminal constantly, in the lassitude of home, as well as in the 
excitement of public observation, in his chamber as well as in the court-house. 
§ 1286. Of all the great poisoners, the most stealthy and feline, we have 
been told, was the widow Zwanziger, known in history by the name of her 
last husband, the Privy-Councillor Ursinus, of Berlin. Madame de Brinvil- 
liers was an enthusiast, who poisoned with a spread and dignity of circum- 
stances which necessarily invited detection. The widow Zwanziger, on the 
other hand, slid softly about from house to house poisoning unobtrusively. 
So quiet and home-like were her attentions to the deceased—so deep and yet 
so well controlled her grief—so completely her whole deportment that of a 
tender, sober, and yet undemonstrative friend, that when her lover, who began 
to be tired of her—her husband, of whom she began to be tired—her aunt, 
whose heir she was—successively sickened and died; she was the last who 
would have been suspected of having dispatched them. Yet this most expe- 
rienced, self-disciplined, and wary of poisoners—this actress so consummate 
that to the end she played the parts of the lady of fashion, and the senti- 
mental and pietistic poetess with a perfection that showed no flaw—was care- 
less enough, when engaged in such common game as the poisoning, as if 
merely to keep her hand in, of an ordinary man-servant—to leave the arsenic 
open in a room where her intended victim, made curious by one or two abortive 
operations she had attempted on him, scented it out, carried it to a chemist, 
and established the fact that it was of the same character with the poison by 
- which she had seasoned some prunes she had been giving to him for dessert. 
§ 1287. Equally wary and artistic, though in a different line of guilt, was 
Fauntleroy, perhaps the most complete forger of modern times. He was subtle, 
reticent, accomplished, and imperturbable. In a long course of years, he per- 
fected a system of forgery, by means of which he obtained the transfer of stocks 
entered in the Bank of England, in the names of various persons, to the amount 
of £100,000. Such was the thoroughness of the fictitious accounts and false 
entries by which his forgeries were covered up, that his partners and clerks, 
as well as the bank, were deceived, and yet, at the very time he was weaving 
a veil otherwise impenetrable, he took the extraordinary step—a step unaccount- 
982 


BOOK X.] INCOHERENCE AT CRIME. [$ 1287 


able except on the hypothesis of the innate inability of the mind to act out 
with perfection any fabricated part—of keeping a private diary of his guilt, 
and executing a paper, signed with his name, and carefully put away among 
his vouchers, in which he expressly declared that guilt. 

Richard Crowninshield, of Salem, Massachusetts, was, in 1830, a young man 
of family and education. Of dark and reserved deportment, subtle and self- 
possessed, he united a depravity and malignity of heart which made crime 
natural and normal to him, with a courage of purpose, a temperance in sensual 
indulgence, and a sagacity and adroitness in the choice and in the use of 
means, which made crime easy. His tastes and temperament were such as to 
cover his tracks with almost impenetrabledarkness. ‘‘ Although he was often 
spoken of as a dangerous man, his person was known to few, for he never 
walked the streets by daylight. Among his few associates he was a leader 
and a despot.’ , | 

Joseph White, a wealthy merchant, eighty-two years of age, was found mur- 
dered in his bed, in his mansion house, on the morning of the 7th of April, 
1830. His servant man rose that morning at six o’clock, and on going down 
into the kitchen and opening the shutters of the window, saw that the back 
window of the east parlor was open, and that a plank was raised to the win- 
dow from the back yard; he then went into the parlor, but saw no trace of 
any person having been there. He went to the apartment of the maid-ser- 
vant, and told her, and then went into Mr. White’s chamber by its back door, 
and saw that the door of his chamber leading into the front entry was open. 
On approaching the bed he found the bedclothes turned down, and Mr. 
White dead ; his countenance pallid, and his night-clothes and bed drenched in 
blood. He hastened to the neighboring houses to make known the event. 
He and the maid-servant were the only persons who slept in the house that 
night, except Mr. White himself, whose niece Mrs. Beckford, his housekeeper, 
was then absent on a visit to her daughter, at Wenham. 

The physicians and the coroner’s jury, who were called to examine the body, 
found on it thirteen deep stabs, made as if by a sharp dirk or poniard, and 
the appearance of a heavy blow on the left temple, which had fractured the 
skull, but not broken theskin. The body was cold, and appeared to have been 
lifeless many hours. On examining the apartments of the house, it did not 
appear that any valuable articles had been taken, or the house ransacked for 
them ; there was a package of doubloons in an iron chest in his chamber, and 
costly plate in other apartments, none of which was missing. The first clue 
obtained to the murder was by the arrest, at New Bedford, of a man named 
Hatch, who stated, when under examination for another offence, that he had 
heard Crowninshield mutter intimations of violence towards Mr. White. Soon 
another thread was found. Mr. White was childless, and left as his legal 
representatives Mrs. Beckford his housekeeper, the only child of a deceased 
sister, and four nephews and nieces, the children of a deceased brother. He had 
executed, as was known in the family, a will by which he left by far the larger 
portion of his estate to Stephen White, one of the few children of the testa- 
tor’s brother, reserving but a small legacy to Mrs. Beckford. A daughter of 
Mrs. Beckford married Joseph J. Knapp, Jr., who, with his brother, John 

983 


§ 1288] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


Francis Knapp, were young shipmasters of Salem, of respectable family, the 
sons of Joseph J. Knapp, also a shipmaster. Shortly after the murder, the 
father received a letter obscurely intimating that the party writing the letter 
was possessed of a secret connected with the murder, for the preservation of 
which he demanded a ‘‘loan”’ of three hundred and fifty dollars. This letter 
Mr. Knapp was unable to comprehend, and handed it to his son, Joseph J. 
Knapp, who returned it to him, saying he might hand it to a vigilance com- 
mittee which had been appointed by the citizens on the subject. This the 
father did, and it led to the arrest of Charles Grant, the person writing the 
letter, who, after some delay, disclosed the following facts: He (Grant) had 
been an associate of R. Crowninshield, Jr., and George Crowninshield; he had 
spent part of the winter at Danvers and Salem, under the name of Carr, part 
of which time he had been their guest, concealed in their father’s house in Dan- 
vers ; on the 2d of April he saw from the windows of the house Frank Knapp 
and a young man named Allen ride up to the house; George walked away 
with Frank, and Richard with Allen, and on their return, George told Richard 
that Frank wished them to undertake to kill Mr. White, and that J. J. 
Knapp, Jr., would pay one thousand dollars for the job. They proposed 
various modes of doing it, and asked Grant to be concerned, which he declined. 
George said the housekeeper would be away all the time; that the object of 
Joseph J. Knapp, Jr., was first to destroy the will, and that he could get 
from the housekeeper the keys of the iron chest in which it was kept. Frank 
called again in the same day in a chaise, and rode away with Richard, and 
on the night of the murder, Grant stayed at the Halfway House, in Lynn. In 
the mean time suspicion was greatly strengthened by Joseph J. Knapp, Jr., 
writing a pseudonymous letter to the vigilance committee, trying to throw the 
suspicion on Stephen White. Richard Crowninshield, George Crowninshield, 
Joseph J. Knapp, Jr., and John F. Knapp, were arrested and committed for 
murder. Richard Crowninshield made an ineffectual attempt, when in prison, 
to influence Grant, who was in the cell below, not to testify, and when this 
failed, committed suicide. John F. Knapp was then convicted as principal, and 
Joseph J. Knapp, Jr., as accessory before the fact. George Crowninshield 
proved an alibi, and was discharged. 

§ 1288. We have here a murder coolly planned and executed by persons of 
consummate skill, and yet we find the whole scheme disclosed by the following 
incoherences :— 

a. Joseph J. Knapp, Jr., instead of retaining or destroying Grant’s letter, 
as he could readily have done, losing his presence of mind so far as to hand it 
to his father with directions to give it to the vigilance committee. 

b. Crowninshield, ordinarily so astute and reserved, letting Grant, who 
was not even an accomplice, and who therefore was not pledged by fear to 
silence, into the secret. 

ce. All the parties basing the assassination on a mistake of law, they sup- 
posing that Mr. White’s representatives, in case of his death intestate, would 
take per stirpes, whereas in fact they would take per capita; so that actually 
Mrs. Beckford, to increase whose estate the murder was committed, received 
no more by an intestacy than she would have by the will. 

984 


BOOK X.] INCOHERENCE AT CRIME, [$ 1290 


§ 1289. 2d. Self over-reaching.—The Earl of Northampton, the second son 
of Henry Howard, Karl of Surrey, was the uncle of Lady Frances Sussex, the 
wife first of the Earl of Essex, and afterwards of Robert Carr, the famous Karl 
of Somerset. Private revenge and state policy led this beautiful and brilliant 
though bad woman to desire the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury, who opposed 
her marriage with her second husband, and who held secrets which might, if 
disclosed, thwart her political ambition. She procured or promoted the com- 
mittal of Overbury to the Tower, where poison was administered to him under 
her direction. In the attempt, at least, she had as accomplices, her husband, 
and her uncle, Lord Northampton. The work was successful. The next 
effort was to conceal it. Helwysse, the Lieutenant of the Tower, was in- 
stantly to advise Lord Northampton of the result. This he did, and then 
came a letter, evidently meant to be confidential, from the Karl in reply :— 

“ Nosie Lirutenant—lIf the knave’s body be foul, bury it presently. Dll 
stand between you and harm: but if it will abide the view, send for Lidcote, 
and let him see it, to satisfy the damned crew. When you come to me, bring 
me this letter again yourself with you, or else burn it. NORTHAMPTON.”’ 

This was written early in the morning. So great, however, was the tur- 
moil in Northampton’s mind, lest the body should not be got out of sight, 
that at noon on the same day he hurries off the following :— 

“ WortHy Mr. Lizur—enant—Let me entreat you to call Indcote and 
three or four friends, if so many come to view the body, if they have not 
already done it; and so soon as it is viewed, without staying the coming of a 
messenger from the court, in any case see him interred in the body of the 
chapel within the Tower instantly. 

“Tf they have viewed, then bury it by and by; for it is time, considering 
the humors of the damned crew, that only desire means to move pity and raise 
scandal. Let no man’s instance cause you to make stay in any case, and bring 
me these letters when I next see you. 

“Fail not a jot herein, as you love y" friends: nor after Lidcote and his 
friends have viewed, stay one minute, but let the priest be ready ; and if Lid- 
cote be not there, send for him speedily, pretending that the body will not 
tarry.” : 

§ 1290. This had no signature, and was evidently meant for the eye of 
Helwysse alone. But what would the world say if the proud and great Karl 
of Northampton, the “wisest among the noble, and the noblest among the 
wise,’’ should seem to be silent when officially informed of the death of one 
with whom he and Lord Rochester (the first title of Somerset) had been on 
such intimate terms. So he writes to the Lieutenant the following artful 
letter, meant for the public eye :— 

“WortHuy Mr. LirutenANtT—My Lord of Rochester, desiring to do the 
last honor to his dee’d friend, requires me to desire you to deliver the body of 
Sir T. Overbury to any friend of his that desires it, to do him honor at his 
funeral. Herein my Lord declares the constancy of his affection to the dead, 
and the meaning that he had in my knowledge to have given his strongest 
straine at this time of the King’s being at Tibbald’s, for his delivery. I fear 

985 


~§ 1292] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK xX. 


no impediment to this honorable desire of my Lord’s but the unsweetness of 
the body, because it was reputed that he had some issues, and, in that case, 
the keeping of him above must needs give more offence than it can do honor. 
My fear is, also, that the body is already buried upon that cause whereof I 
write; which being so, it is too late to set out solemnity. 

“This, with my kindest commendations, I ende, and reste 

‘“‘'Your affectionate and assured friend, 
‘“‘H. NORTHAMPTON. 

‘“P. S. You see my Lord’s earnest desire, with my concurring care, that all 
respect be had to him that may be for the credit of his memory. But yet I 
wish, withal, that you do very discreetly inform yourself whether this grace 
hath been afforded formerly to close prisoners, or whether you may grant my 
request in this case, who speak out of the sense of my Lord’s affection, though 
I be a counsellor, without offence or prejudice. For I would be loath to draw 
either you or myself into censure, now I have well thought of the matter, 
though it be a work of charity.’’(b) 

Unfortunately for the success of the plot, both sets of letters were pre- 
served; and their inconsistency formed one of the chief presumptions in the 
remarkable trials that ensued. 

§ 1291. III. After crime. Ast. Convulsive confession.—“ The guilty 
soul,” said Mr. Webster, in a speech already quoted, ‘‘cannot keep its own 
secret. It is false to itself; or rather it feels an irresistible impulse of con- 
science to be true to itself. It labors under its guilty possession, and knows 
not what to do with it. The human heart was not made for the residence of 
such an inhabitant. It finds itself preyed on by a torment, which it dares not 
acknowledge to God or man. A vulture is devouring it, and it can ask no 
sympathy or assistance, either from heaven or earth. The secret which the 
murderer possesses soon comes to possess him; and, like the evil spirits of 
which we read, it overcomes him, and leads him whithersoever it will. He 
feels it beating at his heart, rising to his throat, and demanding disclosure. 
He thinks the whole world sees it in his face, reads it in his eyes, and almost 
hears its workings in the very silence of his thoughts. It has become his 
master. It betrays his discretion, it breaks down his courage, it conquers his 
prudence. When suspicions from without begin to embarrass him, and the 
net of circumstance to entangle him, the fatal secret struggles with still greater 
violence to burst forth. It must be confessed, it will be confessed; there is 
no refuge from confession but suicide, and suicide is confession.” 

Confessions that are voluntary are out of the range of the present discus- 
sion. Of those that are involuntary or convulsive we may take the following 
illustrations. 

§ 1292. John Whitney, a wealthy farmer of Loudonville, Ohio, was robbed 
and murdered in November, 1856. Great but unsuccessful efforts were made 
to ferret out the murderer. A man named Stringfellow, who was living at 
Loudonville at the time, was strongly suspected of the crime, but nothing 
could be fastened upon him. Stringfellow soon afterwards left the neighbor- 

(b) Amos’ Great Oyer, 173, &c. 
986 


BOOK X.] CONVULSIVE CONFESSIONS. [§ 1293 


hood, and, after an absence of two years, settled in the village of Johnstown, 
Hardin County. Here he was taken sick, and in his illness became delirious. 
It would seem that conscience was constantly at work within him, for during 
his delirium he mentioned Whitney’s name frequently, and divulged a number 
of secrets which had been long hidden in his bosom, and which left not the 
shadow of a doubt but that he was a blood-guilty man. After Stringfellow 
became convalescent, he was told of the guilty secrets he had laid bare: the 
murder was charged upon him, and he was placed under surveillance. 

Here is murder confessed in delirium. Cases of confession in dreams are 
more numerous. A person who worked in a brewery at Basle, in Switzerland, 
quarrelled with a fellow workman, and struck him in such a manner as to pro- 
duce instant death. He then took the dead body and threw it into a large 
fire under the boiling vat, where it was in a short time so completely con- 
sumed that no traces of its existence remained. On the following day, when 
the man was missed, the murderer observed that he had seen his fellow 
servant intoxicated, and that he had probably been drowned in crossing a bridge 
which lay on his way home. For seven years after no one entertainéd any 
suspicion as to the real state of the case. At the end of this time, the mur- 
derer, being again employed in the same brewery, was constantly reflecting on 
the singularity of the circumstance that his crime had been so long concealed. 
One night one of his fellow workmen, who slept with him, hearing him say in 
his sleep, “It is now fully seven years ago,” asked him, “ What was it you 
did seven years ago?” “TI put him,” he replied, still speaking in his sleep, 
“under the boiling vat.’? As the affair was not entirely forgotten, the man, 
suspecting that his bed-fellow might allude to the person who was missed 
about that time, informed a magistrate of what he had heard. The murderer 
was apprehended, and though at first denying all knowledge of the matter, 
afterwards confessed and was executed. 

§ 1293. That guilt takes the dreaming state as a peculiar site for the ex- 
ercise of its retributive retrospections, is a familiar psychological fact. ‘‘ If,” 
said Pascal, ‘‘we dreamt every night of the same thing, it would perhaps 
affect us as powerfully as the objects which we perceive every day.” 
‘“‘ Dreams,” was the comment of Sir W. Hamilton, “have frequently a degree 
of vivacity which enables them to compete with the reality.”” And a keen 
observer of the human mind—one whose keenness is not made the less re- 
markable by the fact that he was both the tenderest and most humorous poet 
of his day—has given us a vivid picture of the misery which marks this 
form of remorse :— 


‘¢__Wer sleep was restless and broken still ; 
For turning often and oft 

From side to side, she muttered and moaned, 
And tossed her arms aloft. 


‘* At last she started up, 
And gazed on the vacant air, 

With a look of awe, as if she saw 
Some dreadful phantom there; 

And then in the pillow she buried her face 
From visions ill to bear.—”’’ (c) 


(c) See Hood’s Lady’s Dream. 
987 


~§$ 1296 PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 
| 


Now, on confessions emitted when in this troubled state, not a few criminal 
processes have been made to depend. One well-known case is referred to, in 
another relation, elsewhere. A peddler was murdered. All attempts to dis- 
cover the assassin failed. At last a wayfaring man, who had been strolling 
about the neighborhood, dreamed that the body would be found in a particu- 
lar spot, and that certain persons with whom he had lately been sleeping in a 
barn were the guilty parties. It turned out that this was true. But it also 
turned out that the dreamer had, in his own dreams, heard the convulsive con- 
fessions of one of the assassins, the latter also dreaming. 

§ 1294. Before, however, a confession should be taken as real, it should be 
subjected to certain psychological tests. Delusion ; a morbid desire to attract 
attention; a sort of epidemic which sometimes strikes down whole classes 
with a passionate impulse to insist upon some blood-stain on the conscience, 
something like the hypochondriac epidemic impulse which insists upon some 
personal abnormity ;(@) weariness of life; a propensity to self-destruction 
through a channel which from its very tortuousness possesses its own fasci- 
nation ; a Lara-like desire to appear mysterious and dark, though in this case 
the propensity exudes in vague intimations of participation in 


‘¢ Nameless deeds of guilt’’ 


rather than in confessions of specific offences ;—the existence of such elements 
as these should be inquired into before a confession is received as absolute. 

§ 1295. Delusions, either sane or insane, have produced many false confes- 
sions. A very singular illustration of the first has lately been revived before 
the American public, and has already been more than once cited. Two 
brothers, named Boorn, living in Vermont, had an altercation with their 
brother-in-law, a man named Colvin, a partial lunatic. They left him, as they 
may well have supposed, in a dying state. He crawled off, however, and fled 
to the middle States. Several years afterwards, suspicion was excited by a 
dream of an uncle of the supposed murderers. In this dream he was told that 
Colvin had been murdered, and that his remains would be found in a spot 
that was pointed out. The dream was repeated three times until at last the 
place was searched, and some articles of clothing were found which were 
identified as Colvin’s. Then a spaniel, connected in some way with the Colvin 
family, was seen snuffing uneasily about a spot close by, calling attention to it 
by his importunities. It, too, was examined, and a cluster of bones were 
drawn up by the dog’s paw. That these were Colvin’s, and that these almost 
miraculous interpositions were designed to bring the murder out, there were 
none in the community who doubted. 

§ 1296. Other circumstances led to the arrest of the Boorns. They were 
conscious of guilt, and it is no wonder that these strange prosecutors, which 
after so long an interval had united by means so supernatural to ferret out 
their guilt, should have impressed them with a belief that it was vain to fight 
against what seemed to be Divine vengeance. So one of them confessed the 


(d) We have an illustration of the latter in a convent of nuns, near Chalons, who 
were stricken down with the belief that they were cats. 


988 


BOOK X.] DELUSIVE CONFESSIONS. _ [$ 1298 


murderous assault, and went on further to state how, in order to evade detec- 
tion, the body had been partially burned, and the clothes destroyed. . The first 
part of the story was true. The last was a fabrication, the result either of 
delusion, or of desperation, or of that impulse to complete a story with which 
the imagination is sometimes seized. That the actual death was indeed false, 
was shown by the subsequent appearance of Colvin himself, in time to inter- 
cept the execution of at least one of his supposed murderers. 

But a still more singular confession followed. The first was in 1819. In 
1860, a very old man named Boorn was arrested in Cleveland for counterfeit- 
ing. When in custody, he confessed that forty years before he had been con- 
cerned in a murder, and escaped by a false personation of the deceased. The 
confession led to a re-investigation of the former trial. That the second con- 
fession, as well as the first, was a delusion, was established finally. But the 
retention of this delusion for forty years in the criminal’s breast, shows the 
enduring effect on the nervous system of the guilt of blood, even though that 
guilt was not consummated. 

§ 1297. Perhaps the same hypothesis will explain a class of cases which 
have recently been revived in the public attention.(e) Prominent among these 
is what was long called the Campden Wonder. An old man, named William 
Harrison, steward to Lady Campden, went out on foot on the 16th of August, 
1660, to collect rents. He did not return at his usual hour, and his wife sent 
his servant, John Perry, to inquire after him. ferry, according to his own 
account, wandered about during the night without finding his master. The 
next morning, however, a hat and comb much hacked and cut, and a band 
stained with blood, which had been worn by Harrison the evening before, 
were found in a wild spot, near a large furze brake, where he would have been 
likely to have been met by Perry. The neighborhood naturally enough 
jumped at the conclusion that Harrison was murdered, and that Perry was the 
murderer. Perry soon came to this conclusion too, and made a confession to 
this effect, implicating his brother and mother. The trial took place, and 
though there was no proof of the corpus delictt, the mother and the two sons 
were convicted and executed. Some years afterwards Harrison reappeared at 
Campden, stating that he had been robbed by two horsemen on the night in 
question, and then kidnapped beyond seas. 

§ 1298. So much for sane delusions. Somewhere between sane and insane 
delusions, may be classed those of witches. So far as concerns the spiritual 
sin, they had no doubt a foundation of fact. The loosest deist will admit that 
there are exterior agencies, in the shape of temptations, which assault the hu- 
man heart, and with which it is a sin to tamper. The Christian ascribes these 
temptations to the direct agency of Satan. Now let us suppose the tempta- 
tion of jealousy. A rival is hated, and his death vehemently agonized for. 
Here is a positive sin of the heart. Let the law ascribe this—as the common 
law did and does—to the instigation of the devil; and let a tampering with 
this temptation, as a sort of commerce with the evil one, be made a specific 
offence, as it once was. And add to this the spites arising from the petulances 


(e) See Blackwood’s Magazine, July, 1860, p. 54. 


989 


§ 1298] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


of old age. Here you have a series of subjective crimes which may be confessed 
with truth. 

But the witches did not stop here. They confessed to all sorts of conse- 
quential overt acts. Their machinations had taken effect. Infants had melted 
away before their evil eye, as wax before the fire. The old had withered and 
wrinkled as the same glance fell on them. Hearts which loved were alienated ; 
hearts that believed were made to curdle in unbelief. Mothers dropped their 
untimely fruit. The warrior’s courage forsook him in battle. Cattle took sick, 
and pains, through the witches’ magic, tore and wrung the frames of those 
who crossed the witches’ path. 

Now many of these confessions were the result of mere insanity. But it 
would be wrong, however, not to recognize in others of them incidents of that 
divine economy which makes a superstitious foreboding, and sometimes a 
monomaniac realization of the consequences of crime, one of the results of 
the criminal conception. The mind that revels in intended guilt is apt, in 
the delirium of remorse, if it be not in the development of the imagination 
under the fervor of a wounded conscience, to see the consequences which that 
guilt would have produced. There is never an entire orphanage of the deed 
from the intent. There are few who cannot recall waking in an agony of 
terror at the picture brought before them, of the consummation of some 
unlawful purpose. They dreamed they did the thing over which they were 
brooding, but from which they were held back by want of opportunity, or 
fear of consequences. 

Hawthorne thus vividly portrays this phenomenon :— 

‘In the depths of every heart, there isa tomb and a dungeon, though the 
lights, the music and revelry above may cause us to forget their existence, and 
the buried ones, or prisoners whom they hide. But sometimes, and oftenest 
at midnight, those dark receptacles are flung wide open. In an hour like this, 
when the mind has a passive sensibility, but no active strength; when the 
imagination is a mirror, imparting vividness to all ideas, without the power 
of selecting or controlling them; then pray that your griefs may slumber, and 
the brotherhood of remorse not break their chain. It is too late! A funeral 
train comes gliding by your bed, in which Passion and Feeling assume bodily 
shape, and things of the mind become dim spectres to the eye. There is your 
earliest sorrow, a pale young mourner, wearing a sister’s likeness to first love, 
sadly beautiful, with a hallowed sweetness in her melancholy features, and 
grace in the flow of her sable robe. Next appears a shade of ruined loveli- 
ness, with dust among her golden hair, and her bright garments all faded and 
defaced, stealing from your glance with drooping head, as fearful of reproach ; 
she was your fondest Hope, but a delusive one; so call her Disappointment 
now. A sterner form succeeds, with a brow of wrinkles, a look and gesture 
of iron authority; there is no name for him unless it be Fatality, an emblem 
of the evil influence that rules your forture; a demon to whom you subjected 
yourself by some error at the outset of life, and were bound his slave forever, 
by once obeying him. See! those fiendish lineaments graven on the darkness, 
the writhed lip of scorn, the mockery of that living eye, the pointed finger 
touching the sore place in your heart! Do you remember any act of enormous 

990 


7 


BOOK X. | CONVULSIVE CONFESSIONS. [$ 1800 


“folly, at which you would blush, even in the remotest cavern of the earth? 
Then recognize your Shame. 

‘Pass, wretched band! Well for the wakeful one, if, riotously miserable, 
a fiercer tribe do not surround him, the devils of a guilty heart, that holds its hell 
within itself. What if remorse should assume the features of an injured friend? 
What if the fiend should come in woman’s garments, with a pale beauty amid 
sin and desolation, and lie down by your side? What if he should stand at 
your bed’s foot, in the likeness of a corpse, with a bloody stain upon the 
shroud ? Sufficient without such guilt is this nightmare of the soul; this 
heavy, heavy sinking of the spirits; this wintry gloom about the heart; this 
indistinct horror of the mind, blending itself with the darkness of the cham- 
ber.” 

§ 1299. Poets, who have observed human nature the most closely, and this 
not from its religious side, have recognized in mere unexecuted guilt, this 
retributive energy. Shakspeare makes Cardinal Beaufort, when dying, col- 
lect these phantoms of undeveloped purposes. Hood, in one of the most 
exquisite of his poems, a poem which has been already noticed, describes 
to us a lady of refinement and elegance, whose sins had been those of mere 
omission—who had dressed in silk and satin, and fed on the dainties of the 
land, and whose hardness consisted merely in a neglect to look after the poor 
—as writhing in a dream at the sight of the crowd of miserable outcasts 
whom she might have relieved but did not. It may have been that many of 
these vivid and awful confessions of the witches were produced, though with 
a greater self-deceiving power, by the same influence. A fevered conscience 
in both cases was at work. The witch, however, threw the phantom outward, 
on the canvas, as it were, of a magic lantern, until it became a reality; with 
others, who were more enlightened, or who have less deliberately and persist- 
ently delighted in the conception of the crime, the phantom was thrown 
inwards, and was detected as a phantom, though perhaps at the same time as 
a rebuke. But the witch believed in the fact, and confessed it. 

§ 1300. Now the policy which permitted the execution of these poor 
wretches, without proof of a corpus delictt, was no doubt barbarous and 
wrong. But this should not lead us to refuse to recognize as a part of the 
divine economy of rewards and punishments, this very self-punishing incident, 
of that criminal purpose on which the mind has consciously and determinedly 
revelled. The intent brings its phantom consequences with it. Sometimes 
they continue phantoms, but they do not the less torture or degrade the mind 
they haunt. They may torture it by the presence of a tribe of avenging shades, 
or they may degrade it by introducing into it a progeny of foul and polluted 
consummations. The monastic system has brought many wituesses to this. 
So it was with the phantoms of sensuality of Jerome, and the phantoms of 
pride of Simon Stylites. Wilkie, in one of his drawings, brings before us— 
and no one who has studied it can forget it—a copy of a Spanish picture, 
where a young monk, feverish and macerated with the internal gnawings of a 
brood which had been hatched in his heart in the heat of mere permitted con- 
ceptions—appeals for pity and solace to an aged confessor; and the agonized 
expression of the suppliant, and the sad, wise, sympathy of the confessor, tell 

991 


§$ 1801] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


the story but too plainly. But the story is not one of the confessional alone, 
but of every heart which, before whatever throne, bears itself and pours forth 
the story of indulged conceptions. And every lunatic asylum bears witness to 
the same fact in the cases of imbecility in which unexecuted purposes of sin— 
purposes which had only been thought over, but at the same time nursed—are 
babbled out, and with all their coarse consequences told by the tongue of age. 
The muscular hand of youth kept the curtain down—and the secret though 
nourished sin was thus concealed. But when the power of self-restraint weak- 
ened—when the cords and rings of the curtain decayed—then the secltded 
contents of the heart—these unexecuted sins, now exhaling phantoms by their 
very exposure—rise and spread themselves in their deformity before the public 
gaze. Sometimes overt acts follow, and we hear of sudden falls in old and 
heretofore correct men—falls, however, which were not sudden, for there were 
back-stairs in the heart down which the culprit had been for years descending. 
Sometimes the act is one of imagination only, but is talked out in the gross 
familiarity of senility. But, however this phenomenon may exhibit itself, 
it is a part of that grand. system of Providence, by which guilt is lodged in the 
intent, and by which, as a compensation for human law, which judges of the 
overt act alone, the intent incloses in itself its own retribution. The thing is 
patent in the history of society, and is meant to be so, as a mark of the divine 
purpose—as a deterrer—as an avenger—as an element to be received into 
consideration in adjusting the balance of human jurisprudence. 

§ 1301. But there are cases in which these delusive confessions may be the 
ofispring of pure mania, though in such the delusion must be proved by the 
mania, not the mania by the delusion. Bunyan speaks of such a case, half 
pityingly, half doubtingly :— 

“Since you are entered upon stories, I also will tell you one, the which, 
though I heard it not with my own ears, yet my author I dare believe. It is 
concerning one old Yod, that was hanged about twenty years ago or more, at 
Hartford, for being a thief. The story is this: At a summer assize holden 
at Hartford, while the judge was sitting upon the bench, comes this old Tod 
into the court, clothed in a green suit, with his leathern girdle in his hand, 
his bosom open, and all in a dung sweat as if he had run for his life; and 
being come in, he spake aloud as follows: ‘ My lord,’ said he, ‘ here is the 
veryest rogue that breathes upon the face of the earth; I have been a thief 
from a child; when I was but a little one I gave myself to rob orchards, 
and to do other such like wicked things, and I have continued a thief ever 
since. My lord, there has not been a robbery committed this many years, 
urthin so many miles of this place, but I have either been at tt or privy to 
it.’ The judge thought the fellow was mad; but after some conference with 
some of the justices they agreed to indict him, and so they did, of several 
felonious actions; to all which he heartily confessed guilty, and so was hanged 
with his wife at a same.”’ 

‘“‘T murdered my wife, some years ago,’’ says the inmate of an insane asy- 
lum to a visitor. ‘It is necessary that I should be placed here in confine- 
ment.” And then the supposed murderer goes on to relate with great 

992 


BOOK X.] EPIDEMIC CONFESSIONS. [$ 1808 


equanimity and circumstantiality the details of the murder. But the wife was 
not murdered at all, and is still alive. 

So the publication of a conspicuous homicide is apt to generate a series of 
pretenders to the honor of being the perpetrator. Why should there not be 
several Charlotte Cordays among a thousand patients, as well ag several 
Robespierres ? 

§ 1302. Then comes the epidemic confession—the strangest of all. We have 
several instances of this in the German monkish chronicles of the twelfth and 
thirteenth centuries. True purposes, as well as feigned facts, are often thus con- 
fessed. Whole communities, acting under that singular fascination which 
mind in the aggregate often acquires over mind in the individual, have thus 
come forward in sackcloth and ashes and accused themselves sometimes falsely 
of the act, sometimes perhaps truly of the intent. Nor are these epidemics 
peculiar to a superstitious age. Dr. Southwood Smith, in his lectures on 
Forensic Medicine, brings an instance down to the present century. Cap- 
tain Pigot, during the naval struggles between France and England under 
the empire, commanded the Hermione frigate. A mutiny took place, and he 
and a portion of his officers were murdered very barbarously. ‘One midship- 
man escaped, by whom many of the criminals, who were afterwards taken and 
delivered over to justice, one by one, were identified. Mr. Finlaison, the 
government actuary, who at that time held an official situation at the admi- 
ralty, states: ‘In my own experience I have known, on separate occasions, 
more than six sailors who voluntarily confessed to having struck the first blow 
at Captain Pigot. These men detailed all the horrid circumstances of the 
mutiny with extreme minuteness and perfect accuracy ; nevertheless not one of 
them had ever been in the ship, nor had so much as seen Captain Pigot in 
their lives. ‘They had obtained by tradition from their mess-mates the parti- 
culars of the story. When long on a foreign station, hungering and thirsting 
for home, their minds became enfeebled ; at length they actually believed them- 
selves guilty of the crime over which they so long brooded, and submitted with 
a gloomy pleasure to being sent to England in irons for judgment.’ ” 

§ 1303. Then comes that morbid vanity which takes self-crimination as a 
way of obtaining notoriety. Hypochondria sometimes mixes with this. Per- 
sons whose temperament has become thus touched will resort to the most 
desperate methods to attract attention. The most innocent type that we have 
is that of the sentimentalist, who feigns certain mental experiences of a pecu- 
liarly poignant character; which experiences are hung out something in the 
way pictures are in a gallery, to excite the interest of the amateur. Of course 
the more lurid the coloring, and the more sad the sorrow it depicts, the more 
real the sympathy to be secured from an honest and kind-hearted observer, and 
the more profuse the ejaculations of the mere co-sentimentalist. 

Next facts are fabricated as well as experiences. Thus Cherubina believes 
that she was changed in the cradle, and that an earl and countess are her 
parents, instead of the old farmer and his wife who brought her up. This 
big lie, of course, necessitates a myriad of minor ones, to enable it to be 
earried about with a proper retinue, until Cherubina’s whole life becomes a 

63 998 


§ 1804] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


fabrication. If guilt has to be confessed, to make up a consistent story, con- 
fessed guilt is. | 

Persecutions with such are favorite myths. Margaret Fuller, whose atti- 
tudes and surroundings, in spite of her apparent earnestness, were all pictorial — 
and artificial, made the neglect she suffered from her father one of the favorite 
topics in her letters, though even her editor, laudatory as he is, is forced to 
tell us that all this neglect was imaginary—that a kinder or truer father did 
not exist. It is still doubtful whether Caspar Hauser’s wounds were not self- 
inflicted and his dumbness self-assumed. And it is certain that the more 
tender the care bestowed on such cases is, and the more confiding the sympa- 
thies, the more frequent and subtle the simulation. 

§ 1304. But if the flag by which this attention is to be roused is inscribed 
among the more refined with a sentiment, among the coarser it is likely to be 
blazoned with a crime. Lord Cockburn, in his memoirs, gives us the following 
instance of this :— 

“On the 13th of November, 1806, a murder was committed in Edinburgh, 
which made a greater impression than any committed in our day, except the 
systematic murders of Burke. James Begbie, porter to the English Linen 
Company’s Bank, was going down the close in which the bank then was, on 
the south side of the Canongate, carrying a parcel of bank-notes of the value 
of four or five thousand pounds, when he was struck dead by a single stab, 
given by a single person who had gone into the close after him, and who 
earried off the parcel. This was done in the heart of the city, about five in the 
evening, and within a few yards of a military sentinel, who was always on guard 
there, though not exactly at this spot, and at the moment possibly not in view 
of it. Yet the murderer was never heard of. The soldier saw and heard 
nothing. All that was observed was by some boys who were playing at hand 
ball in the close; and all that they saw was that two men entered the close as 
if together, the one behind the other, and that the front man fell, and lay still; 
and they, ascribing this to his being drunk, let him lie, and played on. It was 
only on the entrance of another person that he was found to be dead, with a 
knife in his heart, and a piece of paper, through which it had been thrust, 
interposed between the murderer’s hand and the blood. The skill, boldness, 
and success of the deed produced deep and universal horror. People trembled 
at the possibility of such a murderer being in the midst of them, and taking 
any life that he chose. But the wretch’s own terror may be inferred from the 
fact that in a few months the large notes, of which most of the booty was 
composed, were found hidden in the grounds of Bellevue. Some persons were 
suspected, but none on any satisfactory ground; and, according to a strange 
craze or ambition not unusual in such cases, several charged themselves with 
the crime, who, to an absolute certainty, had nothing to do with it.” 

Then come confessions from very weariness of life— 


‘‘T am foot-sore, and very weary, 
And I travel to meet a friend.’’ 


That friend is death, and the frame of mind which thus seeks it is very apt to 

engender phantoms of blood-guiltiness which soon appear as realities. Thus, 

cases have not been unfrequent where women, deserted by those in whom they 
994 


BOOK X.] HOW CONFESSIONS ARE TO BE GUARDED. [$ 1806 


trusted, and sick of living, have accused themselves, and this perhaps sincerely 
though falsely, of the murder of infants whom they never bore, or who died 
naturally. By one, who was thus life-weary, was the whole scene described 
with the most touching minuteness—the wailing of the young child—its 
piteous look—its burial in a little grave under the matted and crisp spires at 
the foot of a pine. Yet no one had been buried there, nor had the mother 
aught to do with the child’s death. 

§ 1305. Then sometimes the same weariness of life seizes upon a false con- 
fession as a congenial method of suicide. Death is sought in a way which 
may best correspond to the then morbid condition of the brain; in a way which 
involves others, though innocently on their part, in the self-murder, and makes 
them strike the blow. ‘TI fling myself, not into the river, nor into the abyss, 
but upon the scaffold.””, Thus Lord Clarendon tells us of a Frenchman, named 
Hubert, who was convicted and executed on his confession of having occasioned 
the great fire in London, “although,” says that sagacious jurist and historian, 
‘neither the judges nor any one present believed him guilty, but that he was 
a poor, distracted wretch, weary of life, and who chose to part with it in this 
way.”(f) 

§ 1306. Before a confession be acted upon, therefore, let these tests be ap- 
plied. Let it be remembered, to sum up in the words of a great civilian, that 
‘there sometimes lurks, under the shadow of an apparent tranquillity, an in- 
sanity, which impels men readily to accuse themselves of all kinds of iniquity. 
Some, deluded by their imaginations, suspect themselves of crimes which they 
have never committed. A melancholy temperament, the tedium vite, and an 
unaccountable propensity to their own destruction, urge some to the most 
false confessions ; whilst they were extracted from others by the dread of tor- 
ture, or the tedious misery of the dungeon.’’(g) 

The last motive rarely exists among ourselves, but the first may be not in- 
frequent. The first precaution is to have absolute proof of the corpus delicti. 
This, however, is not enough. 'There may be abundant proof that a crime 
was committed, and yet the confession may be false. We must exact proof 
that connects the supposed criminal with the actual crime. We must examine 
into his condition of mind, and see how far insanity, or remorse, or bravado, 
or weariness of life, or delusion, may have influenced him. When these tests 
are applied, we are ready to take the confession as impressed with its true sig- 
nificance. It thus becomes the most positive form of proof.(h) 


(f) Continuation of Lord Clarendon’s Memoirs, written by himself, p. 352. 
(g) Hein. Ex. 18, § 6. 


(h) “To guard against false confessions,” says Jeremy Bentham, “the two following 
rules ought to be observed :— 

“1. One is, that, to operate in the character of direct evidence, confession cannot be 
too particular. In respect of all material circumstances, it should be as particular, 
as, by dint of interrogation, it can be made to be. Why so? Because (supposing it 
false) the more particular it is, the more distinguishable facts it will exhibit, the truth 
of which (supposing them false) will be liable to be disproved by their incompatibility 
with any facts, the truth of which may have come to be established by other evidence. 
The greater the particularity required on the part of the confession, the greater is the 
care taken of the confessionalist—the greater the care taken to guard him against 
undue conviction, brought upon him by his own imbecility and imprudence. 

“2. The other rule is,that, in respect of all material facts (especially the act which 


995 


—§ 1807] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


§ 1307. 2d. Nervous Tremor.—The Countess of Somerset, when arrested 
on the charge of the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury, laughed off the possi- 
bility of guilt with that fascination which so eminently belonged to her. It 
was hard to believe that underneath that young and beautiful brow, so cruel 
and artful an assassination could have been planned. No alarm was shown, 
no cloud of manner by which the slightest trouble of conscience was betrayed. 
So she bore herself until she found she was to be taken to the Tower. There 
Sir Thomas Overbury, himself but a young man, and one whom she had fre- 
quently and kindly met, had just died in unspeakable torments. There she 
had sent, under the guise of kindness, the poisoned tarts which caused his 
death. One great terror grew over her—that she should be taken to his 
room—that she should have to pass lonely nights there, and in that bed. At 
last her nerves, wrought up to their highest dissimulation, snapped asunder. 
She sank prostrate and wretched to the ground, and then followed her con- 
fession. 

From this nervous tremor arose the old habit of requiring supposed crimi- 
nals to touch the corpse of the murdered man. With this was no doubt 
joined a superstition that the corpse would bleed when it felt the murderer’s 
hand. But this was but collateral to the belief that in this way the conscience 
of the guilty party would be exposed to a test which might, in some cases at 
least, prove efficacious. It is true that when the criminal has time to nerve 
himself for the purpose, he is able, if he has much courage of manner, to bear 
himself calmly and innocently. This was the case with Major Strangways, in 
1657, who, on being required to take the deceased by the hand and touch his 
wounds, did so with a demeanor undisturbed. It is true, also, that others, by 
a powerful effort of nervous imagination, may fling themselves into the cha- 
racter of an innocent person, in the same way that Mrs. Siddons could fling 
herself into the character of Queen Catharine, or Talma into that of Hamlet. 
“You looked as if you were really metamorphosed, and not merely trying to 
appear so.” ‘I made myself believe that the audience was divested of all 
flesh—mere spirits, and I a spirit speaking to them,’ was Talma’s reply. 


constitutes the physical part of the offence), it ought to comprehend a particular de- 
signation in respect of the circumstances of time and place. For what reason? For 
the reason already mentioned: to the end that, in the event of its proving false (a 
case not impossible, though in a high degree rare and improbable), facts may be found 
by which it may be proved to be so. ‘I killed such a man’ (says the confessionalist, 
mentioning him), ‘on such a day, at such a place.’ ‘Impossible’ (says the judge, 
speaking from other evidence), ‘on that day neither you nor the deceased were at 
that place.’ 

“ But time and place are both indefinitely divisible. To what degree of minuteness 
shall the division be endeavored to be carried for this purpose? A particular answer 
that shall suit all cases, cannot be given. The end in view, as above stated, must be 
considered, and compared with the particular circumstances of the case, in regard to 
either species of extension, ere the degree of particularity proper to be aimed at by 
the interrogatories can be marked out. Under the head of time, the English law, in 
the instrument of accusation, admits of no other latitude than what is included in the 
compass ofa day. The nature of things did not, in this instance, render uniformity 
impossible ; the parts into which time is divided are uniform and determinate. Place 
—relative space—is not equally obsequious ; the house? yes; if the supposed scene 
of the supposed transaction be a house ; the street ? yes; if the scene were in a street ; 
but a field, a road, a common, a forest, a lake, a sea, the ocean; any of these may have 
been the scene.’’ (Bentham, Rationale of Jud. Ev. Book v. chap. vi. § 3.) 


996 


BOOK X.] NERVOUS TREMOR. [$ 1809 


But this leap requires some little breadth of base from which to start. The 
mind cannot rise up to it suddenly. The murderer who might, if a due inter- 
val be given, nerve himself to the work, often collapses if suddenly brought in 
contact with the deceased. ‘The old result is reversed; for in former times it 
was the dead man that gave sign: now it is the living. We have an instance 
of this in the latest American case where the process was tried. A man named 
Johnson, under trial for murder in New York, in 1824, was taken out of his 
cell to the hospital by the high constable, and required to touch the murdered 
body. He did so, but the touch broke the texture of the murderer’s dissimu- 
lation. He fell into a nervous tremor, which resulted in a confession. This 
confession, when he recovered, he sought to retract; and his counsel endea- 
vored to exclude it in court, on the ground that it had been improperly ob- 
tained. But the judges overruled the objection, without in any way objecting 
to the process. (hh) 

§ 1308. William Peterson, a young man of only about nineteen, but of 
the most extraordinary self-control, was charged, in the Memphis District, 
Tennessee, in 1852, with the highway robbery and murder of Thomas Merri- 
weather. No feature, in this very remarkable case, is more remarkable, than the 
mastery over his nervous system which had been obtained by this young but 
desperate criminal. An almost girlish delicacy and fairness of skin and 
features covered an iron energy of muscle and nerve that was able to brace itself 
against any expected attack. Yet even this power gave way. Closely re- - 
sembling the murdered man—so closely as to produce mistakes between the 
two—was his brother, William Merriweather. The prisoner, not knowing 
he was suspected, was lying asleep in his bed near midnight. His chamber 
was suddenly entered by the officers charged with his arrest. He betrayed no 
sign, though the slight trembling of the eyelids showed that his sleep was 
feigned. ‘‘I will go with you readily,”’ and he got up quietly to meet the 
charge. But suddenly his eyes fell on a figure which may well have recalled 
to him the dead man, for there, darkened in the background, stood William 
Merriweather, pale and corpse-like, in the exhaustion and excitement of his 
long search for, and final discovery of, his brother’s murderer. It was as if 
the dead and living were confronted. Then, as in former cases, the living 
broke down. Peterson’s composure could not stand the trial. The policy 
of his intended defence was that he did not know the deceased ; but as he looked 
at the brother his ‘head dropped upon his breast, and he sighed deeply.’ 
A partial confession and a conviction followed. (7) 

§ 1309. The following incident is given in Parton’s Life of Burr. Ona 
trial for murder, the prisoner was defended jointly by Colonel Burr and General 
Hamilton. ‘ At first, the evidence against the prisoner seemed conclusive, and 
I think Burr himself thought him guilty. But as the trial proceeded, suspi- 
cions arose against the principal witness. Colonel Burr subjected him to a 
relentless cross-examination, and he became convinced that the guilt lay between 
the witness and the prisoner, with the balance of probability against the witness. 


(hh) People v. Jolinson, 2 Wheeler’s C. C. 378. 
(7) See this case reported, ante, § 1144. 


§ 1811] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


“The man’s appearance and bearing were most unprepossessing. Besides 
being remarkably ugly, he had the mean down look, which is associated with 
the timidity of guilt. Hamilton had addressed the jury with his usual fluent 
eloquence, confining his remarks to the vindication of the prisoner, without 
alluding to the probable guilt of the witness. The prosecuting attorney 
replied, and it was now Burr’s province to say the last word for the prisoner. 
But the day had worn away, and the court took a recess till candlelight. This 
was extremely annoying to Colonel Burr, as he meditated enacting a little 
scene, to the success of which a strong light was indispensable. He was not 
to be balked, however. Through one of his satellites, of whom he always had 
several revolving around him, he caused an extra number of candles to be 
brought into the court-room, and to be so arranged as to throw a strong light 
upon a certain pillar, in full view of the jury, against which the suspected wit- 
ness had leaned throughout the trial. The court reassembled, the man re- 
sumed his accustomed place, and Colonel Burr rose. With the clear concise- 
ness of which he was master, he set forth the facts which bore against the man, 
and then, seizing two candelabras from the table, he held them up toward him, 
throwing a glare of light upon his face, and exclaimed :— 

‘“‘* Behold the murderer, gentlemen !? 

‘“‘Every eye was turned upon the wretch’s ghastly countenance, which, to 
the excited multitude, seemed to wear the very expression of a convicted mur- 
derer. The man reeled, as though he had been struck; then shrunk away 
behind the crowd, and rushed from the room. ‘The effect of this incident was 
decisive. Colonel Burr concluded his speech, the judge charged, the jury gave 
a verdict of acquittal, and the prisoner was free.”’ 

§ 13810. The longer the prior tension the more sudden and complete the 
crash. When Dr. Webster was brought by the police to the medical college, 
where for so many days he had with great external composure been covering 
up the proofs of his guilt, his whole system, at the recurrence of the scene 
under these new auspices, gave way. ‘‘He seemed,” said one of the witnesses, 
“like a mad creature. When the water was put toward him he would snap 
at it with his teeth, and push it away with great violence, without drinking, 
as if it were offensive to him.’”’(77) ‘‘ Dr. Webster appeared to be very much 
agitated,” says another; ‘‘sweat very much, and the tears and sweat ran down 
his cheeks as fast as they could drop.”’(7) ‘The perspiration was so exces- 
sive as to wet through his clothing.’’(/) 

§ 1311. Richard Weston was sub-keeper of the Tower at the time of the 
poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury. He was the first person tried for that 
crime. When the bill of indictment was returned, as we learn from Mr. Amos’ 
“Great Oyer,’’ all eyes were turned to the bar, where the wretched prisoner 
was brought up. He was a man of about sixty years of age. His forehead 
was wrinkled with age, his hair sprinkled with gray. His countenance, though 
not wanting in a certain degree of comeliness, had a stern and grim expression, 
and was now distorted with terror. His face was deadly pale, his lips qui- 


(iz) Bemis’ Report of the Webster Case, p. 60. 
(j) Ibid. 120, 121. (k) Ibid. p. 193. 


998 


BOOK X |] NERVOUS TREMOR. [§ 1818 


vered, and his knees tottered as he stood at the bar while the indictment was 
read. It charged him with having murdered Sir Thomas Overbury in the 
Tower of London by administering various poisons—rosalgar, white arsenic, 
and mercury sublimate—on four different occasions. The prisoner was then 
asked, in the usual form, whether he was guilty of the murder, yea, or no. 
The poor wretch, instead of answering became agitated, and in his distress 
screamed several times, “Lord have mercy on me, Lord have mercy on me.’’ 
At length he stammered out, “Not guilty.””. But when asked how he would 
be tried, instead of answering in the usual form, ‘‘ By God and my country,” 
he exclaimed he referred himself to God—he would be tried by God alone. 
And though the Chief Justice spent an hour in persuading him to put him- 
self upon his country, he could get no other answer out of him than that he 
referred himself to God. 

§ 1312. The Karl of Essex was the last favorite of Queen Elizabeth. 
Young, brilliant, of remarkable fascination both in person and mind, he held 
‘on the queen’s affections, hereditary claims of which his personal graces may 
well have reminded her. For—except the two Careys—he was her only male 
relative on her mother’s side, ‘and as she looked on his handsome person, and 
studied his ardent though inconsistent character—bold, rather than coura- 
geous—dashing, but inconsequent—chivalric in bearing, yet not always gene- 
rous in heart—she could not but recognize the defects as well as the graces of 
her kinsmen of the Boleyn blood. Then, besides, his father had served her at 
the time when her faithful servants were few, and it was one of her principles 
ever to be true not only to those who had been true to her, but to their children. 
But even Elizabeth’s constancy might be overstrained. To almost more than 
womanly weakness in domestic life, she added more than masculine severity in 
matters of state. She became piqued with Essex’s waywardness to her person- 
ally, and permitted herself, upon his failure in his Irish campaigns, not only 
to rebuke but to degrade him. The favorite was stung to the quick, and 
rushed into a desperate scheme to forcibly change the administration. He 
was tried and sentenced to be executed. Then came with her the struggle. 
Whatever may have been her relations to him, she loved him still too affection- 
ately, and had, by her indulgence, given too large a margin to his excesses, to 
permit her to consent to his death. That he should die she never intended. 
But with that singular and cruel waywardness by which her Tudor blood and 
her woman’s caprice were alike shown, her plan seemed to have been to have 
humbled her favorite until she brought him to her feet as a devoted suppliant, 
once more to be fastened to her person, as one who first could give life, and 
then renew prosperity. To this plan one thing was needed on Essex’s part. 
Elizabeth had given him a ring which he was to send to her whenever he was 
in straits, and which, she had given him her word, should bring back from 
her a free pardon. The death-warrant had issued, and she passionately waited 
for the ring. She recalled the warrant, to give more time, but no sign was 
made by Essex. The sentence of his peers hung over him—he asked not to 
have it remitted—and at last the queen let the axe fall. 

§ 1813. Two years passed of eminent prosperity. The Spaniards were 
finally repulsed ; the Irish subdued; a firm alliance was secured with France, 

999 


§ 1315] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


and England was placed at the head of the Protestant powers. Elizabeth had 
apparently deadened all recollections of Essex. But on the death-bed of the 
Countess of Nottingham, a scene took place which brought back the old love 
with all the additional power of remorse. It appeared that Essex had reserved 
the ring for his last extremity, and then had given it—to follow Hume’s in- 
comparable narrative—“ to the Countess of Nottingham, whom he desired to 
hand it to the queen. The countess was prevailed on by her husband, the 
mortal enemy of Essex, not to execute the commission; and Hlizabeth, who 
still expected that her favorite would make this last appeal to her ten- 
derness, and who ascribed the neglect of it to his invincible obstinacy, was, 
after much. delay and many internal combats, pushed by resentment and 
policy, to sign the warrant for his execution. The Countess of Notting- 
ham falling into sickness, and affected with the near approach of death, 
was seized with remorse for her conduct; and having obtained a visit from 
the queen, she craved her pardon, and revealed to her the fatal secret. The 
‘queen, astonished with this incident, burst into a furious passion. She shook 
the dying countess in her bed; and crying to her that God might pardon 
her, but she never could, she broke from her, and thenceforth resigned herself 
over to the deepest and most incurable melancholy. She rejected all consola- 
tion. She even refused food and sustenance; and throwing herself on the 
floor, she remained sullen and immovable, feeding her thoughts on her afflic- 
tions, and declaring life and existence an insufferable burden to her. Few 
words she uttered, and they were all expressive of some inward grief which 
she cared not to reveal. But sighs and groans were the chief vent which she 
gave to her despondency, and which, though they discovered her sorrows, were 
never able to ease or assuage them. ‘Ten. days and nights she lay upon the 
carpet, leaning on cushions which her maids brought her; and her physicians 
could not persuade her to allow herself to be put to bed, much less to make 
trial of any remedies which they prescribed to her.’’ And then came death. 

§ 1814. 3d. Morbid propensity to recur to scene and topic of guilt.—There 
are certain abnormal states of the nervous organism in which the propensity 
to commit a desperate act is almost irresistible. There are few who have not 
felt this when standing on a tower or on the brink of a precipice. A strange 
curdling runs and quivers through the veins, an impulse to break this mystery 
of life, and desperately to face what stands beyond. There are few great crimi- 
nals who have not borne witness to the same propensity. They are ever on 
the precipice-brink of discovery, and often comes this convulsive impulse, to 
throw themselves, blood-stained and confessing, into the chasm below. And 
even when this is not consummated, there is a strange fascination which makes 
them flit over the scene and topics. The impulse is to get as near to the edge 
as they can without toppling over. 

§ 1315. This impulse, working in a mind of peculiar delicacy and culture, 
betrayed itself in Eugene Aram’s case in a series of refined and oblique allu- 
sions to acts of guilt, such as that of which he had been the perpetrator. His 
mind hovered and quivered over the topic, assuming and expressing itself in 
varied fantastic shapes, often flitting apparently away, but floating again 
from the same spot, as would an exhalation from some hidden pernicious 

1000 


BOOK X.] RECURRENCE TO GUILTY SCENE. [$ 1817 


mine. So showed the evidence on the trial, which is paraphrased, with extra- 
ordinary psychological delicacy, by Hood :— 


The usher took six hasty strides, 
As smit with sudden pain— 

Six hasty strides beyond the place, 
Then slowly back again ; 

And down he sat beside the lad, 
And talked with him of Cain. 


And long since then, of bloody men 
Whose deeds tradition saves ; 

Of lonely folk, cut off unseen, 
And hid in sudden graves ; 

Of horrid stabs in groves forlorn, 
And murders done in caves! 


And how the sprites of injured men 
Shrieked upward from the sod— 
And how the ghostly hand will point 

To show the burial clod ; 
And unknown facts of guilty acts 
Are seen in dreams from God ! 


He told how murderers walked the earth 
Beneath the curse of Cain— 

With crimson clouds before their eyes, 
And flames about their brain ; 

For blood had left upon their souls 
Its everlasting stain! 


‘* And well,’’ quoth he, ‘I know, for truth, 
Their pangs must be extreme— 
Wo, wo, unutterable wo— 
Who spill life’s sacred stream ! 
For why? Methought last night, I wrought 
A murder in my dream! 


‘One that had never done me wrong, 
A feeble man and old; 
I led him to a lonely field, 
The moon shone clear and cold ; 
Now here, said I, this man shall die, 
And I shall have his gold !”’ 


That very night, while gentle sleep 
The urchin’s eyelids kissed, 

Two stern-face men set out from Lynn 
Through the cold and heavy mist ; 

And Eugene Aram walked between, 
With gyves upon his wrists. 


§ 1316. Among coarser minds the same propensity exhibits itself in the 
affectation of jocularity or rude jest. Thus Robinson, who was tried for the 
murder of Suydam, whose body was found under the front basement floor of 
Robinson’s house, remarked two days before the discovery, to a carpenter who 
found him, with a hoe, dragging the earth in the back basement, as if he had 
been getting out sand for the masons, “ Here ’s where I was going to poke 
Suydam under ;” adding that “he had not time to do it.” This was tossed 
off as a joke, and may perhaps be regarded as an artifice to divert attention. 
But it arose more probably from a morbid propensity impelling the murderer 
to dwell in language on the topic which was to him at once so perilous and 
so engrossing. 

§ 1317. The same peculiarity was observable in Nancy Farrer’s case. 
Whether or no that remarkable woman was technically responsible it is not 
proposed now to consider. Conceding, however, that she was insane (and to 
this effect went the last verdict taken in her case), she had a vein of shrewd 

1001 


§ 1819] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


‘cunning running through her which enabled her to shelter herself from suspi- 
cion during two successive groups of poisonings. There were the same pre- 
cautions as taken by other criminals to deaden surprise by intimations of the 
ill health of her intended victims—the same assertions of constitutional ten- 
dency to these particular symptoms. And with this there was the same sub- 
sequent hovering of the mind over the scene of guilt. Thus, after the death 
of “Johnny,” one of the children whom she was employed to nurse, and 
whom she had poisoned, she was found “ excited and anxious if any two were 
talking, to get close to them, and to wish to know what they were saying.” 
And then came one of those strange convulsive confessions such as that in 
Robinson’s case—confessions in which the truth is thrown out as if it were 
too hot for the heart to hold, and yet at the same time put forth as if it were 
a joke, so as to relieve the mind of him that speaks from the solitude of this 
awful secret, and yet not too boldly proclaim guilt. Nancy told a witness, 
after the death of one of the children, ‘‘ how lucky she was with sick folks; 
they all died in her hands.’’ The witness saying, “ May be you killed them ;” 
she said, “May be I did.” ‘She seemed to be joking—seemed to be smiling 
—seemed to be very careless about it.’’(Z) 

§ 1818. 4th. Permanent mental wretchedness.—We may pass the case of 
a tender conscience, which commits a heinous act inconsiderately, or under 
force of strong temptation, and then is stung by bitter and enduring remorse. 
These cases may be said to be exceptional. We may be told, and perhaps 
truly, that the majority of great crimes are committed by men whose hearts 
are so rigid and callous as to give no sign of a troubled conscience. The sun, 
on the day after the crime, shines upon a face just as hard as that on 
which he shone the day before. Blood cannot stain a skin already black with 
guilt. No man is suddenly a great criminal. He becomes so, it is argued, 
by long and slow processes, during which all the impressible elements of the 
heart are hardened, and solidified. 

Now this may be all true, and yet common observation tells us that there 
are certain types of character among which a priort we are accustomed to 
look for the perpetrator of some great crime. And this rigidity of heart is 
one of these. This, in itself, may give a faint though definite psychological 
presumption. But it is questionable whether there are any characters in 
which this type is permanent :— 


“The deepest ice that ever froze 
Can only over the surface close— 
The living stream lies quick below, 
And flows, and cannot cease to flow.” 


§ 1319. ‘Something was wrong with him. My suspicion was aroused by his 
troubled sleep.”” This is the frequent answer to the question as to what put 
the witness first on the watch. Shakspeare makes Lady Macheth’s great 
secret vent itself in this way, and to attract very much the same observation 
from by-standers. And this, in fact, is but in obedience to one of those divine 
sanctions by which crime is made in part its ownavenger. ‘‘ There are violent 
and convulsive movements of self-reproach,” says Dr. McCosh, “ which will 


(/) Farrer v. State, 2 Ohio St. R. (N. 8.) 64. 
1002 


BOOK X.] | REMORSE. [$ 1820 


at times break in upon the self-satisfaction of the most complacent. Man’s 
peace is in this respect like the sultry heat of a summer’s day; it is close and 
disagreeable at the time, and ever liable to be broken in upon by the thunders 
and tempests of divine indignation. Even in the case of those who are anxious 
to keep their attention turned away as much as possible from themselves, and 
as little as possible upon the state of their hearts, there will occur intervals 
unfilled up between the scenes that express them, and on these occasions there 
will be recollections called up which occasion the keenest misery. It may be 
after a day of selfish business, or an evening of sinful excitement, that such 
unwelcome visitations are paid to them to disturb their rest, while others have 
buried their cares in the forgetfulness of sleep. Or it may be, in the time of 
disease, or in the prospect of death, that the ghosts of deeds committed long 
ago spring up as from the grave. These gloomy fears proceeding from con- 
scious guilt, always rise up like a ghostly apparition, never in the sunshine of 
prosperity, but always in the gloom of adversity, to render the darkness more 
horrific. 

“In other cases, the troubling of the conscience is produced, we can scarcely 
tell how, by the state of the nervous system, or by an accidental event, recalling 
the deed committed to oblivion, or by a sudden flashing of some willingly 
forgotten scene upon the mind, revealing, like the lightning’s glare at night, 
dreadful depths of darkness. In regard to such phenomena we may know 
what are the general laws; though it may be as difficult to explain the 
specific causes, as it is to tell the immediate cause of the raising this gust 
of wind, or of this cloudy atmosphere, of both of which we may know per- 
fectly what are the general means of their production.”’ 

§ 1320. Extraneous circumstances may produce this involuntary remorse. 
The culprit may form around him his own atmosphere, which will impart 
for a while its tinge to his conduct. He may, by a powerful effort of 
imagination, create for himself fictitious wrongs and fictitious justification. 
Suddenly, however, comes a rude touch and dissolves the whole fabric. Hereto- 
fore he believed himself a hero, or an instrument of inexorable fate. Now he 
sees himself a murderer, cruel and loathsome, and a spasmodic ery of agony 
escapes his lips, or insanity, or suicide, or, what may be worse than either, a 
dull and incurable despair, closes his life. 

The independent existence of this latent consciousness of guilt is shown by 
the fact that it is called into action by events over which the will has no con- 
trol. It is not the creation of a diseased brain. It is not the result of a 
morbid self-introspection. Were it either of these, the will could recall it, or 
perhaps again banish it. But it is produced arbitrarily and convulsively by 
circumstances with which the will has nothing to do. The sudden sight of a 
ring belonging to one whom Queen Elizabeth had loved but sacrificed, threw, 
as we have seen, that most proud and self-poised of women into an agony of 
demonstrative remorse. 'The Countess of Somerset, who had borne herself 
with such consummate self-possession and tact during the prior periods of the 
prosecution, screamed with terror at the prospect of being taken to sleep in 
the room of Sir Thomas Overbury, whom she had poisoned. Nor are these 
eases unfamiliar to our every-day observation. A little locket, a lock of hair, 

1003 


§ 1823] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X, 


‘a faded rose, a ribbon, taken from the person of one who has been loved and 
lost, will recall a passionate torrent of long buried grief. We may have been 
a moment before, calm or buoyant. If we had been able to exercise our own 
will, we would have banished these memories finally. But now, without our 
agency, they burst upon us and overwhelm us. 

§ 1321. There is a feature, however, in respect to a consciousness of guilt 
thus produced, that distinguishes it from a suddenly recalled grief. The latter 
reproduces merely a past memory, the former a present reality. The recollec- 
tion of the latter is, I WAS IN TIME PAST so and so. The discovery with the 
former is: I AM NOW A CRIMINAL; I DID THAT DEED oF GuiILr. Of this 
discovery there are but two or three consequences. One is confession, and the 
consequent relief from a comparatively unburdened conscience. Another is a 
continued condition of misery. A third is the stupor or hardness which is so 
common an. attribute of old criminals. Hither of these is a positive psychical 
condition, as much the subject of ascertainment as are the types or phases of 
the physical condition. 

§ 1322. 5th. Animosity among confederates.—“ He knows my secret, and 
I must dispatch him.”’ ‘‘ Because he fears my betraying him, he will try to 
get rid of me.” One of these feelings, and perhaps both, lurk in the breast 
of the confederates in almost every joint secret crime. How dangerous is the 
possession of a political secret in a despotic government, is evidenced to us in 
the many assassinations by which fell the favorites of the French and English 
monarchs of the seventeenth century. 

But another and more subtle impulse sometimes intervenes to work out the 
same result. It seems almost an invariable psychological rule that passionate 
love, producing crime, is followed by passionate hatred. Take, for instance, 
the reign of James I., and go to Lord Coke’s great Oyer, which has been 
already more than once referred to. Whether or no the Earl of Somerset was 
really guilty of the consummated poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury, may per- 
haps be doubted. It is clear, however, that his countess caused poison to be 
sent to the deceased to remove or punish his opposition to her marriage, and 
that her husband was at least privy to her designs. It is clear, also, that he 
must have known, if not participated in the nefarious plot by which his 
wife, as a preliminary to her marriage with himself, was divorced from the 
Earl of Essex. For by fraud, if not by bloodshed, as all England knew, was 
the first marriage dissolved and the second secured. To make this second 
marriage happy many outward circumstances conspired. The earl and his 
countess were each remarkable for their beauty and graces. They had wealth 
and station; they loved each other with a love which had torn asunder the 
most sacred barriers, and had conquered almost unsurmountable difficulties ; 
but when they at last met, they found an invisible obstacle between them which 
they could not overcome. ‘This was the consciousness of a common crime. 
Their love was followed by hatred so intense, and by quarrels so bitter, that 
quiet was only secured by separation. For years they lived in the same house 
with hearts so hostile, that they instinctively shrank from each other when 
they met. Aversion became divorce. 

§ 1523. Poets have often dwelt upon this property of crime, but by no one 

1004 


BOOK X.] QUARRELS AFTER GUILT. [$ 1826 


has this been done with greater energy than by Robert Browning. Ottima, 
an Italian woman, pursues with the utmost passion an adulterous intercourse 
with a German, Sebald. Together they murder her husband. Then comes for 
a moment the passionate voluptuousness of guilty love in its full. But while 
they are still in the flush of delight at the removal of the obstacle to their un- 
disturbed enjoyment, a country girl passes under the window singing a home 
song which brings them back to the reality of the crime they have committed. 
It is the ordinary reaction produced on a morbid state of the brain by a single 
healthy thought. Then fierce love is followed by fierce hatred, and death by 
death. (m) 

§ 1324. Catharine of Medicis, on the death of Francis IT., had still three 
surviving sons, Charles [X., who succeeded to the crown; Henry, Duke of 
Anjou, afterwards Henry III.; and Francis, Duke of Alencon. Over each 
she had acquired an ascendency which would give her supreme power could 
she make the crown autocratic. There was in the way of this, however, an 
insurmountable difficulty. The Huguenots were a co-ordinate power in the 
state, and their religion and their political principles alike made them intract- 
able. Coligny was their leader, and besides this possessed military skill, popu- 
lar influence, and inflexible integrity. Assassination was to Catharine the 
natural remedy, and to this she obtained the ready support of the chief of the 
Catholic party, the Duke of Guise, and then the reluctant assent of Charles 
IX. The blow was struck ; Coligny murdered ; and forty thousand Huguenots 
in one night destroyed. 

§ 1825. Then came the reaction, and prominent in this was the disruption 
between the queen, her sons, and her accomplices. To exclude Henry of 
Navarre from the succession was one of the chief points in the confederacy. 
yet eight days after the massacre, Charles IX., according to Ranke, was ob- 
liged to summon Henry to him in the night to quiet the agonies by which he 
was tortured. The young king was filled with dread at a wild tumult of con- 
fused voices, among which were distant shrieks and howlings, mingled with 
the indistinguishable raging of a furious multitude, and with groans and curses, 
as on the day of the massacre. So vivid was his conviction of the reality of 
these sounds, that he sent messengers into the city to know if a fresh: tumult 
had broken out. But the sounds were mere delusions, which continued to 
torment Charles during the short remainder of his life. Thus he died, alter- 
nately cursing his mother, as the cause of his misery, and turning to her sub- 
missively, in awe of her overweening power. 

§ 1326. So it was with her two remaining sons. Francis, Duke of Alen- 
con, flew into open rebellion, making the massacres of which he was one of the 
joint agents the plea. Henry ITI., it is true, when he succeeded to the crown, 
bowing before the queen’s superior genius, conceded to her for a while the 
supremacy. But this same restlessness under the joint load of a common 
guilt, this almost anguish to throw it off on her who produced it, soon severed 
the son from the mother. Then came a scene in the castle of Blois, where the 


(m) “ Pippa Passes,” by Robert Browning. . Mr. Hawthorne’s last work, the “ Mar- 
ble Faun,” hinges on the same topic. 


1005 


§ 1326] PSYCHICAL INDICATIONS. [BOOK X. 


Duke of Guise, almost at the foot of the throne, was obliged to defend himself 
by teeth and nails like a wild beast, for he had not time to draw his sword. 
He had been invited there by the king, as one of the counsel of State, and 
when there was thus massacred by his old co-conspirator. And underneath, 
on her dying bed, lay Catharine of Medicis, the wild tumult above giving her 
proof of this final dissolution of the strange partnership she had formed for 
the Huguenot massacre. The community of guilt had to them been indeed 
fatal. It had been followed by the bitterest recriminations and imprecations. 
It had been followed by massacres and cross-massacres. Charles IX. did not 
hesitate to ascribe to poison administered by his mother’s hand, the disease 
which tore his vitals; and, though this may be discredited, she permitted his 
death-bed to be neglected, and his funeral deserted, to increase the welcome to 
her more favored son Henry. The Duke of Guise was massacred by Henry ; 
Henry a short time after by an avenger of the Duke of Guise. Catharine, 
after having successively deserted those for whom she had risked so much, 
died at last deserted by each in turn. 


Such are some of the ways in which psychology may be used in the detection 
of guilt. It shows how a crime betrays itself before its commission, in pre- 
parations, in intimations, in overacting; at the time of its commission, in 
incoherence; after its commission, in convulsive confessions, in remorse, in 
involuntarily haunting the guilty topic, and in disruption between confederates. 
The inquiry is an important one in legal psychology, for it not only aids in 
the enforcement of the law, but it leads us to those supreme sanctions on 
which all law rests. When we visit a city, and see a series of police officers 
engaged in ferreting out crime; when we see, in connection with this, courts 
in which the criminal is tried, and the penalties to which crime is subjected, 
we draw from these facts the inference of a government whose office it is to 
prevent wrong. In proportion to the perfection in which this police system 
is carried out, do our conceptions of the wisdom, the power, and the earnest- 
ness of the supreme authority increase. So it is with the agencies we have 
been examining. Wherever guilt goes, they go. They dog it in all its 
stages. Its most secret haunts are not closed to them. Its weakness as well 
as its wistom—its triumphs and its remorse—they hear and record. Nor is 
their function that of detection alone. They have a strange power of com- 
pelling guilt to disclose itself. They show us that whatever doubts there may 
be as to the origin of evil, there is no doubt as to its close. For they show it 
to be pursued by a most subtle and powerful penal machinery, which leaves it 
not until in one sense or another it is judicially punished. 

There is one difference, however, between the police of the courts, and that 
of the conscience. The former, in order to scent out the crime, often assumes 
the garb of the criminal. Vidocq goes into the thieves’ den to discover the 
thieves’ secrets. He recalls memories of past crime, so as to induce a similar 
communicativeness in his associates ; he gloats enticingly over the pleasures of 
guilt; he incites to fresh adventures by which the criminal may be entrapped. 
But it is not so with the Angels of the conscience. ‘They warn, they appeal, 
they implore, and this in tones the tenderest and holiest. Their garb is that 

1006 


BOOK X.] THE DIVINE LAW AND THE HUMAN, [$ 1826 


of light, telling from whence they come. While they announce beforehand who 
they are, and use the most touching entreaties to prevent wrong, they declare 
it will be theirs afterwards to avenge that wrong if done ;—while they leave 
no secret as to their awful mission, they gently plead by all the powers that 
persuasion can give, that vengeance may not be theirs to inflict. The memo- 
ries they recall are not of early guilt, but of early innocence—of periods when 
no mad or polluted comrade stood by, inciting to ruin, but some tender friend 
or relative, uttering counsels of love. They paint not the pleasures of guilt, 
but its misery, and they point to scenes of peace to which guilt cannot reach. 
It is not theirs to avenge until their final entreaties are exhausted; and when 
at last they hurry away to give their last report, he whose guilt is disclosed 
cannot but say: ‘This, your office of exposure as well as of restraint I knew 
beforehand. You told me this—you told me that my sin, if unchecked, would 
find itself out.” 

It is here that the presumptions from this agency rise a step higher than 
those from an earthly police. The latter tells of a government, comprehensive, 
sagacious, and just, so far as its general object of punishing crime is con- 
cerned, but of a government which at the same time deals in punishment alone, 
and that by instruments which are often as polluted as the evils they are to 
correct. The former tells of a government, austere it is true, yet very tender; 
moving to holiness through holiness; permeating not merely the outer life, 
but the secrets of the heart; everywhere warning and entreating, while every- 
where judging; making punishment certain and terrible, and yet so working 
it up into the consequences of the criminal’s voluntary act as to render it his 
own choice. So it is that while a police of mere detection and exposure 
argues an executive of mere power, a police of love argues an exccutive of 
mercy; a police that is omnipresent, an executive that is omnipresent; a police 
that for a time entreats, warns and dissuades, an executive that recognizes a 
temporary probation ; a police that ultimately and irrevocably avenges, an 
executive that after a free probation judges definitely and finally. It is here 
we have brought before us the elements of that Christian Providence which 
the courts invoke as the foundation of public justice. In crime itself, there- 
fore, we find the proof of that chief magistrate who avenges crime. 

So it is that while the court-house derives its sanctions from this Supreme 
Power, it contributes to the proof of the existence of this Power an inde- 
pendent share of evidence. No witness can be sworn until he declares his 
belief in a future state of rewards and punishments; no trial can take place 
without strengthening the evidence on which this state rests. Human justice 
falls back on divine for its support; divine justice appeals to human as its 
witness. The penal precepts of the common law professedly find their basis 
in the dictates of an enlightened Christian conscience; the divine sanction of 
this conscience is nowhere so fully shown as in the course of a trial at com- 
mon law. The present discussion will not be without its value, if by illustrat- 
ing these truths, it shows how close is the connection between the divine law 
and the human; and how the science of jurisprudence, while it draws down 
its strength from heaven to earth, may still, if rightly studied, lead its votaries 
from earth to heaven. 

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TENG OE x. 


ABDOMEN, enlargement of the, 3 279. 
wounds of the, 23 860-865. 
Abortion, or Feeticide, 33 885-3855. 
natural causes of, 2 336. 
signs of, 23 346-355. 
legal relations of, see ‘* Homicide.” 
Abstinence, prolonged instances of, 3 889. 
Acetate of lead, poisoning by, 23 648, 644. 
Acetic acid, 3 549. 
fatal results from, 3 549. 
Acid in general, 33 519-550. 
arsenious, ¢2 572-611. 
arsenic, 3 613. 
hydrochloric, 33 586, 539. 
tests for, 2 702. 
nitric, 33 5380-535. 
prussic, 33 705-721. 
sulphuric, 32 519-529. 
tartaric, 3 548. 
Aconite, poisoning by, 33 761-764. 
symptoms in poisoning by, 33 761, 762. 
tests for, 2 764. 
Age, in relation to impotence, ¢3 424, 425. 
relative to identity, 3 474. 
Aidoiomania, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Alcohol, poisoning by, ¢ 7384. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 3 787. 
symptoms in poisoning by, 2 734 
Ale, supposed presence of strychnia in, 3 760. 
ALKALINE poisons, 33 551-560. 
Almonds, oil of bitter, 23 721, 722. 
Ammonia, poisoning by, ¢ 554. 
tests for, 3 556. 
Anger, how to be distinguished from Mental Unsoundness, see, ‘* Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Animal blood, distinguished from human, 23 8380, 831. 
Antimony, chloride of, 3 658. 
in organic mixtures, detection of, 3 656. 
Apoplexy, distinction from narcotic poisoning, 3 512. 
Apricot kernels, poisoning by, 3 724. 
Aqua fortis, 23 580-535 
tofana, 3 578. 
Areola, as a sign of pregnancy, ¢ 285. 
Arsenic acid, 3 612. 
Arsenic, chemical examination in poisoning by, 22 592-611. 
chronic poisoning by, @ 579. 
delay in the symptoms of poisoning by, 2 574. 
eaters, 3 496. 
effect of on the putrefactive process, 33 587-591. 
elimination of from the system, 3 589. 
found in the body after long periods, 33 590, 610. 
in organic mixtures, detection of, 33 607, 608. 
in the soil of cemeteries, 23 610, 611. 


64 1009 


INDEX. 


Arsenic, in the viscera, detection of, 23 607-609. 
‘ intermission in the symptoms of poisoning by, ¢ 575. 
liquid tests for, 33 597-601. 
metallic, 3 571. 
odor when heated, ? 592. 
poisoning by external application of, 32 580, 581. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, ¢¢ 582-584. 
properties of, ¢ 572. 
secondary effects of, 3 579. 
smallest quantity fatal, 33 585, 586. 
solubility of, 3 572. 
suboxide of, ¢ 612. 
sulphuret of, 2 615. 
symptoms of poisoning by, 22 573-581. 
taste of, 9 572. 
test by reduction of, 22 593-596. 
Arsenical and antimonial stains, @ 604. 
ring, ¢3 593-696. 
Arsenious acid, 23 572-611. 
Arseniuretted hydrogen, 2 616. 
Arsenite of copper, 22 618, 619. 
of potash, 3 617. 
of soda, ¢ 614. 
Artery, carotid, ruptured in hanging, ¢ 913. 
Asylums, structure of, for insane criminals, see ‘* Criminals.” 
Atelectasis, distinction from pneumonia, ¢ 366. 
pulmonum, ¢ 365. 
Atropia, poisoning by, 3 777. 
Autopsy, see ‘* Homicide.” 
how to be made, ¢3 986-1002. 


Ballottement, 3 287. 
Barium, chloride of, 3 557. 
Baryta, carbonate of, 3 558. 
poisoning by, 22 557-560. 
tests for, 4 560. 
Beale, Dr., case of, ¢ 443. 
Beef, smoked, poisoning by, ¢ 685. 
Belladonna, poisoning by, 3 776. 
Bernard, St., Hospice of Mount, 4 486. 
Bernt, Prof., on signs of live-birth, 3 363. 
Binoxalate of potash, 3 543. 
tests for, 3 547. 
Bischoff, on Corpora Lutea, ¢ 299. 
Bismuth, subnitrate of, poisoning by, 3 667. 
Bitter almonds, essential oil of, 23 721, 722. 
oil of, symptoms of poisoning by, 3 722. 
poisoning by, ¢ 715. 
strength of oil of, 3 728. 
Bladder, wounds of the, ¢ 863. 
Blindness, how far connected with mental unsoundness, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Blood, arterial and venous, distinguished, 3 828. 
coagulation of after death, 3 799. 
corpuscles of man and animals, 2 831. 
extravasation of, in wounds, 3 802. 
menstrual characters of, ¢ 828. 
microscopical characters of, 3 831. 
stains of, 72 820-831. 
chemical examination of, 2 821. 
color of, 3 820. 
human distinguished from others, 33 822, 825, 827. 
microscopical evidence, 2 831. 
on clothing, &c., 2 820. 
presence of fibrin in, 3 829. 
legal presumption from, see ‘‘Homictde.” 
test by odor of, 3 880. 
Bocarmé case, 3 749. 
Brain, concussion of the, 2 847. 
extravasation of blood upon the, 3 851. 


1010 


INDEX. 


Brain, wounds of the, 23 849, 850. 
Bromine, fatal results from, 4 566. , 
properties of, 3 566. 
Burned, post-mortem appearances in the, 2 873. 
wounds upon the, ¢¢ 870, 871. 

Burnett, Sir William’s disinfecting fluid, 3 662. 
Burns and scalds, 23 866-878. 

division of, 2 866. 

effects upon the system, 3 872. 

upon the dead body, appearance of, 77 867, 868, 869. 


Cadaveric changes affecting the evidence from wounds, 23 805, 806. 
lividity, characters of, 3 806. 
phenomena, ¢ 797. 
Camphor, poisonous effects of large doses, 33 738, 739. 
Cancrum oris, 33 633-639. 
Cantharides, smallest quantity fatal, 2 679. 
symptoms in poisoning by, 3 670. 
poisoning by, generally, 22 677-680. 
post-mortem appearance in poisoning by, 2 680. 
Carbonic acid gas, appearances after death by, 3 783. 
properties of, 22 782, 785, 786. 
symptoms of poisoning by, ¢ 782. 
source of, 3 785. 
Carbonic oxide, poisonous properties of, 3 785, note. 
Castor seeds and beans, fatal results from, 2 672. 
Castration, a cause of impotence, 3 420. 
Catamenia, suppression of the, 3 278. 
Cedar oil, poisoning by, 2 766. 
Cerebral matter, microscopical characters, 2 832. 
Cheese, poisoning by, 3 686. 
Cherry, laurel water, 3 726. 
Chest, wounds of the, 37 855-859. 
Child, active movements of, 2 288. 
killing of, see ‘* Homicide.” 
new-born, causes of death in the, 32 379-405. 
Chlorine, poisoning by, 3 570. 
Chloroform and Ether, 22 728-783. 
as facilitating felonious assaults, 2 733. 
criminal employment of, ¢ 733. 
means for detection of, ¢ 742. 
means for prevention of accidents from, 3 732, note. 
poisonous effects of, 3 729. 
post-mortem appearances in death by, 2 731. 
Cholera, distinction from irritant poisoning, 3 506. 
morbus, distinction from irritant poisoning, 3 507. 
Cicatrices, disappearance of, 3 482. 
identification from, 3 482. 
Circumstantial evidence, see ‘‘ Homicide.” 
Coagulation of blood in wounds, 3 799. 
Cocculus Indicus, poisoning by, 24 773-775. 
Coercion, how far affecting acts of imbeciles, see ‘‘Contracts.” 
Coition, 22 812-314, see ‘‘Rape.” 
Colchicum autumnale, 33 669, 670. 
detection of after death, % 670. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 2 669. 
smallest quantity fatal, 2 669. 
symptoms in poisoning by, 2 669. 
Cold, as retarding putrefaction, ¢ 486. 
death from, 34 885-887 
post-mortem appearances in death from, 2 886. 
Color of the neck in hanging, 23 911, 912. 
Combustion, ordinary, characters of, 22 876, 877. 
spontaneous, 72 874-879. 
Commissions of Lunacy— 
What is necessary to be proved, in order to deprive a party of the management of his 
estate, 32 40. 
When a party is incapable, the practice is to appoint a committee, who take the 
alleged lunatic’s place, 3 41. 


1011 


INDEX. 


In what way the question of lunacy, under such circumstances, is tried, 3 42. 
General and not partial incompetency must be shown, 3 42. 
The test is, is the respondent capable of managing his own estate? @ 42. 
What in such cases is required of medical witnesses, 3 43. 
The same process lies in cases of habitual drunkenness, 2 44. 
The test here is, is there a fixed habit of drunkenness? 2 44. 
Compression, effect of, on inflated lungs, 3 372, 
Compulsion, how far affecting acts of imbeciles, see ‘‘Contracts.”’ 
Conicine or Conia, 7 755. 
Conception, time of, 22 807, 318. 
Concussion of the brain, ¢ 847. 
distinguished from intoxication, % 847. 
Confectionery, colored, poisoning by, ee 618, 619, 650. 
Confessions, see ‘‘ Psychical Indications.” 
Contracts or Wills— 
What degree of unsoundness invalidates, ¢ 2. 
As to lunatics or idiots, 3 2. 
General legal principle is, that contracts or wills of idiots or lunatics will 
not be enforced. 
Cases where there is a sufficient degree of sanity to create responsibility for 
crime, and yet when a contract or will will be avoided. 
Imbecility generally, and herein of fraud and compulsion. 
Fraud itself vitiates a contract, and in this the contracting party’s intellect 
becomes an essential item for consideration, ¢ 3. 
Lord Portsmouth’s case, 3 38. 
Acts and contracts of persons of weak understanding will be held void, 
when such persons have been imposed upon by cunning or undue in- 
fluence, @ 4. 
In cases of wills this is peculiarly the case, 3 5. 
The testator must have had a disposing memory, 2 5. 
Over-importunity of controlling friends may destroy capacity, @ 5. 
The question in reference to contracts and wills does not depend upon 
mere subjective capacity, and ‘hence no positive definition can be 
given, @ 6. 
Idiocy, to make it a positive incapacity, must be shown to have been ac- 
companied with business disability, 3 7. 
The question of capacity will be greatly affected by the reasonableness or 
unreasonableness of the act attempted to be set aside, @ 8. 
The inquiry in many cases is, whether the testator or grantor had capacity 
or information enough to comprehend and disregard any attempt at 
fraud or coercion, @ 9. 
Difficulties in such cases.from conflict of medical opinion, @ 9. 
A distinction is taken between the cases where the Court is asked to annul 
an executed contract, and where it is asked to execute an wnexecuted 
one, 2 11. 
agile i intellect, from extreme old age, works a disability, 3 12. 
But great caution should be exercised in this respect, the object being to 
protect old age, not to render it still more defenceless, ¢ 12. 
How far the deaf and dumb are thereby incompetent, @ 13. 
Partial Insanity, 2 14. 
Rule in this country is, that unless the contested act is the product of an 
insane delusion, it is not vitiated by it, 3 14. 
The present English rule, however, seems to be that the existence of an 
insane delusion destroys testamentary capacity altogether, 2 16. 
Opinion of Lord Brougham on this point, 2 17. 
Objections to this view, 3 18. 
Compatibility of hallucinations with sound disposing memory, @ 19. 
Instances of existence of hallucinations in persons otherwise sane, ¢ 21. 
Lucid Intervals. 
When habitual insanity is shown, the presumption is, that the act was com- 
mitted in an insane period, ¢ 33. 
The character of the act goes a great way in determining whether it was 
committed in a lucid interval, 3 35. 
Intoxication. 
When actually existing renders a party civilly incompetent. 
A party, however, cannot use his drunkenness as a means of imposition, 
Q 36. 
Difference in this respect between executed and unexecuted contracis, 
g 37. 


1012 


INDEX. 


In actions for torts, drunkenness is no defence on the merits. 
Drunkenness avoids a will when acted on by fraud or imposition, 3 38. 
Copper coins, poisoning by, 2 651. 
in organic mixtures, detection of, @ 652. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 3 649. 
salts of, 73 648-652. 
symptoms of poisoning by, 3 648. 
tests for, 3 652. 
utensils, poisoning from the use of, 2 650. 
Cord, mark of, in hanging, 22 910-913. 
umbilical, compression of and by, 2 880. 
Corpus delicti, see ‘* Homicide,” 
luteum, 22 297-301. 
two varieties of, 32 298, 299. 
Corrosive sublimate, chemical tests for, 22 624-629. 
elimination from the system, 39 628, 629. 
in organic mixtures, detection of, 3 626. 
poisoning by, 24 620-629. 
poisoning by external use of, 3 623. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, ¢ 622. 
properties of, 2 620. 
smallest fatal quantity, @ 621. 
symptoms of poisoning by, 2 621. 
Conium maculatum, 243 753, 754. 
Cretinism, see ‘‘ Mental Unsowndness.” 
Crime, responsibility for, see ‘* Responsibility for Crime.” 
Criminals, insane treatment of, 3 259. 
Necessity of separate places of confinement in which insane criminals can 
be placed, 3 259. 
For Retribution, 3 260. 
In most, if not all, cases of crime resulting from insane impulse, 
there is original responsibility, 3 260. 
Insanity, in most cases, the result of moral excess, 23 261-9. 
Qualified responsibility of lunatics, 32 261-9. 
For Prevention, 2 270. 
Mischief to society if monomaniacs are suffered to go at large, 
270 


Necessity of restraint, 3 271. 
For Example, 3 272. 

Contagiousness of unchecked crime, 3 272. 
For Reform, ¢ 278. 

Impossibility of patient ay AR when permitted to run at 
large, 3 273. 

Injury to the community ae the want of secondary punish- 
ments, the result being acquittals of dangerous parties, 
from an unwillingness to see the severer penalties inflicted, 
@ 274. 

Ordinary penitentiaries inadequate, 3 275. 

And so of ordinary lunatic asylums, ¢ 276. 

Gpaniae of potassium, poisoning by, 3 727. 


Dalton, Dr., on Corpora Lutea, 3 299. 
Datura stramonium, poisoning by, 3 745. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 3 746. 
Dead, exhalations from the, 2 791. 
Deaf and dumb, how far competent to make contracts, see “Contracts,” ** Mental Unsound- 
ness.” 
Deafness, how far connected with mental unsoundness, see ‘* Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Deformities, identification from, 3 479. 
Death, length of time since, 3 484. 
signs of: 

Cessation of the respiration and circulation, 3 943. 

Filmy aspect of the eyes, 3 944. 

Pallor of the body, 3 945. 

Extinction of animal heat, 3 946. 

Relaxation of the muscles, ¢ 947. 

Relaxation of the cornea, ? 948. 

Flattening of the fleshy parts, 3 949. 


10138 


INDEX. 


‘Death, signs of: 
Suggillations, 2 950. 
External, 2 951. 
Internal, 3 952. 
Lungs, 3 952. 
Brain, ¢ 958. 
Kidneys and intestines, 7 954. 
Heart, 3 955. 
Cadaveric rigidity, 3 956. 
Putrefaction, 3 957. 
fat, &c., 3 958. 
woman after child-birth, 3 959. 
newly-born infants, 7 960. 
manner of death, 2 961. 
effect of external agents, 3 962. 
exposure in open air, ¢ 962. 
moisture, 3 963. 
heat, 3 964. 
external signs, 3 965. 
Saponification, 3 966. 
Mummification, 3 967. 
Decomposition of internal organs, 3 968. 
windpipe, ? 969. 
brain of infants, 3 970. 
stomach, ¢ 971. 
intestinal canal, 2 972. 
spleen, ¢ 978. 
omentum and mesentery, 3 974. 
liver, 3 975. 
brain of grown persons, 3 976. 
heart, 3 977. 
lungs, ¢ 978. 
kidneys, 3 979. 
urinary bladder, 3 980. 
oesophagus, ? 981. 
pancreas, 3 982. 
diaphragm, 2 983. 
arteries, 2 984. 
uterus, ¢ 985. 
Decomposition in coffins, 43 489, 490. 
progress of, after death by drowning, 3 939 d seq. 
in vaults, ¢ 490. 
Delirium, see ‘* Mental Unsoundness.” 
Delivery, feigned, 2 301. 
protracted, ¢ 384. 
sigus of, 73 292-301. 
in the dead, 23 296-801. 
unconscious, 3 402. 
Delusions, how far affecting civil capacity, see ‘‘ Contracts,” see generally ‘‘ Mental Un- 
soundness.” 
Dementia, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Demono-mania, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Depression, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Derangement, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Development of foetus, premature, 2 326. 
Diaphragm, wounds of the, 3 862. 
Digitalis, poisoning by, 2 778. 
poisonous properties of, 3 778. 
Disease, as modifying the action of poisons, 3 497. 
Doubtful Sex, 22 406-414. 
Drastic purgatives, fatal results from, ¢ 671. 
Drowning, see ‘* Homicide.” 
changes in body after death by, 2 939. 
floating of body after, 3 929. 
homicidal or suicidal, 2 942. 
in shallow water, ¢ 941. 
mode of death by, 2 927. 
of new-born child, 3 399. 
rapidity of death by, ¢ 928. 


1014 


INDEX. 


Drowning, signs of death by, 32 9380, 937. 
Drunkenness, ga fee affecting -civil capacity, see ‘‘ Contracts,” ‘‘ Commissions of 
unacy.’ 
how far affecting responsibility for crime, see ‘‘ Responsibility for Crime.” 
Ductus arteriosus, 33 362, 363. 
Dumb, how far civilly incapacitated, see ** Contracts,” ‘* Mental Unsoundness. u 
Dumbness, how far connected with mental unsoundness, see ‘* Mental Unsoundness.” 
Duration of pregnancy. Legal decisions, 3 322. 
statistical results, 2 314. 


Early viability, 33 323-378-1217. 
Ecchymosis, caused by umbilical cord, 3 882. 

from natural causes, 3 805. 

in wounds, 27 802-4. 
Emphysema, an objection to hydrostatic test, 3 371. 
Ergot, 3 336. 
Erysipelas from wounds, 2 841. 
Ether and chloroform, physical effects of, 3 448, note (q). 
Etherization, external phenomena of, 3 730. 
Evidence, circumstantial, in wound, 23 81819-1141 1212. 

of violence, see “ Homicide. ee 

Examinations, medico-legal, how to be conducted, 3 948 et seqg., and 2 6595. 
Examination of the body in death from wounds, 3 796. 
Excusable homicide, see ‘‘ Homicide.” 
Execution by hanging, anomalous case of, 3 910, note (x). 
Exhalations from the dead, 3 791. 
Experiments upon animals, in proof of poisoning, 3 504. 
Experts, Medical, testimony of in cases of insanity, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Exposure of new-born child, 3 394. 


Face, wounds of the, 3 852. 
Fanatico-mania, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Feigned insanity, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
, Fish, poisonous, 3 687. 
Fly poison, accidents from, 3 571. 
Foetal channels of circulation, 3 862, 363. 
Foetal heart, pulsation of, 3 289. 
Feeticide, see ‘‘ Homicide.” 
Foetus, age of, 22 823-24, 352. 

blighted, 23 331-88. 

first movement of, 33 282-84. 

putrefaction in the, 3 491. 

size of, 33 828, 352. 

weight of, 23 323, 352. 
Foramen ovale, 33 362, 363. 
Fractures, identification from, 3 479. 

of the skull, 2 848, 
during birth, 2 380. 
in delivery, 3 392. 

Fraud, how far affecting acts of imbecile, see ‘* Contracts.” 
Friction matches, poisoning by, 2 562. 
Fungi, poisoning by, 33 673-76. 


Gardner peerage case, 2 310, note. 
Gases evolved in human decomposition, 3 490. 
Gastritis, as a result of poisoning, ¢ 511. 
Genital organs, wounds of the, 3 865. 
condition of in hanging, 3 914. 

Gestation, protracted, 3 303. 

see ‘* Homicide.” 
Goerlitz case, 3 877, note (v). 
Gold, terchloride of, ? 664. 
Grief, how to be distinguished from mental unsoundness, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Gunshot wounds, #2 811, 815. 

character of, 22 811, 815. 


Habit, as modifying the action of poisons, 3 496. 
Habitual drunkenness, see ‘‘ Commissions of Lunacy.” 
Haschich, composition of, 3 742. 


1015 


INDEX. 


‘Hair, fraudulent discoloration of the, 3 483. 
identification by means of the, 3 483. 
mode of identifying, 2 832. 
Hallucination, see ** Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Hanging, see ‘‘ Homicide.” 
before or after death, 3 909. 
mark of the cord, 33 910-13. 
death by, 3.907. 
cause of death in, 3 907. 
signs of death by, ¢ 908. 
rupture of carotid artery in, 3 918. 
suicidal and homicidal distinguished, 32 915-26. 
Head, injuries of the, 32 847-51. 
Heart, pulsation of foetal, 3 289. 
rupture of the, 3 859. 
wounds of the, 22 857, 858. 
Heat, as a cause of putrefaction, 3 485. 
as retarding putrefaction, 3 486. 
death from, 32 880, 881. 
Hemlock, poisonous properties of, 33 753, 754. 
Hemorrhage, as evidence of the vital origin of a wound, 3 800. 
constitutional tendency to, 3 884. 
from umbilical cord, 3 836. 
internal, 3 834. 
secondary, 3 843. 
Hereditary tendency to mental unsoundness, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Hernia, as a cause of impotence, 2 428. 
Hermaphroditism, 23 406-14. 
female, 7 409. 
male, 3 408. 
real, 3 410. 
surgical interference in, 3 414. . 
Hodge, Prof., on criminal abortion, 3 341, note (y). 
Home-sickness, how to be distinguished from mental unsoundness, see ‘* Mental Unsound- * 
ness.” 
Homicide in its legal relations. 
elementary definitions, 3 1008. 
Murder, ¢ 1005. 
General definition of, 2 1005-7. 
Malice the essential ingredient, 3 1006. 
Malice either express or implied, 3 1006. 
When malice to be presumed. 
Murder from general malice, 3 1006. 
When homicide is committed from general malevolence it is murder, 
2 1006. 
But when from wantonness, but manslaughter, 3 1006. 
Murder from individual malice, 3 1007. 
In reference to the party killed, 4 1007. 
How such malice to be proved, 3 1007. 
In what it consists by the civil and common law, 3 1007. 
Intent to kill, 3 1008. 
In this case the offence is always murder, 2 1008. 
How such intent may be proved, ¢ 1009. 
Declarations and acts of defendant admissible for this purpose, 
22 1009, 1156, 1173. 
Intent to do bodily harm, 2 1010. 
In this country such homicide generally is murder in the second 
degree, ¢ 1010. 
The grade therefore depends on the intent, 3 1010. 
In reference to the party killed, when the blow falls on the deceased 
by mistake, 7 1011. 
When in an attempt to produce abortion, the mother is unintentionally 
killed, 2 1011. 
From collateral malice, 3 1012. 
This includes those cases where the malice is directed to an object other 
than that of human life or limb, 3 1012. 
Manslaughter, 3 1018. 
General definition of, 3 1013. 
_ Involuntary manslaughter, 3 1014. 


1016 


INDEX. 


Homicide. 
Excusable homicide, § 1015. 
Where a man doing a lawful act, without any intention of hurt, by accident 
kills another, 3 1015. 
Where a man kills another in self-defence, 3 1015. 
The distinction between excusable and justifiable homicide, is in this coun- 
try merely theoretical, 3 1016. 
Justifiable homicide, 3 1017. 
When committed by unavoidable necessity, 3 1017. 
When committed in advancement of public justice, 2 1017. 
Murder in the second degree, 1018. 
Object of distinction is the restriction of capital punishment to those cases 
only in which there is an intent to take life, 22 1018-19. 
The distinguishing feature between the two degrees is a specific intent to 
take life, 44 1018-19-20. 
Homicide by poisoning not necessarily murder in the first degree, 3 1023. 
Homicide collateral to rape, robbery, &c., is necessarily murder in the 
first degree, 3 1021. 
Homicide of A., when the intent was to kill B., is murder in the second 
degree, 3 1022. 
Specific intent to take life to be inferred from circumstantial evidence, and 
from declarations, &c., 3 1028. 
- Corpus delicti. 
That a death took place, 2 1024. 
Universal rule of civil and common law, that the fact of death should be 
proved, ¢ 1024. 
Identification of dead body, see 3 473, &c. 
Cases of conviction of innocent parties, from neglect of this precaution, 22 
1024-6. 
Exceptions to the rule, 3 1027. 
Possession of body is unnecessary when decease is proved by eye- 
witnesses, 3 1027. 
And so where it is proved that the body was destroyed by chemical 
or mechanical agents, 3 1028. 
Webster’s case reported, 3 1029. 
That the death was from violence. 
It must appear that it was not natural, 33 833-846. 
How autopsy to be conducted, 34 947-962, 1002, n. 
Poisoning. 
Measures to be taken by the prosecution when poisoning is sus- 
pected, 2 1084. i 
Chemical proof of poison in stomach not essential, 31092. (See 
22 493-791.) 
Importance of chemical examination of stomach and its contents, 
21093. (See, as to nature and character of post-mortem, 
2@ 501-508, 514, 515, 516, 522, 532, 5387, 544, 568, 582, 
622, 646, 649, 654, 669, 684, 700, 716, 731, 746, 748, 768, 
772, 2 1002, n.) 
When, however, this is prevented by the accused, he cannot set 
up the want of it, 3 1098. 
On the other hand, neglect by the prosecution to procure it, if in 
its power, is a powerful presumption in favor of the accused, 
2 1098. 
Summary of reported cases in the common law courts, 2 1095. 
Donellan’s case, 1781, 2 1098. 
Donnall’s case, 1817, 2 1097. 
Anonymous, 1835, 3 1098. 
Chapman’s case, 1831, ¢ 1100. 
Tawell’s case, 1825, 3 1102. 
Graham’s case, 1845, 3 1108. 
Hartung’s case, 1854, 2 1105. 
Palmer’s case, 3 1110. 
Facts on which a verdict of guilty can be supported, 3 1120. 
Duties of counsel for prosecution and defence, 3 1125. 
Wounds and blows, 2 1127. 
Legal definition of wounds, 3 1127. 
Under what circumstances wounds imply criminal agency, 3 1130. 
Character of the wounds themselves, 2 11380. 
Adaptation to a particular instrument, 3 1130. 


1017 


INDEX. 


‘Homicide—Corpus Delicti. 
Shape and direction, 7 1132. 
Particular class, 3 11383. 
Gunshot, ¢ 11383. 
Punctured, 3 1134. 
Incised, ¢ 1135. 
Contused, 3 1136. 
Number, 3 11387. 
Situation, @ 1188. 
Expression of countenance, 2 1139. 
Inferences from surrounding objects, 2 1140. 
Clothing, 2 1140. 
Agent commensurate to the effect, 3 1141. 
Place where found, ¢ 1142. 
Position and appearance of the body, ¢ 1151. 
Attitude, 3 1151. 
Marks of blood, ¢ 1152. 
Bruises, 2 1153. 
Probability of infliction of injury before death, 3 1154. 
: Connection of the wound with the death, 3 1155. 
Intent and design, from what to be inferred, 3 1156. 
Prior attempts, preparations, and threats, 4 1156. 
Evidence of such always admissible, 72 1156-7. 
And so as to obtaining instruments of mischief, and possession of them, 
@ 1157. 
Cases illustrative of this, 34 1158-9. 
Threats to be received for the same purpose, 3 1158. 
Cases illustrative of this, 3 1160. 
Marks of violence, ¢ 1161. 
Presumptions to be drawn from such, ¢ 1162. 
Presumptions to be drawn from nature of gunshot wounds, 2 811. 
It must appear that the alleged violence was the cause of death, either in 
part or in whole, 3 1168. 
Distinction between wounds made before and after death, 33 798, 804. 
Blood-stains, 37 820-831. 
Suicidal or homicidal, 33 810, 816. 
Instrument of death, 2 1164. 
The use of a lethal instrument leads to the presumption that death was 
intended, ¢ 1164. 
Suicide may be inferred.from the position of the weapon, ¢ 1165. 
Other presumptions to be drawn from es of death, 22 819, 1166-7. 
Liability of deceased to attack, 23 1166-7. 
Possession of money, 2 1170. 
Avarice and ambition, 3 1170. 
Old grudge, ¢ 1178. 
Jealousy, 3 1174. 
Position of deceased, 22 946, 1152. 
Presumption to be drawn from this as to suicide, 22 819, 1151. 
In cases of hanging, ¢¢ 907, 926. 
Tn cases of drowning, ¢ 9388. 
In cases of poisoning, 3 1175. 
Materials appropriate to be converted into instruments of crime, § 1177. 
Importance of indicatory evidence in this respect, 3 1177. 
Purchase of poison and powder; preparation of other materials, 3 1177. 
Detached circumjacent bodies, 3 1178. 
Dress of deceased; footprints; presumptions to be drawn from the latter, 
22 1180-1-2. 
Detached articles of clothing, 3 1181. 
Wadding of gun, &c., 3 1181. 
Cases illustrative of the importance of this species of evidence, 2 1185, &e. 
Possession of fruits of offence, ¢ 1193. 
Illustration of the general value of indicatory evidence, 2 1194, &c. 
Infanticide and foeticide, 3 1195. (See, for the medical view of this subject, 22 335, 


How far foeticide is affected by the degree to which gestation has proceeded, 
@ 1195. 

At common law, destruction of an unborn infant isa misdemeanor. Late 

differences of opinion as to whether there must be a quickening. 


1018 


INDEX. 


Homicide—Infanticide—Corpus Delicti. 
Better opinion is, that all attempts of this character are misdemean- 
ors, no matter what be the stage of gestation, 22 1195-97. 
How far the offence is affected by the fact of birth, 3 1202. 
When a child dies after birth, from a wound inflicted before, the offence is 
murder; when the death takes place before birth, it is at common law 
but a misdemeanor, 72 1203-4. 
Tests of viability recognized by the courts, 3 1204. 
Viability medically considered, 32 356, 378. 
Time of gestation, see 34 310, 827. 
Difference of opinion as to actual degree of birth which is requisite to con- 
stitute the legal offence, 3 1205. 
General propositions of law bearing on this topic :— 

Where there is a malicious wound inflicted on an infant, with intent 
to produce death, and death ensues after birth, the offence is 
murder, 3 1205. 

Where there is a malicious exposure of an infant, with intent to pro- 
duce death, and death ensues after birth, it is murder, 3 1205. 

Where there is a wanton exposure of an infant, without the intent to 
procure death, but with the expectation of shifting the support 
of the infant upon some third person, and death ensues after 
birth, it is manslaughter, 3 1205. 

Where there is an exposure resulting from necessity, ignorance, or 
insanity, and death ensues after birth, the offence is excusable 
homicide, in which, in accordance with American practice, the 
defendant is entitled to an acquittal, 34 1205-8. 

Corpus delicti in infanticide, Z 1208. 
Difficulties arising in this respect from— 

The uncertainty of the fact of pregnancy, 3 1208. (See 33 310, 329.) 

The uncertainty of the time of death, 2 1208. 

Uncertainty of presumptions, ¢ 1208. 

Casualties of gestation and delivery, 3.1208. (See this subject medi- 
cally considered, ¢3 379, 398.) 

Homicidal insanity, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness,” ‘‘Responsibility for Crime.” 
Hospital gangrene, from wounds, ? 842. 

Human blood, distinguished from animal, 23 830, 831. 

Hydatids, description of, 33 847, 348. 

Hydrochloric acid, 37 5386-539. 

chemical examination in poisoning by, 2 588. 

post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, ? 5387. 

symptoms of poisoning by, ? 536. 

Hydrocyanic, see ‘‘Prussic Acid.” 
Hydrocele, as a cause of impotence, 3 423. 
Hydrogen, arseniuretted, 2 616. 
Hydrostatic lung-test, 2 370. 
objections to the, 23 371-375. 
Hymen, evidence from, in cases of rape, 27 429, 480, 482, 447, 448. 
Hyoscyamus, poisoning by, 23 740, 741. 
Hypochondria, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Hysteria, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.” 


Identification of the dead, 33 474-492. 
by what marks, 22 1223-5. 
of the living, 3 473. 
legal relations of identity— 
appearance, ¢ 1218. 
voice, 3 1219. 
marks, 3 1220. 
portraits, &c., 3 1221. 
presence in neighborhood, ¢ 1222. 
suspicious circumstances, 3 1223. 
Identity, questions relative to, 33 473-492. 
disputed, ¢ 473. 
See ‘‘Homicide,” ‘‘Corpus Delicti.” 
Idiocy, how far avoiding contract or will, see ‘‘Contract,” *‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Idiosyncrasy, as modifying the action of poisons, 3 495. 
Illuminating gas, accidents from, ¢ 788. 
Imbecility, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
how far avoids contract or will, see ‘‘Contract.”’ 


1019 


INDEX. 


Immaturity of the foetus, signs of, 3 354. 
Impotence, causes of, 72 416-419-424, 
Indicatory evidence, see ‘‘Homicide.” 
Indigo, sulphate of, 2 529. 
Infanticide— 
Infanticide generally, 23 356-405. 
by drowning, 3 399. 
exposure, ¢ 394. 
poisoning, 2 404. 
strangulation, 3 398. 
suffocation, 2 896. 
wounds, 2 400. 
in its legal relations, see ‘* Homicide.” 
Inflation, artificial, an objection to hydrostatic test, 3 372. 
distinguished from imperfect respiration, 3 374. 
practicability of, 32 372-373. 
Ink, poisoning by, ¢ 525. 
Insanity, see ‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Insane criminals, treatment of, see *‘Criminals.” 
delusions, how far affecting civil capacity, see “Contracts,” see generally “ Mental 
Unsoundness.” 
persons, how far capable of making contracts or wills, see ‘‘Contracts.”’ 
Insemination and conception, 2 318. 
Intent and design, see ‘‘Homicide.”? 
Intercourse, single act of, 22 312, 314. 
Intervals, lucid, how far affecting testamentary capacity, see ‘‘Contract.” 
Intoxication, how far affecting civil capacity, see ‘“Contracts.” ‘‘Commissions of Lunacy.” 
How far it affects responsibility for crime, 3 62. 
Insanity produced by delirium tremens affects responsibility in the same way as 
insanity produced by any other cause, 2 62. 
Insanity immediately produced by intoxication, does not destroy responsibility 
where the patient, when sane and responsible, made himself voluntarily in- 
toxicated, 3 66. 
While intoxication is per se no defence to the fact of guilt, yet when the question 
of intent or premeditation is concerned, it is material for the purpose of de- 
termining the precise degree, 3 70. 
Iodine, poisoning by, 3 567 
tests for, 3 569. 
Iron, chloride of, poisoning by, 3 666. 
sulphate of, poisoning by, 2 665. 
tests for, 23 665, 666. 
Irritant poisons, 3 519-690. 
Irritants, animal, 22 677-689. 
mechanical, 3 690. 
metalloidal, 73 561, 570. 
vegetable, 23 669-676. 


Jackson, Dr., description of gangreenopsis, 3 637. 
Justifiable homicide, see ‘‘Homicide.”’ 


Kiestein in the urine, 3 291. 
Kleptomania, see ‘* Mental Unsoundness.” 
Krahmer, Prof., on duration of pregnancy, 33 317, 318. 


Labor, induction of premature, 23 842, 344. 

Labor, precipitate, 2 387. 

Lactucarium, 2 743. 

Lead, chronic poisoning by, 22 641-645. 
constitutional effects of, 22 641-645. 
in the tissues, detection of, 3 647. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 3 646. 
salts, poisoning by, 22 640, 641. 
tests for, 3 647. 

Legitimacy, presumption of, 3 802. 

Leucorrhea, 32 485, 486. 

Lighting gas, accidents from, ¢ 788. ‘ 

gas, appearances after death by, 2 788. 


1020 


INDEX. 


Lightning, death from, 2 883. 
post-mortem appearances in death by, 2 884. 
Lime, its influence upon putrefaction, 3 492. 
Linea Alba, discoloration of the, 3 280. 
Live-birth, signs of, 24 327, 358, 368. 
tests of, 22 869-378. 
Liver, wounds of the, 2 861. 
Living, identification of, 2 478. 
Lobelia inflata, poisoning by, 2 765. 
Lockjaw, from wounds, 2 840. 
Lucid intervals, how far affecting civil capacity, see ‘Contracts ;”—see generally ‘Mental 
Unsoundness.”’ 
Lunacy, commission of, see ‘Commissions of Lunacy.” 
Lunar caustic, poisoning by, 3 664 
Lunatico inquirendo, see ‘Commission of Lunacy.” 
Lunatics, how far capable of making contracts or wills, see ‘‘ Contracts.” 
characteristics of, generally—see ‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Lungs of new-born child, 3 361. 
of stillborn children, 3 857. 
specific gravity of, 3 375, 
wounds of the, 3 856. 
condition of, after drowning, 23 9383-935. 


Malformation of child, 3 398. 
Malice, see ‘‘Homicide.”’ 
Malpractice, medical. 
civil law practice, 3 1248. 
common law practice, 4 1252. 
in criminal prosecutions, 3 1252. 
in actions for torts, 3 1273. 
Mania sine delirio, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Manslaughter, see ‘*Homicide.”’ 
Marsh’s process for the detection of arsenic, 72 602-605. 
Maturity of the Foetus, signs of, 3 5038. 
Meat, unsound, poisoning by, 2 689. 
Mechanical injury, death from, 3 836. 
Mechanical means for procuring abortion, 23 341, 345. 
Meconic acid, tests for, 2 702. 
Meadow saffron, poisoning by, 27 669, 670. 
Medical evidence concerning wounds, ¢ 795. 
experts, reliance to be placed on in cases of insanity, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
examiner, office of—see Jdid. 
evidence, in poisoning, necessity of combination of, 2 516. 
Medical malpractice, see ‘‘Malpractice.”’ 
Medico-legal examinations, ? 943. 
locality, 3 987. 
identity, 2 988. 
indications of violence or unnatural death, 3 989. 
manner of conducting, 3 990. 
mode of drawing reports, 3 1002. 
Melancholy, see ‘‘dfental Unsoundness.” 
Menses, cessation of, 3 418. 
suppression of the, 3 278. 
Menstrual blood, characters of, 2 828. 
function, irregularity of, 3 308. 
Menstruation in old women, 2 418. 
Mental unsoundness considered psychologically. 
Classification of Dr. Ray, @ 74. 


“s ‘¢ Flemming, ¢ 75. 
C. ‘¢ Ellinger, 2 76. 
ce ‘¢ Present treatise, 3 77. 


General theories. of mental unsoundness, 2 78. 

Psychological theory, ¢ 79. 

Somatic theory, 2 80. 

Intermediate theory, 2 81. 
Difficulties attending each of the first two, 3 82. 
Question as to moral responsibility of lunatics, 2 85. 
Views of President Edwards, 2 84. 
Of Dr. Barlow, 2 85. 


1021 


INDEX. 


’ Mental Unsoundness. 
How mental unsoundness is to be detected, 2 86. 
By whom, 2 86. 
Medical expert necessary for this purpose, 2 86. 
Great skill and experience needed in examiner, @ 87. 
Dangers of an inexperienced examiner being baffled, 3 88. 
Responsibility in law of medical examiner, 2 89. 
Importance of examiner adapting his manner to patient’s condition, 
@ 90. 
Important that legal and medical officers should, in such cases, act in 
concert, 2 92. 
Manner in which medical witness is to be examined on trial, 2 94. 
At what time, 2 95. 
Time of act, 3 95. 
At trial, 3 97. 
At and after sentence, ¢ 98. 
By what tests, ¢ 100. 
Physiognomy, ? 100. 
Relations of the different features, 3 101. 
Bodily health and temperament, 3 102. 
State of bowels, 3 102. 
Physical disorganization, 2 103. 
Insensibility to pain and cold, ¢ 104. 
Irregularities in action of senses, 2 105. 
Change in disposition, 2 106. 
Hereditary tendency, 2 107. 
Importance of this test, 3 108. 
Admissible in point of law, 2 108. 
Opinion of Gibson, C. J., 2 108. 
Conversation and deportment, 3 110. 
Necessity of great circumspection in this respect, 2 110. 
Cases illustrating this, 3 111. 
Nature of act,.¢ 112. 
Insensibility, 3 112. 
Its incongruity with antecedents, 3 113. 
Its motivelessness, 3 114. 
Its inconsequentiality, 3 115. 
From what Mental Unsoundness is to be distinguished. 
Emotions, ¢ 116. 
Remorse, ¢ 116. 
Anger, 3 118. 
Shame, ¢ 122. 
Grief, 3 124. 
Homesickness (Nostalgia), 3 125. 
2d. Simulated insanity, 2 127. 
Necessity for close examination, 3 127. 
Tests to be applied, 3 128. 
Delirium most usually counterfeited, but the most difficult, 2 129. 
Physiognomy and health to be examined, 2 130. 
Case to be compared with other recorded cases, 3 131. 
Simulation not to be inferred from absence of a trace of reese at 
the examination, 3 182. 
Causes why such signs may be suppressed, ¢ 132. 
Pretended insanity frequently turns into real, 3 133. 
How examination is to be conducted, 3 134. 
Patient to be brought into a succession of relations, 22 185-8. 
To be furnished with pen, ink, and paper, and other methods of exa- 
mination, ? 135-8. 
Insania Occulta, features of, 2 139. 
Necessity of guarding against, 3 139. 

Mental Unsoundness, as connected with Derangement of the Senses, and Disease, 3 140. 
Deaf and dumb, 2 140. 
Blind, @ 141. 

Epileptics, @ 142. 
Peculiar tendency of epilepsy to insanity, 2 142. 
Nature of epilepsy, 3 143. 
Distinction between the several classes, 3 144. 
Different stages of the disease, ¢ 145. 


INDEX, 


. Mental Unsoundness. 
Actions committed during attack, not valid, 2 146. 
Rule as to intermediate stages, 3 147. 
Tests laid down by Clarus, 2 148. 

Mental Unsoundness, as connected with Sleep, 2 149. 

General effect of sleep on the senses, 2 149. 
Somnolentia or sleep-drunkenness, 2 151. 
Sompambulism, 2 159. 

Mental Unsoundness, as affecting Temperament, 3 163. 
Depression, 3 1638. 
Hypochondria, 3 166. 
Hysteria, 2 169. 
Melancholy, 3 170. 
Mental Unsoundness, as affecting the Moral System, 2 174. 
General moral mania, 3 174. 
Effect of, 3 174. 
General symptoms, 3 175. 
Illustrations, 3 176. 
Monomania, ¢ 177. 
Doctrine of Mania sine Delirio, 3 178. 
Difference of opinion as to its existence, 3 179. 
Tests to be applied to it, 2 180. 
Tendency in this country to recognize its existence, 3 185. 
Homicidal mania, 3 186. 

Cases where Esquirol supposes it to exist, 2 180. 

Precautions necessary in its recognition, 3 190. 

aoe Dh Mes by Dr. Ray, 2 190. 

Dr. Taylor, 3 190. 

De Mayo’s objections to the entire theory, 2 191. 
Kleptomania—(morbid propensity to steal), 3 192. 
Pyromania—(morbid incendiary propensity), 2 195. 

How far recognized in England, 3 197. 

Necessary tests, 2 198. 

Aidoiomania—(morbid sexual propensity), 2 199. 
Pseudonomania—(morbid lying propensity), 3 202. 
Oikeiomania—(morbid state of domestic affections), 3 204. 
Suicidal mania—(morbid propensity to self-destruction), 2 206. 

Tendency to this in cases of melancholy, &c., 3 207. 

Legal consequences in actions against life insurers, 2 208. 
Fanatico-mania, 3 209. 

Supernatural or pseudo-supernatural demoniacal possession, 


Testimony of ancient writers to this, 3 210. 

Testimony of the New Testament, 2 211. 

Mental alienation on religious subjects, ¢ 214. 

Tendency of infidelity to insanity, 3 214. 

Conservative influence of Christianity, 3 215. 

Insane delusion the result of a departure from Christianity, 


Illustrations of this, 3 217. 
Legal bearings of religious insanity, 3 219. 
Politico-mania, 3 220. 
How far an epidemic, 3 221. 
Causes likely to generate it, 3 221. 
Mental Unsoundness, as connected with intellectual prostration, 3 222 
Idiocy, 3 222. 
Nature of, 3 222. 
Physical incidents of, 33 223-5-6. 
Cretinism, 3 228. 
Imbecility, 3 229. 
With concomitant insanity, 2 230. 
Original, 2 230. 
Supervening, 2 280. 
Specious, ¢ 230. 
With confusion of mind, 3 230. 
Without insanity, 2 231. 
Distinction between innocent and malignant imbecility, 3 232. 
Dementia, 2 254. 


« -:1023 


e~ 


INDEX. 


Mental Unsoundness accompanied with delirium, 3 235. 
General delirium, ¢ 235. 
Depressed delirium, 3 236. 
Maniacal delirium, ? 237. 
Delirium tremens, 3 238. 
Puerperal mania, 3 289. 
Partial delirium, 3 240. 
Mental Unsoundness, as connected with Delusions and Hallucinations, 2 241. 
General, 3 241. 
Marked by poner! derangement of the perceptive faculties, 3 241. 
Various phases it assumes, 3 242. 
Tests of Ellinger, 3 243. 
Effect of general delusion, 3 244. 
Partial, 3 245. 
Delusions and hallucinations, ¢ 245. 
When there is no other sign of mental unsoundness, ¢ 246. 
When mental unsoundness has made some progress, 3 247. 
In cases of drunkenness, &c., 3 248. 
In cases of developed insanity, 3 249. 
Causes of delusions, ? 250. 
Abercrombie’s classification, 8 252. 
Hallucination in regard to a change into, or a possession by, wild ani- 
mats, 3 258. 
Mental Unsoundness, as connected with Lucid Intervals, 3 254. 
Mental Unsoundness, how far affecting contracts or wills, see ‘* Contracts.” 
Mercurial preparations, poisoning by various, 3 681. 
Mercury, bi-chloride of, 23 620-629. 
chronic, poisoning by, 22 632-639, 
deleterious effects of, 34 632-639. 
effect of, on the mouth, ¢¢ 683-689, 
effects of, distinguished from disease, 32 633-639. 
Mercury, nitrate of, 3 630. 
Metallic arsenic, 2 571. 
poisoning by, 2 571. 
Metallic Irritants, 2 571. 
Metalloidal Irritants, 23 561, 570. 
Mezereon, poisoning by, ¢ 532. 
Milk, microscopic examination of, ¢ 293. 
Moisture, influence of, on putrefaction, 22 488, 489. 
Moles, description of, 23 347, 348. 
Monomania, see ‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Moral insanity, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness,” ‘* Responsibility fon Crime.” 
Morphia, poisoning by, ¢ 699. 
tests for, 3 701. 
Murder, see ‘‘ Homicide.” 
Mushrooms, deprivation of the poisonous property of, ¢ 674. 
poisoning by, 32 6738-676, 
symptoms in poisoning by, 3 675. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 2 676. 
Mussels, poisoning by, 2 688. 


Narcotico-acrid poisons, 32 745-80. 
Narcotic poisons, 24 692-744. 
Neck, wounds of the, 3 858. 
New-born child, drowning of, 3 399. 
exposure of, @ 394. 
length of skeleton of, 3 475. 
strangulation of, 3 598. 
suffocation of, ¢ 396. 
wounds, of, 3 400. 
killing of, in its legal relations, see ‘‘ Homicide.”’ 
Nicotina, detection of, in the viscera, 33 751, 752. 
poisoning by, 3 749. 
properties of, ¢ 750. 
Nitric acid, 22 580-535. 
character of, 2 530. 
chemical examination in poisoning by, @ 538. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, ¢ 582. 
stains on clothing from, 3 585 


1024 / 


a a 


INDEX. 


Nitric Acid. 

symptoms of poisoning by, ? 531. 
Nostalgia, how to be distinguished from mental unsoundness, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Nux Vomica, 3 756. 


(Enanthe crocata, 2 754. 
Opium, and its preparations, 33 692-704. 
chemical examination in poisoning by, 22 700-4. 
effects of modified by disease, 3 696. 
habit, ¢ 697. 
idiosynerasy, ¢ 696. 
effect of on longevity, 3 697. 
in organic mixtures, detection of, 23 703-4. 
poisoning by, distinguished from apoplexy, ? 512. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 2 698. 
smallest quantity fatal, 3 695. 
symptoms in poisoning by, 22 692, 6938. 
Organs internal, description of their natural aspect, 3 953. 
Orpiment, 2 615. 
Ossification of the skull, defective, 3 391. 
. process of, ¢ 475. 
Oxalic acid, character of, 2 540. 
chemical examination in poisoning by, @ 546. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 3 544. 
smallest quantity fatal de os se 9 648 
Oxalic acid, symptoms of, in poisoning by, @ 541. 
Oysters, poisonous, ¢ 687, 


Parkman, Dr. identification of body of, 3 477. 
see full report of trial for killing of, 22 993-1068. 
Partial insanity, how far affecting civil capacity, see ‘‘ Contracts.” 
see ‘* Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Peach kernels, poisoning by, 3 725. 
Penis, malformation of, 3 422. 
Peritonitis, asa result of poisoning, 3 511. 
Perforation of the stomach in poisoning by, @ 508. 
Phosphorus, chemical examination in poisoning by, 3 564. 
poisoning by, ¢2 561-5. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 2 563. 
smallest quantity fatal, ¢ 562. 
symptoms of poisoning by, 3 552. 
Platinum, bichloride of, 3 664. 
Plocquet’s test, ¢ 377. 
Pneumonia distinguished from atelectasis, 3 366. 
Poisoning, chemical examination in cases of, 3 508. 
homicide by, see ‘* Homicide.” 
differential diagnosis of, 32 505-17. 
evidence of, 72 498-504 . 
gastritis, as a result of, 3 511. 
irritant, mistaken for cholera, 32 500, 506. 
for cholera morbus, ¢ 507, 
mode of action of, 2 494. 
narcotic symptoms of, 3 512. 
perforation of the stomach in, 2 508. 
post-mortem appearances in, ? 501. 
results of compared with those of disease, 33 514-17. 
symptoms of, 2 499. 
the new-born child, 3 404. 
use of the microscope in cases of, 22 501, 502. 
legal relations of, see ‘‘ Homicide.” 
Poison, definition of, the word, 2 493. 
Poisonous gases, 72 782-91. 
Poisons, action of modified by disease, 2 497. 
habit, 3 496. 
idiosynerasy, 3 495. 
classification of, 2 518. 
narcotic, 22 692-744. 
irritant, 32 519-690. 
Politico-mania, see ‘*‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 


65 1025 


INDEX. 


Post-mortem examination, see ‘* Homicide.” 


Locality, 3 987. 
Identity, 3 988. 
Indications of violence or unnatural death, 2 989. 
Manner of conducting autopsy, 3 990. 
Natural aspects of the organs at different ages, 3 992. 
Mode of drawing reports, 2 1002. 
Potash, bichromate of, poisoning by, ¢ 668. 
binoxalate of, 3 543. Sorrel, salt of, 3 548. 
nitrate of, poisoning by, @ 501. 
poisoning by, ¢¢ 551-2. 
Potassium, cyanide of, 3 727. 
Precocious development, 32 417, 424. 
Pregnancy, duration of, 3 802-22. 
presumption to be drawn from, in infanticide, see ‘* Homicide.” 
signs of, 32 277-91. 
wounds in, ¢ 838. 
Premature labor, induction of, 24 342, 344. 
Presumptions, see ‘‘ Homicide.” 
Priority of death, see ‘‘ Survivorship.” 
Prussic acid, 33 705-21. 
chemical examination for, 2 716-20. 
detection of, after death, 24 720. 
odor of, after death, 3 712. 
period of death in poisoning by, 33 707, 708. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 2 711. 
properties of, 2 705. 
question as to source of, 32 718, 714. 
recovery from large doses of, 3 710. 
smallest quantity fatal, 3 709. 
symptoms in poisoning by, 2 706. 
tests for, 72 716-20. 
Pseudonomania, see ‘* Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Psychological view of insanity, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Psychical Indications :— 
Prior to crime. 
Preparations, 3 1276. 
Intimations, 3 1278. 
Overacting, 3 1284. 
At Crime. 
Incoherence, 3 1285. 
Self-overreaching, 3 1286. 
After Crime. 
Convulsive confession, ¢ 1291. 
Nervous tremor, 3 1807. 
Morbid propensity to recur to scene and topic of guilt, 2 1314. 
Permanent mental wretchedness, 7 1818. 
Animosity between confederates, 3 1822. 
Puerperal mania, see ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Purgatives, drastic, poisoning by, 3 671. 
for procuring abortion, 3 839. 
Puirefaction an objection to hydrostatic test, 3 371. 
as affected by arsenic, 33 587-91. 
by cold, 3 486. 
by heat, 3 485. 
by moisture, 3 489. 
by water, 2 488. 
as affecting evidence of strangulation, 3 906. 
as influenced by temperature, 37 485, 486. 
Dr. Waller Lewis’ observations on, 2 490. 
in the foetus, 3 491. 
influence of lime upon, 2 492. 
Orfila’s observations on, 2 489. 
phenomena observed before, 3 797. 
Pyromania, see ‘* Mental Unsoundness.” 


Quickening, 2 282. 
period of, 3 282. 
value of as a sign of pregnancy, 33 282-4. 
legal relations of, see ‘* Homicide.” 


1026 


INDEX. 


Quinia, poisonous effects of, 3 780. 


Rape, ¢3 426-72. 
medical evidence in case of, 3 426. 
on adult females, possibility of, ¢ 438. 
on adults in an unconscious state, 23 439, 440. 
on old women, 3 442. 
on persons asleep, 3 440. 
on persons under the influence of ether or chloroform, ¢ 443. 
upon children, 23 427-37. 
frequency of, 3 482. 
marks of violence in, 3 482. 
transmission of gonorrhoea, Xc., in 23 432, 433 
upon persons ignorant of the nature of the act, 2 444. 
Legal relations of, 3 457. 
ist. Submission of prosecutrix, 3 458. 
(1) from artificial stupefaction, 3 458. 
(2) from ignorance of the nature of the act, 3 460. 
(3) from mistake of person, ¢ 464. 
(4) from fear, 3 465. 
2d. Prior want of character of prosecutrix, 3 466. 
3d. Subsequent suppression of the fact by prosecutrix, 2 468. 
4th. Extent to which coition was carried, 3 469. 
5th. Want of age of defendant, 3 472. 
6th. Want of sexual capacity of defendant, 37 419-25. 
Rapid delivery, 3 402. 
Realgar, 3 615. 
Reckoning, modes of, 23 304-9. 
Reduction test for arsenic, 37 590-6. 
Reid, Dr., on duration of pregnancy, 2 311. 
Reinsch’s process for the detection of arsenic, 3 606. 
Religious insanity, see ‘*‘ Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Remorse, how to be distinguished from ‘‘ Mental Unsoundness.” 
Reports, medico-legal, how to be drawn up, 2 968. 
Respiration, causes of imperfect, 3 367. 
signs of imperfect, 3 364. 
Responsibility for crime—how far avoided by Mental Unsoundness, 2 45. 
The difficulties in this respect have arisen from mistaking dicta given in particular 
cases for general and absolute rules. 
Til consequences arising from looseness of citation, 3 45, n. 
The true doctrine is, that medical science is a part of the common law of the land, 
and is to be treated as such, ¢ 45, n. 

Cases where the defendant is incapable of distinguishing right from wrong 
in reference to the particular act, 46. 

Under this head fall cases of idiocy and amentia, 3 46. 

Cases where the defendant is acting under an insane delusion as to circum- 
stances, which, if true, would relieve the act from responsibility, or where 
his reasoning powers are so depraved as to make the commission of the 
particular act the natural consequence of the delusion. 

An act committed under a bona fide belief of its necessity in self-defence, 
will be regarded as if there really was such necessity, 3 47. 

And the gauge here is the defendants capacity, 3 47. 

An honest insane delusion is to be viewed in the same light, 3 48. 

But the delusion must have been the cause of the crime in order to excuse it, 
and not collateral, 3 49. 

Cases where the defendant is impelled by a morbid and uncontrollable impulse 

to commit the particular act, 2 53. 
The doctrine of homicidal mania has been recognized by the courts of this 
country, @ 59. 

Chief Justice Shaw, 3 53. 

Chief Justice Gibson, 3 54. 

Chief Justice Lewis, 2 55. 

Chief Justice Hornblower, contra, § 57. 


The right and wrong test is impracticable as an absolute rule, 22 60, 61. 
Rue, 2 338. 


Salt of sorrel, 2 548. 
Sausages, poisoning by, 32 681-685. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 3 684. 


1027 


INDEX, 


Sausages, symptoms in poisoning by, ¢ 682. 
Savin, 3 337. 
detection of, after death, 3 769. 
poisoning by, 22 767-769. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 3 768. 
Scars, disappearance of, 3 482. 
identification from, 3 482. 
Scheele’s green, 34 618, 619. 
Semen, emissions of, in hanging, 3 914. 
Sex, doubtful, 22 406-414. 
identification of, 3 478. 
Sexual disability, 32 415-425. . 
organs, absence of, ¢ 412. 
Shame, how to be distinguished from mental unsoundness, see “‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Shellfish, poisonous, 22 687, 688. 
Shock, death from, 3 835. 
Silver, nitrate of, poisoning by, ? 664. 
Simpson, Dr., on duration of pregnancy, 27 309, 311. 
Simulated insanity, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Skeleton, female, peculiarities of, 3 478. 
identification by the, 23 475, 477. 
Skin, condition of, after drowning, ? 981. 
Skull, fractures of the, 3 848. 
during birth, 2 389. 
in delivery, 2 392. 
Sleep-drunkenness, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Soap-lees, poisoning by, ¢ 551. 
Soda, poisoning by, 3 551. 
Solanum, 3 744. 
Somnambulism, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Somnolentia, see ‘‘Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Souffle, umbilical, 3 290. 
uterine, 3 290. 
Spine, dislocation of the, 3 854. 
wounds and injuries of the, 3 854. 
Spontaneous combustion, 32 874-879. 
cases of, 3 875. 
conclusions respecting, 32 878, 879. 
Stains on clothing, from nitric acid, 3 535. 
from sulphuric acid, 3 528. 
Starvation, death from, 23 889-892. 
post-mortem appearances in death from, @ 891. 
Stas, Prof., his process for the detection of nicotina, 3 752. 
detection of opium, 3 704, 
Static tests, conclusions, 3 378. 
of live birth, 33 876, 877. 
Sterility, 22 415-418. 
relative causes of, 3 416. 
Stillborn children, appearance of, ¢ 357. 
Stomach, aspect of, in health, 3 514. 
condition after drowning, ¢7 935-6. 
cadaveric changes in, 3 514. 
lesions of, found in poisoning, 3 514. 
Strangulation, death by, 33 899-906. 
cause of death in, 3 899. 
marks of violence upon the neck in, 2 900. 
before or after death, 2 901. 
evidence of design in death by, 3 902. 
suicidal, 32 903-4. 
Strangulation, homicidal, 3 905. 
putrefaction affecting the evidence of, 3 906. 
case of Drory, ? 905, note (v). 
of new-born child, 23 383-398. 
Strychnia, poisoning by, 22 756-760. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, ¢ 759. 
recovery from large doses, 3 758. 
smallest quantity fatal, 3 758. 
symptoms in poisoning by, @ 757. 
tests for, 2 760. 


INDEX. 


Sudden death as presumptive of poisoning, 2 613. 
Suffocation, accidental, 32 895, 898. 
death from, 33 898-898. 
homicidal, 2 897. 
of new-born child, 3 396. 
post-mortem appearances in death by, 2 894. 
suicidal, ¢ 896. 
trial for murder by, 2 897, note (0). 
and rape, 3 898. 
Suicidal mania, see ‘Mental Unsoundness.”’ 
Suicidal and homicidal eee distinguished, 33 915-926. 
Suicide, see ‘‘Homicide.” © 
Sulphurets of arsenic, 3 615. — 
Sulphuretted hydrogen gas, accidents from, 3 789. 
appearances after death by, 2 790. 
Sulphuric acid, 32 519-529. 
characters of, 3 519. 
chemical examination in poisoning by, ¢ 526. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 2 522. 
smallest quantity fatal, 3 521. 
symptoms of poisoning by, 2 520. 
aromatic, 3 528. 
Sunstroke, death from, 23 889, 881. 
post-mortem appearances in death from, 2 882. 
Superfoetation, 32 328-885. 
apparent, 232 331-335. 
definition of, 3 328. 
in animals, ¢ 329. 
Supernatural possession, see ‘Mental Unsoundness.” 
Surgical interference, refusal of, 3 846. 
Surgical operations, as influencing fatality of wounds, 77 844-845. 
Survivorship, presumptions as to, 3 1225. 
from sex, 3 1225. 
from age, 3 1227. 
from size, &c., 2 1228. 
from health, 3 1229. 
from mode of death, 3 1230. 
tests concerning, 3 1247. 
Sympathetic phenomena of pregnancy, 33 284-286. 


Tansy oil, 3 337. 
poisoning by, 2 771. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, @ 772. 

Tartar emetic, 42 653-697. 

in organic mixtures, detection of, 3 656. 

post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, @ 604. 

smallest quantity fatal, 3 653. 

symptoms of poisoning by, 2 653 

tests for, 3 655. 
Tartaric acid, 3 548. 

fatal results from, 2 548. 
Tartrate of antimony and potassa, 37 653-657. 
Tattoo-marks, disappearance of, 3 482 
Taxus baccata, poisoning by, 770. 
Teeth, identification by the, 34 477-12238-5. 
Temperature, influence of, on putrefaction, 77 485, 486. 
Testamentary capacity, see ‘* Contract or Will.” 
Testes, congenital absence of, 3 419. 

diseases of the, 3 421. 
Tests of live-birth, 32 869-378. 
Tetanus, distinguished from effects of poisons, 3 512. 

in wounds, ¢ 840. 
Tin, chloride of, 2 663. 
Tobacco, Indian, poisonous properties of, 3 765. 
poisonous effects of, 2 747. 
post-mortem appearances in poisoning by, 2 748. 

Tschudi, Dr., account of the arsenic eaters, 3 496. 


1029 


INDEX. 


Umbilical cord, compression of and by, 2 308. 
dessication of, ¢ 360. 
evidence from, 32 359, 360. 
hemorrhage from the, 3 3886. 
mark left by the, 3 380. 
strangulation by, 3 880. 
usual length of, 3 388. 
Unconscious delivery, ¢ 402. 
Urine, kiestein in the, 2 291. 
Uterine respiration, 3 367. 
souffle, 3 290. 
Uterus, absence of, 3 416. 
double, ¢ 3388. 


Vagina, absence of, 2 416. 
Vaginal respiration, 3 367. 
Vagitus uterinus, 3 367. 
Venesection, as an abortive, 3 540. 
Vertebrae, fracture of the, 3 854. 
Viability, early, 22 823-28. 
See ‘* Homicide.” 
Vibices, description of, 2 806. 
Vinegar, poisoning by, 2 550. 
Violence, marks of, in bodies found drowned, 3 938. 
Vitriol, elixir of, 3 528. 
Vulva, gangrenous inflammation of, 3 427. 


Water, as affecting putrefaction, 3 488. 
Webster case reported, 32 993-1068. 
Wilde’s cases of alleged felonious assaults, 7 456. 
Wills, how far affected by mental unsoundness, see ‘‘ Contracts.” 
Womb, changes in the mouth and neck of, 3 281. 
Wound, direction of the, 3 817. 
situation of the, 3 816. 
Wounds, accidental or spontaneous, 3 810. 
before and after death, distinction of, 22 798, 799. 
cause of death in, 32 833-46. 
circumstantial evidence in, 32 818-19. 
classification of, 33 807-10. 

danger of, 3 794. 
death from a multiplicity of, 4 836. 
definition of the term, 3 792. 

See ‘* Homicide.” 
evidence of design, 33 816-19. 
fatal after surgical operations, 3 844. 
after long periods, 2 839. 
from a diseased condition of the body, ¢ 887. 
from erysipelas, 3 841. 
from hospital gangrene, ? 842. 
from secondary causes, 73 839-46. 
from tetanus, 3 840. 
fatality of hemorrhage in, 3 834. 
from wadding and gunpowder, 2 815. 
general considerations, 32 792-806. 
grounds of classification of, 3 798. 
gunshot, 24 811-15. 
incised and punctured, 33 807, 808. 
indirectly fatal, 22 839-46. 
lacerated and contused, ¢ 809. 
made by small shot, 2 813. 

- medical evidence concerning, 2 795. 
mortality of, as influenced by age and disease, 3 834. 
purposely made upon the dead body, ¢ 808. 
suicidal, 3 816. 
of the abdomen, 23 860-5. 

bladder, 3 8638. 
brain, 22 849, 850. 
chest, 33 855-59. 


1030 


INDEX. 


Wounds, of the diaphragm, 3 862. 
face, 3 852. 
genital organs, 2 865. 
heart, 32 857, 858. 
fatality of, 2 857. 
long survivance in, 3 857 (note). 
suddenness of death in, 2 858. 
liver, 3 861. 
lungs, ¢ 856. 
neck, ¢ 853. 
spine, 3 854. 
of various parts of the body, 23 847-65. 
on pregnant women, 2 838. 
on the new-born child, 3 400. 
upon the burned, ¢2 870, 871. 


Yew, 3 770. 


Zine, chloride of, poisoning by, 2 662. 
in organic mixtures, detection of, 3 661. 
oxide of, poisoning by, ¢ 659. 
sulphate of, poisoning by, 2 660. 
tests for, 3 661. 


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